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    Bios report 38gb instead of 120gb???

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by tobvr4, Jan 17, 2008.

  1. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    The problem occurred with my Fujitsu 120GB 5400RPM SATA, MHW2120BH.
    The drive came with Dell Vostro 1500 with vista business installed. I upgraded to 160GB using Arconis True Image 11. The new drive worked fine on the Vista laptop.
    I have another laptop, Dell inspiron E1405 which has Toshiba 40GB SATA and XP media center edition 2005 installed. I ran Acronis True Image 11 on XP laptop to clone everything from Toshibe 40GB to Fujitsu 120GB. I did not format the Fujitsu drive before running the cloning software, but the cloning process ran sucessfully. I connected the Fujitsu HDD to Vista laptop via usb port to copy data (around 70MB) and then installed it to XP laptop.
    The problem is when I installed the Fujitsu HDD to my XP laptop, bios reported only 38gb instead of 120gb and it was unable to start window xp.
    I removed the Fujitsu HDD and installed it back to the external enclosure and connected to my laptops. My Vista laptop and XP laptop reported total capacity of only 35.1GB and said the Fujitsu HDD was not formatted. I installed the Fujitsu drive back to Vista laptop, the bios also reported 38GB.
    What should I do to get my 120gb back?
     
    tobvr4, Jan 17, 2008
    #1
  2. mikelets456

    mikelets456 Notebook Consultant

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    Was the 120 GB last using Vista? Also, you did hit the "format and delete" partions, correct? It sounds as though you crated another partition on the 120 GB drive that is not bootable.....

    Try again and make sure you hit "delete all partitions"....
     
    mikelets456, Jan 17, 2008
    #2
  3. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    I selected "delete partition" at the time I was attempting to clone 40GB to 120GB. I tried to do cloning again, but Acronis True Image reported that the drive was only 35GB.
     
    tobvr4, Jan 17, 2008
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  4. mikelets456

    mikelets456 Notebook Consultant

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    Maybe remove Acronis from the 120 GB HD? I don't know, but it still sounds as though there are two operating systems it may not want to delete one of them therefore keeping XP as the one boot sector and Vista as another with coth labled as "C" drive.So possibly deleting Acronis from the 120 GB and also checking if there is another partition. The easiest thing would be putting the 120 GB unit in the old notebook and format it or connect it up to the new system via usb and format it.
     
    mikelets456, Jan 17, 2008
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  5. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    I connected to my Vista Laptop via usb and formatted it. I got only 35GB even if window report that it was Fujitsu MHW2120BH. Now, Acronis did not see the drive.
     
    tobvr4, Jan 17, 2008
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  6. mikelets456

    mikelets456 Notebook Consultant

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    If you put the drive in the old computer and format it....beyond that I'm at a loss.
     
    mikelets456, Jan 17, 2008
    #6
  7. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    Is there any hard drive utility tools that I can use to scan the hard drive?
     
    tobvr4, Jan 17, 2008
    #7
  8. ohlip

    ohlip Toughbook Modder

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    Do you have the acronis disk director suite? if yes, use it to delete all partition and it will tell you that you have 120gb unallocated space. Not exactly 120 but you will recover all the free sapce on the drive. And then create a partition, use as primary and your set.
     
    ohlip, Jan 17, 2008
    #8
  9. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    Yes, I have it. I will try it tonight.
     
    tobvr4, Jan 17, 2008
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  10. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    It didn't work. I deleted all partition, but I still got only 35.8gb as unallocated. Any other solution?
     
    tobvr4, Jan 18, 2008
    #10
  11. ViciousXUSMC

    ViciousXUSMC Master Viking NBR Reviewer

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    go back to the basics and just fdisk the thing and wipe the hdd then set up proper partitions.
     
    ViciousXUSMC, Jan 18, 2008
    #11
  12. compgur910

    compgur910 Notebook Enthusiast

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    This is a little old school, and I dont know if this applies or not. But, on older IDE and some SATA hard drives, there is a jumper setting that will set your hard drive to the 38 gig max size. I dont know what that is for exactly, but I do know that there is a jumper setting on some hard drives that do that. Like I said, its old school, and I doubt its your problem, but its worth a check I guess
     
    compgur910, Jan 18, 2008
    #12
  13. ohlip

    ohlip Toughbook Modder

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    You maybe misssed something when you used the acronis disk director suite it happened to me one time. Go back again ,as far as i remember on that software in order to recover all unallocated partition, there is a tool bar that i move forward something like that on a partition tool. Try it again.
     
    ohlip, Jan 18, 2008
    #13
  14. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    tobvr4, Jan 19, 2008
    #14
  15. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    What is the tool bar that you use? I used recovery but found not work.
     
    tobvr4, Jan 19, 2008
    #15
  16. tobvr4

    tobvr4 Notebook Enthusiast

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    I did it. I get my 120GB back. This time I just put the bootable HDAT2 CD in my XP laptop and followed the proceeds in the thread I posted on #14. Bios detects 120GB and Acronis Disk Director Suite report total capacity of 111.8GB. I just need to create partition to let Windows detect full capacity of 111.8GB.
    Thank you for all of you who tried to help me.
     
    tobvr4, Jan 20, 2008
    #16
  17. ohlip

    ohlip Toughbook Modder

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    Glad, you sorted out
     
    ohlip, Jan 20, 2008
    #17