Hard Disc size?

[MickJ]

A friend has just had a new hard drive fitted by a computer repair shop after the old drive died.

 

The drive was supposed to be 120GB but we cannot find any information to confirm this in Device Manager where right clicking on the drive and choosing properties usually brings up the volume of the disc.

 

The drive is partitioned into:

 

C: 7.98GB

D: 17GB

E: 17GB

F: 17GB

G: 17GB

 

Total 75.98GB

 

A hell of a lot less than the 120GB drive that was claimed to be fitted. Even allowing for losses for formatting and partitioning.

 

The system is running WIN ME with FAT32 file system.

 

Will try Everest next time I go over, but in the meantime any thoughts and information would be appreciated.

 

Information needed before the invoice has to be paid, makes it easier to argue your case!

[jeepster]

why is it partitioned like that in the first place?

[Tog]

Look in the bios for the actual disk info.

Or even on the HDD itself as many sniffer programs can get it wrong.

Partition manager and similar programs can increase the sizes of partitions without data loss.

Yes 'dealers' are known to charge for a bigger drive than what they have fitted.

And why the heck is it set up as 5 drives??

[MickJ]

Wish I knew why it was partitioned like that, they said that WIN ME does not like partitions above 30GB, but why 17GB?

 

Funny thing is the original HD was 60GB in a single partition, as set up by the 'box shifter' and it worked with no problems, that is until it burned out!

 

Will look at the bios next time I am over.

 

Thanks guys

[Ian FG]

No doubt Ian will enlighten us but until then I remember I used to run ME on a 40GB drive.

 

But why would anyone want to run ME?

 

Your friend needs to ask why they have created so many partitions. He can always merge them with Partition Magic.

 

There are several ways, I believe, of calculating the size of a hard drive and you normally have a smaller drive than you think you have....if that makes sense.

[IanR]

Thanks Gobio for your confidence

 

Some older BIOS's are limited in their Hard Drive size recognition, typically 8.4Gb upward. Most hard drive manufacturers provide an "overlay" to get around this. I, personally, do not like these overlays. WinME, as far as I know, has a hard drive limitation of 127Gb, or 137Gb, depending on how you interpret sizes, ie, 1000 or 1024.

 

I share the views on ME, basically, rubbish, but some installations are stable. I'd prefer Win98SE.

 

I can't understand the reasons for the given partitions either, although some ex-corporate machines are sometimes configured in that fashion.

 

If you post the BIOS/Motherboard details, I will try to find more information relevant. You can use Belarc Adviser http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html to determine these details.

 

Cheers

 

Ian.

 

[ 03. June 2005, 09:07 PM: Message edited by: IanR ]

[UK-Fishing-Tackle.co.uk]

Hmm..

 

Pretty sure I've had ME on 80gb to 120gb drives as single partitions - however - I'm dedicated to Win2k for all my own stuff (and I use NTFS).

 

Looking at the above it sounds suspiciously like an 80gb - I've done computer repairs many times, and once or twice put the wrong one in myself (it's very easy to do, since the procedure for setting them up is basically the same). Whilst I am sure many do it out of dishonesty, most dealers have automatic boot disks, and once th OS is one, pretty much get the drivers on and call that it.

 

Best method is to check the hard disk physically and see what the label says. Failing that when the hard drives are autodetecting during the post hit the pause/break key and take down the drive information and we can look it up here for you. [Enter] will resume the post again.

 

Partitioning is a useful thing by all accounts (plenty of info via Google if interested) though if it's an 80 I'd go with four 20's or two 40's.

[UK-Fishing-Tackle.co.uk]

post = power on self test i.e. when you get your initial Bios text....

 

Sorry!

[MickJ]

Will get back to you all in about a week, when I can get a look at the machine again.

 

Plenty of useful information here, thanks.

 

Why WIN ME? Beacause it was installed when she bought the machine and she does not mess with anything, leaves it all to me. At least if it goes wrong she can blame me.