new hard drive not recognised

[falcemob]

I am trying to install a 160gb hd as a slave drive. When I boot, the bios finds the drive and it is also shown in the system settings-hardware profiles window. The problem is that the drive is not visible in My computer and I can't actualy find it. It only shows Drive C which is the original drive and the CDrom and DVD drives.
Windows XP home and the new drive is a Samsung.
Anyone got any ideas.

[pdV6]

You need to format it with your preferred choice of file system before you can use it.

[falcemob]

Er, how do I do that then? I have never had to format one before.

[pdV6]

New drive may have come with a utility to do it.

I'm not too hot on XP Home, but in XP Pro you'd:

Right click My Computer.
Select "Manage"
Navigate to Storage/Disk Management.
Right click on the appropriate Disk (presumably "Disk1").
Select "Format" and follow the instructions.

[HarryW]

SLightly OT but of a similar vein, I have three hard drives, two IDE one SATA. Have used the old IDE drives as bulk storage mainly as the SATA one is much larger and faster. I have now put the operating system onto it now as well. However, how the feck do you get windows BIOS to boot from the SATA drive and not the IDE ones . I've tried the obvious routes available in BIOS but primary/secondary drive options are always IDE. Yours one coonfused user .

Harry

[Plotloss]

Open disk manager, it first needs to be initialised, then it can be formatted.

Once you have waited for about 80 minutes it will be ready to use.

[falcemob]

Plotloss said:

Open disk manager, it first needs to be initialised, then it can be formatted. Once you have waited for about 80 minutes it will be ready to use.

Thanks for that, I see what you mean about the time it takes. Why does my supposedly 160gb only format as 149gb, where are the other 11gb hiding?

[jimmyjimjim]

falcemob said:

where are the other 11gb hiding?

The manufacturers tend to use 1,000,000 bytes as a megabyte, instead of 1,048,576 bytes. Can't sue them for it, as it is common usuage - caveat emptor.

And the 160Gb would be the unformatted size. Not all of the disk will be available for storage, for overhead reasons; some is used for the allocation table (index of where all your files are), for example.

[falcemob]

OK, thanks for all your help people. Problem solved.

[ErnestM]

Plotloss said:

Open disk manager, it first needs to be initialised, then it can be formatted. Once you have waited for about 80 minutes it will be ready to use.

...or you could fast format an NTFS partition in about 1 minute...

ErnestM

[ErnestM]

HarryW said:

SLightly OT but of a similar vein, I have three hard drives, two IDE one SATA. Have used the old IDE drives as bulk storage mainly as the SATA one is much larger and faster. I have now put the operating system onto it now as well. However, how the feck do you get windows BIOS to boot from the SATA drive and not the IDE ones . I've tried the obvious routes available in BIOS but primary/secondary drive options are always IDE. Yours one coonfused user . Harry

There is probably another setting in your BIOS that is something like HARD DISK PRIORITY or some such (usually hanging around the boot options area). You need to specify which drive order you want. There may also be some SATA specific settings in the BIOS that you will have to change depending on which BIOS you have. What type of MB is it?

ErnestM

[HarryW]

ErnestM said:

..... There is probably another setting in your BIOS that is something like HARD DISK PRIORITY or some such (usually hanging around the boot options area). You need to specify which drive order you want. There may also be some SATA specific settings in the BIOS that you will have to change depending on which BIOS you have. What type of MB is it? ErnestM

ASUS something....8X deluxe, a modern one . Had a tip that I should maybe check for a MB BIOS update, but not on-line at home at present, so its difficult.
Biggest bugger is that I can get it to boot from the SATA drive with only one of the IDE drive's connected but with both it hangs .

Harry

[FunkyGibbon]

HarryW said:

ASUS something....8X deluxe, a modern one . Had a tip that I should maybe check for a MB BIOS update, but not on-line at home at present, so its difficult. Biggest bugger is that I can get it to boot from the SATA drive with only one of the IDE drive's connected but with both it hangs . Harry

does it boot from SATA with either of only one IDE connected (if you see what I mean) or have you just tried disconnecting the main boot IDE disk.

If this is the case then I suspect all you need to do is set the jumpers on the main boot IDE disk to tell it to act as a slave drive (like the other IDE disk you have). There should be a sticker on the disk showing you where the jumpers should be positioned.

HTH

[HarryW]

FunkyGibbon said:

HarryW said: ASUS something....8X deluxe, a modern one . Had a tip that I should maybe check for a MB BIOS update, but not on-line at home at present, so its difficult. Biggest bugger is that I can get it to boot from the SATA drive with only one of the IDE drive's connected but with both it hangs . Harry does it boot from SATA with either of only one IDE connected (if you see what I mean) or have you just tried disconnecting the main boot IDE disk. If this is the case then I suspect all you need to do is set the jumpers on the main boot IDE disk to tell it to act as a slave drive (like the other IDE disk you have). There should be a sticker on the disk showing you where the jumpers should be positioned. HTH

I C what you are saying, yes I have only disconnected one IDE drive so it could be linked as a master then. I assume you mean a jumpers on the drive itself not the MB, as I've checked all MB jumpers.
I'll have another look tonight when I get home.
Ta.

Harry

[ErnestM]

I use ASUS motherboards exclusively. I am currently running a P4C800-E at home with two SATA drives, one IDE drive, a DVD-R/RW and a standard DVD (all IDE).

To get the system to boot from SATA:

1. You have to turn enhanced mode support on in BIOS (MAIN)
2. You have to set the boot device priority to the proper hard drive (BOOT). The SATA drives can be difficult to identify so when you are in MAIN, write down the identifying number(s) of the drives after they are autodetected.

Lastly - I found that the latest MB BIOS retains the setting better in the event of lost power (which we have had a lot of in Florida lately)

I have my OS (XP Pro - SP1 install - upgraded to SP2) on a SATA drive, use another SATA for a video scratch file, use the IDE-133 drive for a holding tank and even have an external SEAGATE (USB) as a backup drive. No worries at all...

ErnestM

[GregE240]

ErnestM said:

I have my OS (XP Pro - SP1 install - upgraded to SP2)

Amateur....try slipstreaming SP2 THEN build it.

Smug sense of satisfaction when you go to WUpdate and it says "No Critical Updates" Although believe thats changed now.

[ErnestM]

GregE240 said:

ErnestM said: I have my OS (XP Pro - SP1 install - upgraded to SP2) Amateur....try slipstreaming SP2 THEN build it. Smug sense of satisfaction when you go to WUpdate and it says "No Critical Updates" Although believe thats changed now.

ErnestM