Only 131GB on 250GB HDD?

C

computerbuild

New Member
Iam intalling XP on my computer and it only shows 131GB. I read somewhere that its an XP issue. does anyone know how I can get it to show all 250GB? Thanks
 
Actually, it could be a jumper issue. Make sure your HDD has the jumper set as Master, not Capacity Limitation setting.
 
codeman0013 said:
Are you running XP pro sp2? sp1 will only recognize 131...
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SP1 can recognize 48-bit LBA drives perfectly fine, its just a base install of normal XP with no service packs that can't.... For reference (SEE HERE)

And no, it isn't a jumper setting as others have suggested, especially on a SATA drive, lol... It is 100% the lack of 48-bit LBA support in the version of windows you are using.

dragon
 
the problem is, as stated perviously, is the 32bit LBA mode running which has a limit of 128/137 gigs (depending on how you count gigs) limit on it. 48bit addressing allows to you get over that barrier. This is a hardware limitation, windows 2000 and above is able to address over 137gigs of volume space, so it is most likely not the OS. Unless you are running like win95.

The problem is with the hardware, you must have something weird set in your BIOS or you are running on an older mobo with IDE drives (like stated beforehand).
 
tlarkin said:
the problem is, as stated perviously, is the 32bit LBA mode running which has a limit of 128/137 gigs (depending on how you count gigs) limit on it. 48bit addressing allows to you get over that barrier. This is a hardware limitation, windows 2000 and above is able to address over 137gigs of volume space, so it is most likely not the OS. Unless you are running like win95.

The problem is with the hardware, you must have something weird set in your BIOS or you are running on an older mobo with IDE drives (like stated beforehand).
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You don't know what you're talking about, honestly... 48-bit LBA may well be present in Win2000, but thats irrelevant to this question, it most certainly is not present in a base install of XP (both home and pro), 48-bit LBA mode is only available to the OS in SP1 or higher... It is NOT hardware related, although some of the eralier BIOS's did require you to enable 48-bit LBa, now-a-days it's enabled by default or it simply doesnt exist as an option and is enabled the entire time.

And as a second time of posting this link, it is an official microsoft Knowledge Base link, it is a known occurance, it is software related, NOT hardware, and can only be fixed by installing a later copy of Windows XP, or slipstreaming SP2 into the base XP install.

--- [READ] --- MICROSOFT KNOWLEDGE BASE LINK TO 48-BIT LBA ARTICLE --- [READ] ---​
 
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dragon2309 said:
You don't know what you're talking about, honestly... 48-bit LBA may well be present in Win2000, but thats irrelevant to this question, it most certainly is not present in a base install of XP (both home and pro), 48-bit LBA mode is only available to the OS in SP1 or higher... It is NOT hardware related, although some of the eralier BIOS's did require you to enable 48-bit LBa, now-a-days it's enabled by default or it simply doesnt exist as an option and is enabled the entire time.

And as a second time of posting this link, it is an official microsoft Knowledge Base link, it is a known occurance, it is software related, NOT hardware, and can only be fixed by installing a later copy of Windows XP, or slipstreaming SP2 into the base XP install.

--- [READ] --- MICROSOFT KNOWLEDGE BASE LINK TO 48-BIT LBA ARTICLE --- [READ] ---​
Click to expand...

Actually it is a hardware limitation. Unless they are running an old release version of XP (which would mean they bought it in 2001) which is probably unlikely. The original problem is NO HARDWARE SUPPORTED 48BIT LBA DISK MODES UNTIL ATA6 CAME OUT! I have read about that problem, but the weird thing is my original 2001 retail copy of Windows XP Professional, which I obtained at the MS Roadshow for free, recognizes my 200gig HD in the installer and installed the OS on it. So, I am curious to how that is the case. I have only owned one copy of Windows XP Pro, and its the original release from the roadshow and it can address HDs larger than 137gig. In fact, I added an additional 160gig drive to it before SP1 ever came out and it worked fine for me. I have never ran into that problem before.

ATA-6 introduced 48 bit addressing, increasing the limit to 128 PiB (or 144 petabytes). Some OS environments, including Windows 2000 until Service Pack 3, did not enable 48-bit LBA by default, so the user was required to take extra steps to get full capacity on a 160 GB drive.
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and

All these size limitations come about because some part of the system is unable to deal with block addresses above some limit. This problem may manifest itself by the system recognizing no more of a drive than that limiting value, or by the system refusing to boot and hanging on the BIOS screen at the point when drives are initialized. In some cases, a BIOS upgrade for the motherboard will resolve the problem. This problem is also found in older external FireWire disk enclosures, which limit the usable size of a disk to 128 GB. By early 2005 most enclosures available have practically no limit. (Earlier versions of the popular Oxford 911 FireWire chipset had this problem. Later Oxford 911 versions and all Oxford 922 chips resolve the problem.)
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reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Technology_Attachment
 
but the weird thing is my original 2001 retail copy of Windows XP Professional, which I obtained at the MS Roadshow for free, recognizes my 200gig HD in the installer and installed the OS on it
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That's odd because inital RTM XP discs did not support 48bit LBA by default. As dragon posted, it wasn't until SP1 came out that support was enabled by default. You could enable it yourself after installing but it had the chance of corrupting data. It's possible that your XP disc was modified to enbale 48bit LBA
 
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