Hard drive questions.

mjc0961mjc0961
edited October 2006 in Tech
Okay, so I put a drive that says it has 15 GB of space on it... And it only shows 1.99 GB of space on the PC. I've already formatted it, so what the hell? It's a FAT format, if it matters (which I think it does, because the one I took out was FAT32, but for the life of me I cannot find the program that converts drives... I know it had one somewhere, because I tried it once but couldn't convert anything).

Any help is greatly appreciated, because the 1.99 GB it's giving me now isn't enough for all my files.

Comments

  • brucebruce
    edited October 2006
    Is the drive partitioned in any way?
  • mjc0961mjc0961
    edited October 2006
    Not that Windows shows me. I have the original hard drive with all the Windows files, the recovery partition off of that drive, and then the drive in question which is mysteriously missing 13 GB of its space.
  • brucebruce
    edited October 2006
    It might be that there is an unformatted partition that window doesn't see. Do you have any kind of diagnostic boot disks?
  • kirbykirby
    edited October 2006
    First try a low level reformat (in dos). if that doesnt work download a partition editor and check if there is any unused/unformatted space on the drive (you might also be able to do this with an xp install disk.)

    This was a friends answer not mine.
  • brucebruce
    edited October 2006
    I think he wants a solution that won't erase all his data.
  • mjc0961mjc0961
    edited October 2006
    There is no data on this drive yet. I don't have any boot disks, and I don't have any idea how to create or edit a partition. But somehow, it's a FAT32 drive now. Hell if I know how that happened.

    kirby, does your friend know a good partition editor? I tried some from google but they both failed to open.
  • X'o'LoreX'o'Lore
    edited October 2006
    It should be FAT32. FAT has size limitations (prabably around 2GB...). Don't do FAT. NTFS would be best, but FAT32 would do.
  • mjc0961mjc0961
    edited October 2006
    That would explain why I started out at 1.99 GB, but that doesn't tell me how to change it. I formatted it again after it said it was a FAT32 but it still comes up 1.99 GB.

    Okay, I found out how I can choose what format I want by going to My Computer, but it still limits my size to 1.99 GB:
    http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v611/mjc0961/Image1.gif

    That's the only size under that drop down menu. WTF?
  • SerephelSerephel
    edited October 2006
    I would recommend yelling at your hard drive until it works.
  • mariomario
    edited October 2006
    Hard drives sometimes can have their jumpers set to limit total file size. I would go online and look up your drive model, and look for the proper jumper settings (most likely your drive needs to be set to either "Slave" or "Cable Select", but it depends on the jumper settings of your other drive as well). Shut down the computer, reseat the jumper in the proper location, then try to format the drive again. If this doesn't work, try putting the drive in another computer and see if the issue persists. There may be a problem with your drive cables or ATA controller, or any number of other things.
  • deku12345deku12345
    edited October 2006
    If you boot from the windows xp cd, can't you create/delete partitions in there? I'd try doing that. Just be sure to not install windows on it in the process.
  • mjc0961mjc0961
    edited October 2006
    Serephel wrote: »
    I would recommend yelling at your hard drive until it works.

    If that worked, all the yelling I've already done would have fixed it by now. But thanks anyway.
    mario wrote: »
    Hard drives sometimes can have their jumpers set to limit total file size. I would go online and look up your drive model, and look for the proper jumper settings (most likely your drive needs to be set to either "Slave" or "Cable Select", but it depends on the jumper settings of your other drive as well). Shut down the computer, reseat the jumper in the proper location, then try to format the drive again. If this doesn't work, try putting the drive in another computer and see if the issue persists. There may be a problem with your drive cables or ATA controller, or any number of other things.

    I have it on slave, but I'll try switching it and let you know what happens.
    deku12345 wrote: »
    If you boot from the windows xp cd, can't you create/delete partitions in there? I'd try doing that. Just be sure to not install windows on it in the process.

    I don't have a Windows XP CD... Just the recovery discs.

    Okay, I was trying mario's thing and now it won't recognize either drive when this one is connected. So I'm going to stop screwing around before I end up ruining my good hard drive. Thanks for all the advice guys. Can anyone recommend a good place to buy a new one? I'm not looking for something with huge space; anywhere around 20 GB or so should be fine.
  • deku12345deku12345
    edited October 2006
    www.newegg.com if you live in the US.
  • mjc0961mjc0961
    edited October 2006
    I do. Thanks.
  • mariomario
    edited October 2006
    If you're gonna spend the time and money getting a new hard drive, get a nice big one. Most companies don't make 3.5" drives less than 60 GB nowadays (I went through hell trying to find a 40 GB drive at Fry's a year ago), since the costs get so low that it isn't worth it for the companies to fiddle with small capacities. You can find great deals if you look hard enough.

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