Could someone please try to help with this problem..

[Kookstick]

I have been struggling with my boss's cheezy system for long enough, He has a plain old pentium 200 and I installed a new cdrom, zip drive and HARDRIVE(13.5 gb IBM)because he'd rather spend alot of money and upgrade than get a new system.So I install the operating system and when I goto the drive to look at the size it says 7.8 gig instead if 13.5. I can only imagine that i'm not setting up the partition right or something.So I did fdisk and deleted the primary dos partition and then created a new primary dos partition and I did say yes to the question about using the whole disk. I know someone can probably tell me pretty easy what i'm doing and maybe talk me thru the steps.I get confused where it says you must restart for this to take effect and that's probably where i'm messing up. It has a VX chipset. Do I need to setup the bios first because in there it says 13.5 gb primary master.Also after installing 32 mb sdram to the 32 existing it shows up as only 40mb, any ideas? Thank you very much and sorry this is so long. Cheers

------------------
Asus P2b(1010),P3 450,128 mb pc100,Matrox G400 DH,Asus 50x,Iomega zip,Mitsumi CDR,Ibm 10 gb hd,Sb Live,Win 98


[This message has been edited by Kookstick (edited 20 October 1999).]

[Guyver]

Most systems that supported the pentium processors had a maximum disk size of 8GB or less. Some were limited to 2GB.

Look to MR.Bios for a bios update - or for just a little more, look at the Spectra 333 or 400 upgrades - they are less than $200 and come with all available Mr. BIOS upgrades that are flashable.

That should help the speed (and the need to spend money)

Guyv

[Mark F]

Also what OS? Win with FAT16 is limited to 8GB. Only with FAT32 can you go over 8GB. Did you FDISK for FAT32?
If the problem is the BIOS 8GB limit you can use a drive overlay program (but, I wouldn't recomend it), or multiple partitions (a generaly better solution).


Mark F.


------------------
OH NO, my retractable cup holder swallowed a CD

[Guyver]

fat16 partition size limit is 2GB. The maximum disk size is 8GB.

I wholeheartedly agree about the driver not being the way to go.

Multiple partitions are acceptible as long as the bios recognizes the larger size, which in this case it (or the OS) doesn't.

Guyv

[This message has been edited by Guyver (edited 20 October 1999).]

[motub]

Assuming Win95/98, can't Kookstick just make say a 6.5 and a 7gb partition and be OK? Or what am I missing??

And doesn't every doggone make of HDD come with a drive overlay proggie? Maxtor does, and so does WD... (I have a Maxtor drive, I'd curse it, but it's my only one and it does run...) If anyone knows what make of drive does not use them, I want to know, because I'm in the market for an upgrade...

--------------------
Holly

[Guyver]

DOS, Win3.x, Win95,95A were limited to FAT-16 - 2GB maximum partition size.

Win95B,95C,98,98SE offer FAT32 and no 2GB max partition size

WinNT had a maximum first partition size of 2GB due to the fact that it was formatted as Fat-16 first, then converted to NTFS. Windows 2000 formats as NTFS right off the bat - no limitation.

Summary....

Total disk size limited to below 8GB - either an OS or BIOS limitation. Fixes - Upgrade to 98 and/or BIOS upgrade. Drive overlay won't help if it's the OS.

Total partition size limited to 2GB or smaller - OS/FAT16 restriction. Fixes - Upgrade to 98.

Guyv

[Mark F]

OPPS!
Haven't had to deal with 2GB (first) and 8GB (later) limits since my 486. First BIOS upgrade, then upgrade to Win95 OSR2.

Mark F.

------------------
OH NO, my retractable cup holder swallowed a CD

[Kookstick]

Thanks guys, I was wondering if there was something I might have done wrong with setting up the partition. Could someone briefly tell me what things I should select in the fdisk menu. I know the bios is old with the vx chipset but would flashing new make a difference because in the bios now it says 13.5 but in windows it says 7.8 or something but I might have setup the partition wrong. Anyways, nothing to lose sleep over, thanks again for the responses.BTW it is win98 if I didn't say it earlier and it says it's fat 32 but I didn't see any option for fat 16 or 32, it just setup fat 32. Later

------------------
Asus P2b(1010),P3 450,128 mb pc100,Matrox G400 DH,Asus 50x,Iomega zip,Mitsumi CDR,Ibm 10 gb hd,Sb Live,Win 98

[Guyver]

If it's windows 98, then the limiting factor has to be the bios.... Look for a newer one that supports larger than 8GB drives....

If the OEV/OEM doesn't have one, then look at MR. Bios - or give me the specs, and I can sort through the CD-ROM and tell you if there is one available for that Motherboard....

Guyv

[Kookstick]

Guyver- I'll check that out today when I get into work, do you think that the ram only detecting 40mb when there's actually 64mb has to do with the bios also or could it be that the last stick I put in is pc100 and the bios doesn't recognize it? Would I have to reformat and reinstall W98 after flashing new bios to get the change or will it change windows. Thanks.

------------------
Asus P2b(1010),P3 450,128 mb pc100,Matrox G400 DH,Asus 50x,Iomega zip,Mitsumi CDR,Ibm 10 gb hd,Sb Live,Win 98

[Guyver]

It could be the PC100 - Some systems will only recognize PC66. Others will only recognize memory of a certain density - ie double-sided, 9-chip or whatever, versus single-sided 8-chip... Check the motherboard specs for types and sizes.


Guyv

[Jake]

DEJA VU!!!!!

Incredible! Only a few days ago, I was in exactly the same situation. My In-laws who have their own business, bought a new server for their small office network, and they asked their "system consultant" to configure the old server for use by my brother in-law, by installing Win98, Word, and so on.

The old server was a P200 with an Adaptec 2940 SCSI controller, a 3.2GB SCSI HDD and tape streamer, which had to be moved to the new server, as the fool (sorry "system consultant") had forgotten that their server used a SCSI setup. The new server came with a 13.5 GB IBM IDE HDD!!! And this dude charges DKR940 an hour (about $135).

So the fool exchanged the drives and thus the P200 was now using the IBM HDD. He did a quick install of Windows98, without setting up anything (screen resolution, color-depth, printer etc.) and left it like that. Of course, my brother in-law was unable to use the system to work on in that poor state, and they asked me to have a "quick look" at it.

I quickly discovered that the HDD was only using 8GB of drive space and DL'ed a new bios from the mobo manufacturers web-site (Atrend ATC-5000), and did a bios update after that. A 5 minute operation!

I was then able to repartition the drive to it's maximum size and install Windows98SE. The rest of the install vent like a charm, except for some strange crashes which I discovered was due to a burned out CPU fan and the PCI graphics card being seated in the last slot, which it (for some strange reason) did not like. The people who originaly assembled the PC had squezed the thick black power cable from the PSU to the power button between the CPU fan and the drive bay causing it to block the rotation of the fan. Thus the burn-out!!!!

Can you believe that SHIT???

Well, the problem is solved now and they fired the ****ole....

So, like the others said: Kookstick, check for a bios update for your motherboard. And you are right to listen to Guyver's advice. He is one of the "Hardware Hardcore Top Dogs" around here. He is right on about the memory problems. (as always)...

Have fun,

Jake

------------------
Who is General Failiure and why is he reading my drive?
----------------------
MGA-G200 8Mb Mill. bios ver. 2.3, Abit BH6 mobo bios ver. LN, PIII-450@558, 128Mb PC-133 SDRAM, 17" Hitachi monitor, Plextor 40TS CDROM, Panasonic 7502 CDR. Diamond MX300 A3D PCI soundcard.


[This message has been edited by Jake (edited 22 October 1999).]

[Kookstick]

Jake, That was a great story! Actually I got the ram problem figured out by returning the one sided pc100 and getting pc66 which worked great. Does it hurt to leave the drive the way it is because my boss doesn't care it only says 8 gig, he's just so stoked that it's running so well and he's already installed a bunch of software. Is there just alot of wasted space then?Thanks again.

------------------
Asus P2b(1010),P3 450,128 mb pc100,Matrox G400 DH,Asus 50x,Iomega zip,Mitsumi CDR,Ibm 10 gb hd,Sb Live,Win 98


[This message has been edited by Kookstick (edited 23 October 1999).]

[Helevitia]

It doesn't hurt to leave the drive the way it is, but all that wasted space!

Dave

------------------
It's almost all about two things:

1. Attitude
2. Children

Everything else is just an added bonus

~David Hilliard~

[Guyver]

Aww shucks... Now I'm blushing....

Thanks, Jake, for that tremendous ego boost...

Isn't it terrible when you have to clean up a supposedly professional's mess? I've seen my share of flub-ups before. One of the best ones was a "supposed" technician that wouldn't replace a floppy cable because it had one of the stickers, that some shops use to prevent the cable from coming loose from the drive during shipping, on it. He said it would void the warranty of the entire system if he did that. I just unstuck the sticker, replaced the cable and restuck it to the new one, and that technician never got the chance to walk back in the door....

At the current pricing, I guess I wouldn't worry about all the extra space. The 13GB drive probably cost less than an 8GB or so drive did a year ago.

Guyv (who really enjoys helping, sharing knowledge - and who often learns as much as he shares!!)