computer geeks help me.

I have a 160gb Western Digital hard drive , but the computer says its only 137 gb??? It came with an IDE controller card or whatever its called, but someone told me I wouldn't need it?

Any help is appreciated!

[Leifless]

yeah, i was wondering about that too. my hd's #'s dont match up either.

[snow_homie]

don't worry about it.. manufacturers count kb's as 1000 bytes, when they actually aren't.. so they are always sold as higher capacity then what they really are

Originally posted by snow_homie
don't worry about it.. manufacturers count kb's as 1000 bytes, when they actually aren't.. so they are always sold as higher capacity then what they really are

Nah. Its 160 gb's. It is displayed as 137 gb. It also says some computers may not support over 137gb thats why there is a controller card included. But clay told me I wouldn't need a controller card.... So I'm a bit confused. I dont really wanna install this card and not know what im doing and mess up the new computer.

[Leifless]

bastards...

[snow_homie]

I remember when Norton File Manager (THE best file manager EVER) would only display up to 2 gigs, so even if you had 40, it would say that you had 2 (it didn't stop you from filling all of it, and if you right click-properties'd the : it would dislpay the right amount)

[switch]

You're only getting 128GB. Your system's BIOS probably doesn't support 48 bit LBA, so you need to use the supplied IDE card (which has a BIOS that the support).

Or your operating system might not support the large driver. If you use XP, you'll need SP1.

[snow_homie]

grrr

[Tire<d>]

Originally posted by snow_homie
grrr

OMG maybe you don't know everything.

Just save yourself the hassle and use the controller card. If your board is even somewhat old it probably doesn't support the speed of your hard drive in which case you'll want to use the controller card for maximum throughput.

[spongebob]

yeh just put the ide card in and it should work, u'll probly get about 159 gigs or something then, its never exact

[ReCkLeSs RiDeR]

just round it up, it's there

[Req]

What about partitioning it into two drives then setting it up as a spanned volume?

[seand]

its most likely NOT your bios. most modern bios's can handle the 48bit LBA to access drives over 120gig.

the usual culprit with this is in the OS.

here ya go...

Q: Why doesn't my >120GB hard drive (160GB, 200GB, 250GB, etc.) only show as ~120GB?

A: You will need Windows XP SP1 or higher to fix this. Many hard drive manufacturers also have utilities to help fix this problem. Alternatively, you can add a PCI ATA133 card to access the full drive. The simplest solution is to split the hard drive into partitions smaller than 120GB. (Which is a smart idea, anyway.)


hope that helps!

ps-
on one of my file servers at home, i have a couple 250giggers in there. i was testing out win2000 (with all service packs) and xp in the same fashion. neither could access over the 120-ish mark. then win2003 was tossed on, and now im limited to about 230gigs; which is fine by me for now.


good luck!

[snow_homie]

but I'm right dammit

what I said is accurate.. it just doesn't make up for the entire loss of space


edit: if it can't identify devices over 120 gig or whatever, and the drive was over 120 gig, wouldn't you get an ide error and not be able to read from the card at all?

[seand]

its lost space if the machine/card/etc cant read over a given space. there are no errors...as far as the seeking device knows, 120gigs is all that is there.