Adding two jumpers to limit capacity and resolve bad cyliner/head 1

[covellite]

Hello,

I have an 80 GB drive that has a limiting capacity "feature" for 30 GB by putting on two jumpers. I am considering doing this as the drive itself has , according to Norton, a bad file system (for other drives it reported them as FAT and NTFS accurately). Running check disk, when verifying the partitions the utility stops at Cylinder 398 Head 161 and 162. I can not make a partition with partition magic. I am wondering if i use the two jumpers if i can make the partition in the part of the disk that is OK so i can access the drive. But the real question is, will I lose data by limiting the hard drive capacity to 30 GB. There are only like 4 GB on there right now. No warranty.
This is my first questino, and from what Ive read, all yall that answer are superhero cool people for answering so thouroughtly. I hope I can get some of that.
THANK YOU
Covellite
tetrahedron@psu.edu

 

[Jakespeare]

1st: 80 GB and NO WARRANTY ?????? Why not ?
( I bet $$$ I could get some warranty out of it. Seriously)

2nd: ON the warranty: Inspect the hard drive. Take all the info off the drive and go to the manufacturers website and try the warranty process. Your computer dealer / the guys who sold it too you may have only given you one year, but MOST hard drives have a 3-year warranty. MOST, I said.

3rd) FORGET NORTON on this. I have seen Norton create / invent problems when there are none; Norton system works can be very problematic....... and a pain.
>>>
* Here is what I suggest: Go to the HD manufacturers website and download their diagnostic software for that hard drive and run that. 1st use the basic test. If that passes, then run the ADVANCED - WITHOUT WIPING DATA.
It will give you ACCURATE information about your hard drive that I do NOT think Norton is capable of from Windows.
The diagnostic is run from DOS without any Windows programs running,,,,,,, and much more accurate. NO Norton system works complexities and problematic conflicts with a variety of programs running.


> ON your original questions: I just don't know. It all sounds good in theory though,,,,,,, BUT - IF your already having REAL hard drive failure, you see it's on the 1st part of the drive,,,,,, and doing this would only give you a 30 Gig partition that is ALREADY BAD.......
NO help.

I would try this: I would create a SECOND PARTION USING FDISK. NOT partion magic.
Make a D drive...... and copy all your data onto that D.
> Then spend the $80 for a NEW 20 GIG hard drive, or $90 - $95 for a new 40 GIG .........
I use

http://www.newegg.com

and buy Maxtor & IBM only.
I suggest buying the 7200 RPM HD'S,,,,, as they are not only faster, but I am ABSOLUTELY convinced that they are made better.

 

[covellite]

Thank you very much for your input. That is exactly what I have done. I got the drive in Mexico from a marketing firm that was going out, so I figured third party guarantees are no good. When I get home Im ready to run the full suite of mfr utilities.

But now that were on the subject? As far as power and resource demands are concerned, wouldnt it be better for me to run a smaller partition, say 20 GB ( I really cant imagine what you'd do with 80!) and set the remainder inactive.? I say this because ever since I put in this new hard drive, I have been getting a lot of resource IO conflicts with the IDE controller...
What I really need to do is revamp everything and start from scratch like Ive always wanted to rather than trying to make my donkey run like a stallion.

Thank you very much.

covellite