512 mb should be 8gb 4

[moldboy]

I have an 8 gb maxtor Hard Drive. I recently installed it in a IBM 80486 machine. Unknowly I incorrectly formated the harddrive in the BIOS and know it only represents itself as 504 mb when I install win 3.1 on it It automaticaly partions it and formats it is FAT16. I am aware that FAT 16 has a partition size limit I have attempted using a Win 89 boot disk to partion it as FAT 32 and Ranish Partition Manager. However it only showes the available disk space as 512mb. As well the BIOS still showes the capactiy as 8000 (and some) mb. Could anybody please help me get this drive back to the 8gb is should be.


Thanks in advance

 

[mainegeek]

Run fdisk again and delete the partition.
You should be able to create 4 2gig partitions but with your system being a 486 it hard to tell what your bios limit is. Probably 540mb. You may be able to get around it with drive overlay but there are hassles with that as well.

 

[edfair]

You could try the maxtor drive utility maxblast. But, like mainegeek says , there are potential glitches.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[micker377]

If you use the "overlay" you will always have to use the overlay. If later you decide to use the drive in a newer PC, you will have to fdisk and reformat the drive. Also, some programs won't work with an overlay.

 

[cdogg]

First of all, FAT16 is actually limited to 2GB and not the 512MB problem you're seeing.

I suspect the BIOS is the problem, even though it is reporting an 8000+ MB capacity. The reason? It was common in old BIOS's, especially in the pre-Pentium days, to only be able to read the first 1024 cylinders. No matter what size the drive might be, if a setting in the BIOS (or the BIOS itself) can't read beyond 1024, then you're always going to end up with the 512MB barrier.

Obviously, a BIOS upgrade is out of the question since it's most likely not even an option. Instead, search the BIOS with a toothpick for any setting that controls LBA or cylinder detection.

Some helpful links:

http://www.stormix.com/community/lists/archives/stormlinux-users-list/2000-July/001371.html

http://www.lesbell.com.au/hpfsfaq.html#BIGDRIVES

~cdogg
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[edfair]

Suggest you do a google search for "hard drive limitations". Much better info there than taking you through the process step by step.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[moldboy]

Thanks to cdogg your post was most helpful. I put the drive in a newer computer and the fdisk utility automaticaly detected that there was an extra 7000 and som mb of information not in a partition.