How do I get to the rest of my HD?

[EpOxY]

I just bought the new HD from Office Depot... it's a Maxtor 160gb 8mb disk.

I got it cuz my old HD had just failed, so I need to install an ew operating system on it. When I tried using the Windows XP Professional disk to format... it went through the whole thing then said at the end that it had failed to format the HD.

I ended up just formatting a 5GB portion and I've installed Windows XP Professional on that and I've just finished downloading and installing all the updates and fixes...

How do I get to the rest of my HD? Boot from the CD again and format a new partition?

I found this "Big Drive Enabler" program on the Maxtor site... but I'm wary to use it... should I?

 

[johnjkr1]

First, flash your bios to the latest version. Next, if your xp disc doesn't have sp 1 as part of the disc, try partitioning it to less than 137 gb. You can go back in disk mangement later after you apply SP1 and the rest of your hard drive will be there. Some motherboards dont support drives that big, and you may have to use the drive overlay program that comes with the drive (did you already use that?)

 

[EpOxY]

Hmm... i didn't try that...

I have the Asus A7N8X Deluxe... i should probably check the bios thing too. if that doesn't work, i guess I'll use that software that came with it. I just never had to use it before.

 

[johnjkr1]

You should not have to use it, your board is easily new enough. Stay away from that software at all costs, it is horrible. Just try it with a 130gb partition.

 

[EpOxY]

Well, I flashed the BIOS to the latest one... and I partioned a specific section for just 5gb...

it seems to be workign for now... but i'm afraid i won't be able to get rid of the partion later.

 

[EpOxY]

bump

 

[johnjkr1]

"it seems to be workign for now... but i'm afraid i won't be able to get rid of the partion later."

so making a smaller partition worked, right? What do you mean, "wont be able to get rid of it later"? what exactly does your setup look like and what would you prefer it look like?

 

[EpOxY]

right now... i have a small partition and a lot of unused/unformatted space.

So currently, it's one 5GB partition with Windows XP and all the updates...

I'd rather it be a 5GB Partition (maybe more if that's possible... i'm thinking about just putting all my program files in a single partition and everything else in another), and a... 155GB Partition...

 

[johnjkr1]

You could do it that way, but make it too small and you might start running out of space. Why not make it 130, and then you can have an extra 30gb for other stuff.

 

[EpOxY]

Sounds like a plan, but how?

 

[Bug]

Do you have Partition Magic?

 

[johnjkr1]

start over, destroy all the partitions, create a 130 gb one......install xp.....install service pack 1.......reboot...go into disk management and you will find 30gb of unpartitioned space that you can now partitions and format

 

[EpOxY]

Where is this "Disk Management" that you speak of?

 

[johnjkr1]

In the control panel, choose administrative tools, then choose computer management, then you will see disk management.