NTLDR When Installing Windows?

[topslop1]

I have a brand new Maxtor 300 gig SATA drive that I'm installing Windows XP onto. I go through the blue screen where it has me select partitions and I select the Maxtor identified only at 139 gigabytes. After it installs files onto it and goes to restart to continue setup I get an error of NTLDR not found. Press CTL+ALT+DELETE to try again. I do the same thing and nothing works.

Am I doing something wrong ?

Thanks.

 

[montag451]

there is a limit of 137 gig on some BIOS's.

It seems that your BIOS is reaching that limit.
You will need to either, go to mobo manufacturer website to see if an updated BIOS for your mobo will raise the limit,
or
go to maxtor's website and download their drive overlay, just do a search on google for another app that will enable 48bitLBA.
It is a bit of software that fools the BIOS into thinking that the drive is within the limit.

Problem is that, if something goes wrong with your os after the installation, you might automatically lose lots of data [that placed above the 137 gig mark]

If you carry on without using a drive overlay, then, any data that is placed in the area above the 137gig mark maybe lost/corrupted

 

[topslop1]

I would be okay with installing windows on the 137 gig drive and then after being in windows download Maxtor's maxblast 3 and enable the other part of the harddrive. But I can't even install windows.. It just gives me that error and doesn't proceed to the setup screen.

 

[montag451]

Is there a jumper on the drive that will make the drive only 32Gig?
i know some older ibm/hitachi drives have this option - that was to overcome the older limit of 32Gig!!
once you install os, you can try the following to enable 48bit support

System Key: [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Atapi\Parameters]
Value Name: EnableBigLba
Data Type: REG_DWORD (DWORD Value)
Value Data: (0 = disabled, 1 = enabled)

you will have to create that key in the registry

 

[topslop1]

I'm not worried about enabling the space after Windows has been installed. I'm just having trouble getting Windows installed right now becuase after it says it'll restart in 10 seconds it gives me the error on a black screen. It might be the condition of the windows disk that is giving me this problem.

 

[montag451]

it is possible that during installation, some files are being written to the wrong part of the drive.

is there a jumper on your drive that is labelled 4092 cylinder limit - if there is, that will limit the drive to 137gig, then, you should be able to install win.

First choice would be bios upgrade if possible

 

[topslop1]

My bios identifies the harddrive as 300 gig. It says it right in there when I go to check out harddrive information. As for Windows, that detects it as 137. On the drive I see a circular plastic cut out with one single metal prong. Next to that I see two prongs that look like a standard jumper. It isn't labeled on the jumper but I'll check out the label on the harddrive when it's done formatting - I don't want to stop it half way through when maybe this will work.

 

[montag451]

no no - you are right, don't stop the format ....... that wouldnt be very nice

 

[topslop1]

I tried putting the jumper in and I didn't notice it changing anything. I'm out to go read on the Maxtor site and see what I'm doing wrong.

Need to install with MaxBlast 3 software in .Iso form.. Will update if it works.

No good...

 

[GAZZA]

Why don't you partition the drive during the setup XP install (say 30gigs or so) and then format the rest once XP is installed ?

Are you using the original XP pre-service pack ? Cause I'm thinking that SP1/SP2 have support for larger drives.