127gb max on a 160gb hdd

i recently reformatted my computer and my external hdd
its a hitachi 160gb internal hdd in a casing.

i am running windows xp home with service pack 2

after i reformatted the drive, it maxed out at 127gb on a 160gb hdd.

i tried updating my bios but i have the current one.
its a dell dimensions 4100i.

i was told i need a 48-bit LBA or something of that sort.

i tried partition magic and no help.

how do i get back the missing 30gb?

 

Did you format the drive with FAT32? I think it has a 127GB limit, and you'll need to convert it to NTFS.

 

yea it was formatted with ntfs

 

was it 160GB before the format? Maybe the partition isnt right. 160GB disk should give you around 145-150 real GBs.
Right click on My Computer and go to manage. Under Storage click on Disk Managment.
Here you can see your disk and partitions. What does the USB disk look like? It should say something like:

Does the partition on the USB drive stretch all the way accross or is there a empty area or 2nd partition?

 

hmm....so i guess my HD w/ 120gb is fine w/111gb after reformatted and getting rid of recovery drive?

 

My external 120 GB drive has exactly 111 GB of space when it has been freshly reformatted, so yes, you are golden.

 

i understand that hdd manufactures sell the drives with less capacity than advertised. i believe it was around 5% less but 127gb is more than what it should be. its still 16 gb.

 

Hard drive space is strange (along with RAM) We both think a gig is 1024 megs. But companies see a gig as 1000 megs. So they kind of rip you off.

 

It's different bases. They don't rip you off... it's like saying he's running 300 yards instead of running 300 meters... they're both close to the same distance, just measured with different units.

See this

 

That is a terrible comparison, because they are measuring them with the same unit, they just take the short cut, and only put 1000 megs in, so they dont have to do a bunch of math.

 

They do it because the public understands base 10, not base 2.

And whole numbers look better in advertisements... It is annoying, but it is also marked on retail boxes that 1 MB =1000KB.

 

It should be still more than 127GB. I think you have a hidden recovery partition or un-allocated space somwhere.

 

use a deep harddrive cleaning software like wipedrive pro to get at everything...perhaps simply use CCleaner to get rid of temp files even, IF you've been using the system for awhile....

if its new...goodluck to ya, i have no other ideas

 

a 160GB drive should give you like 147GB of usable space. there's something going on that you're not seeing. there might be some unallocated space that windows isn't showing you.

 

Your problem is the lack of 48 bit Large Block Addressing (LBA). You can fix it through a registry fix:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/mosaddique/Working%20with Large Hard Drives.html

Do remember, though, that EVERYTHING needs to have this LBA support (your Motherboard, the motherboard's BIOS, etc).