Maximmum HDD capacity of a 440BX chipset's IDE controller?

[CZroe]

I know I've used a 30GB drive in a 440LX system, but this 120GB Maxtor is not being detected in a customer's system by the BIOS at all. Is it the 32GB barrier? I could swear that I've run my 80GB WD drive on a 440BX at home but perhaps only with the Highpoint ATA66 IDE controller (Which I usually avoid using)...

In the 440LX system, we used Ghost to clone an 6GB partition to a new drive and resized up to 30GB. Windows 98 would blue-screen and crash during some file operations. We reimaged it again, this time resizing it to 8GB and creating a second partition to fill the rest. It got rid of the problem. Was that just a Windows problem? It doesn't seem like the 1024th Cylinder (8GB) limitation if the second partition worked fine. I would assume a 440BX system could at least match the BX assuming that's the limitation.

Googling only seems to show me the maximum capacity of RAM. Thnx!

 

[CZroe]

Set the capacity limitation jumper and it recognized immediately at 32GBs. Now to find a workaround....

 

[Lord Evermore]

BIOS updates might make a difference. If not, maxtor's drive overlay software MaxBlast should make it usable.

 

[ScrapSilicon]

the 440bX bios probably will never see it as 120GB...had a 440ZX showed a 10GB as a 2GB ..used Maxtor's EZ-BIOS prog...Win98 shows full 10GB drive..120GB I believe is pushing Win98's boundaries.. did install a 120GB in a build recently where I partitioned it into 40/80 ..installed WinMe on the 40GB(lady only used 4GBs of space over 3 yrs..asked if she needed all 120 available..she said when she goes XP..)

 

[SGtheArtist]

I'm not sure about the LX but my 440BX is currently running an 80GB. Usually the mfg. installations disks checks the chipset and determines if it has to install a "dynamic drive overlay" at least thats what IBM called it. What it does it trick the motherboard chipset to thinking the hard drive is smaller then it is and then when the OS loads the os can see and use all the disc.

However I've found that this dynamci drive overlay puts files on both the boot disc and the new 80 storage disc if this is the config. But more importantly it can cause some alot of problems if you ever decide to use the drive or drives (seperate boot drive) for something else.

Personally I think I accidentally RMA'ed a perfectly good IBM 22GXP because of this dynamic drive overlay stuff.

 

[CZroe]

Dynamic drive overlay seems to have worked. 120GB on a 400BX! FAT32 supports up to 2TB I think (Of course, cluster size is insanely wasteful on this 120GB drive even).

I tried updating the BIOS before my original post. The flash program would refuse to do it saying "Not Enough Memory"

 

[Lord Evermore]

You can define smaller cluster sizes than the default, it just results in a hell of a lot more clusters for the OS to track.

 

[AngelOfDeath]

440BX I get tears in my eyes of joy. THat was a great chipset those days :.)

 

[ugh]

The 440BX is still a good chipset Somehow when I tried plugging in a 40GB into my ASUS P2B, it didn't even want to boot {g}

 

[DaFinn]

Running 3 servers here with BX chipsets... Truly a legendary chipset!
All have SCSI-RAID though, so no boundaries...

 

[Slammy1]

I'm still running a P3B-F as my primary machine. 1 GHz (on overclock) and it let's me run my memory CL2 (16 times through memtest no errors). I installed SCSI a while ago, so the biggest IDE drive I've had on this is 4 GB. The overlay software seriously slows down the drive; most people (from what I've read on system configs) install a separate controller for larger drives. I am getting ready to sink ca $700 into it for MB/CPU/Memory/IDE drive as soon as the c-series processors become more affordable (in the next couple of months). I already have a 9700Pro AIW (at 2X AGP D: ). I think I'll keep the Intel Inside pentium III sticker on this case.

 

[RanDum72]

why not just get a seperate PCI IDE controller card? That way the harddrive runs at full speed while you can attach CD/DVD drives to the mobo, each with its own channel.

 

[mooojojojo]

not sure what overlay is, but I ran a 80GB barracuda on the BX IDE controller with just the latest BIOS.
the mobo was Abit BM6.

 

[Sunner]

We have a box with an Asus P2B-DS(440BX) with an 80 GB 120GXP attached.
Didn't work with the latest official BIOS, but after a flash to the latest beta BIOS, it worked fine, and we haven't seen any side effects from the beta, so all's well.

 

[Acanthus]

worst cast scenario you buy a $30 IDE card online and it will pick it up fine.

 

[Eug]

Originally posted by: ugh
The 440BX is still a good chipset Somehow when I tried plugging in a 40GB into my ASUS P2B, it didn't even want to boot {g}

Check my rig:

Asus P2B 440BX (latest BIOS) with Celeron 1.4 GHz Tualatin and 120 GB Seagate Barracuda V hard drive.

Actually, I'm cheating... I'm using a Promise controller with the Barracuda V. Never tried the Barracuda V with the on-board controller.

However, I've used I think a 60 GB IBM 60GXP drive with the on-board controller. A 45 GB IBM 75GXP also worked fine with the on-board controller. I wouldn't expect to be able to use the full capacity of a 160 GB drive though.