750 GB hard drive showing up as 128 GB

[Cire353]

So I my build went fine, but the only problem I'm having is my 750 gig hard drive is only showing up as 128 Gigs. form what I've read, I think what caused it was my copy of XP pro not having service pack 1 when I installed it. From the research I've done, repartitioning it should give me the proper size will that work? And if it will can you recommend a program to do that with, so I wont have to remove Windows and everything else.

 

[fmw]

Yes, the drive is partitioned in a way that doesn't work for you. Repartitioning it will resolve the problem.

 

[Geoff]

Have you upgraded to SP2/SP3 yet? If so, check out the disk management utility under Control panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management. Perhaps if the rest is listed as unallocated, you can simply expand the current partition.

 

[Cire353]

Yeah I've upgraded to service pack 2, Ill try that though.

EDIT: Looks like that's it, says theres 570 gigs unallocated. Should do a primary or Extended partition? I'm a little confused by the description.

 

[fmw]

My advice would be to partition from scratch. Put a single partition on the drive and then load your operating system.

 

[johnb35]

My advice would be to partition from scratch. Put a single partition on the drive and then load your operating system.

Why would you want one big partition? You should have at least 2 partitions. One for OS and programs and the other strictly for Data. That way if you ever have to reinstall windows your data is safe on the second partition and you won't have to worry about backing it up.

 

[douche]

Right, Windows should NOT be installed on partition greater than 40 gigs, because it will fragment quickly and then get VERY slow....

 

[Geoff]

Yeah I've upgraded to service pack 2, Ill try that though.

EDIT: Looks like that's it, says theres 570 gigs unallocated. Should do a primary or Extended partition? I'm a little confused by the description.

I'm not on a Windows computer right now so I'm doing this by memory, if you right click on the current, active partition there should be an option to expand the current size of the partition.

My advice would be to partition from scratch. Put a single partition on the drive and then load your operating system.

Why reinstall the OS if you don't need to?

Why would you want one big partition? You should have at least 2 partitions. One for OS and programs and the other strictly for Data. That way if you ever have to reinstall windows your data is safe on the second partition and you won't have to worry about backing it up.

Personal opinion really, while it's good for data security if by the off chance your OS becomes corrupt, your documents and media will still be there, when you do that you may run out of free space more easily however since you could have say 60GB free on the OS/App drive but be out of free space on your documents partition.

Right, Windows should NOT be installed on partition greater than 40 gigs, because it will fragment quickly and then get VERY slow....

You're exaggerating, even a severely fragmented hard drive won't make THAT much of a difference, besides, 40GB for an OS install is extremely small by today's standards.

 

[Cire353]

Nope, thats not a option. When I right click the unallocated, and click "New Partition" I get the option for a Primary or extended partition. Would extended be it?