Hard Drive Showing Wrong Size

Updating windows wont help if the drive is already formatted. Try opening disk management and partition the rest of the space if it's there. If you don't have any unallocated space then your BIOS doesn't support 48 bit LBA.

To get to disk management, right click on my computer pick manage then expand the storage tree and click on disk management. You should see your drives listed on the right side.
 
I have a 160GB hard-drive. When I had XP it would only show 127GB. You've probably got Home Edition which is why it's limited to that amount.
 
I have a 160GB hard-drive. When I had XP it would only show 127GB. You've probably got Home Edition which is why it's limited to that amount.

Thats wrong, when I had home on my pc installed on the 250GB, XP seen the full hard drive size ( the size was about 246gb ) witch is normal. I would say you have a hidden partition on your hard drive, You should get more space then that with XP home.
 
Thats wrong, when I had home on my pc installed on the 250GB, XP seen the full hard drive size ( the size was about 246gb ) witch is normal. I would say you have a hidden partition on your hard drive, You should get more space then that with XP home.

I didn't have a hidden partition. When I installed Vista Home Premium 64bit it showed the full 160GB. On XP Home 32bit it only showed 127GB.
 
I have a 160GB hard-drive. When I had XP it would only show 127GB. You've probably got Home Edition which is why it's limited to that amount.
It's not a limitation of XP Home. It's a limitation of the motherboard and it's chipsets.
 
Cromewell - I did what you said. I can now see 240+ GB unallocated. How do I get it to be usable?

That means you installed XP using a disk prior to SP1. You can slipstream SP2 or SP3 into a new XP install disk using a program called "autostreamer". It's fairly easy but you would need a burning program, like nero or roxio to burn the iso image to a cd when its done.

If you want to have access to the balance of the drive you would need to partition it into 2 more drives, since you have a limit of 127 gb right now. Just right click on unallocated space and click on format. But i would do the slipstreaming procedure and start over and then you would have full access to the drive the first time and would not have the 127 gb limitation.
 
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If you want to have access to the balance of the drive you would need to partition it into 2 more drives, since you have a limit of 127 gb right now. Just right click on unallocated space and click on format. But i would do the slipstreaming procedure and start over and then you would have full access to the drive the first time and would not have the 127 gb limitation.
He is now running XP SP3, so i'd imagine if he formatted the remainder of the drive into one single partition he could make it 250Gb + (or however much is left over), seeing as SP3 is installed, 48-bit LBA is most likely now enabled
 
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