Have i been conned?!

tobias123 · 10 Aug 2006 at 10:52

Just bought a 160gb external HDD and it's showing that it's capacity is 127gb. Is that right? I know HDD aren't exact but over 30gb sounds like a mass miscalculation to me.
File System is NTFS

Rab · 10 Aug 2006 at 10:55

do u have SP2 installed, was a prob with Xp @ begining with reconizing large drives, sp2 sorted that

Elric · 10 Aug 2006 at 11:20

SP1 sorted that problem out, not SP2.

If you're trying to do a clean install and use it as one big disk over 123GB you'll either need a XP CD that has Service Pack 1 stipstreamed into it OR use something like Partition Magic to expand into the free space, after Sp1/SP2 has been installed.

tobias123 · 10 Aug 2006 at 11:25

yep have service pack 2 installed. Any other ideas?

rpstewart · 10 Aug 2006 at 11:27

Have you checked through the Disk Management tool to ensure that the disk has been partitioned to use its full capacity?

tobias123 · 10 Aug 2006 at 11:45

how do i do that? ALso it says it is taking up 3gb of space and there is nothing on it. Have checked hidden files too. Very bizarre...

rpstewart · 10 Aug 2006 at 11:49

Right click on My Computer and pick Manage, then select the Disk Management plugin in the Computer Management app.

Where are you seeing the 3Gb used? Right click and properties of the drive? It could well be system restore info in the System Volume Information folder.

Is this a second hand drive?

Elric · 10 Aug 2006 at 11:56

tobias123 said:
yep have service pack 2 installed. Any other ideas?

Was SP2 installed after the PC installation?

tobias123 · 10 Aug 2006 at 21:00

i've just run a program from the seagate website that sets up my hard drive for me. The drive still shows up as 127gb. Any other ideas guys?

tobias123 · 10 Aug 2006 at 21:01

sp2 installed on my pc too....

maranello168 · 11 Aug 2006 at 03:25

does that 160gb drive u have contain 70gigs of porn on it? if so, then it's known that this drive has problems

Messiah Khan · 11 Aug 2006 at 10:45

maranello168 said:
does that 160gb drive u have contain 70gigs of porn on it? if so, then it's known that this drive has problems

lol.

Go to Start>Control panel(In classic mode)>Administrative tools>Computer Management>Disk management. Right click on the drive and partition and format the remaining space.

If that doesn't work, check the back of the drive or your motherboard manual for jumper to limit the drivesize.