Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! - Page 2

RazgrizSeed · 02-28-2008, 11:40 PM

Well, I finished the boot n nuke, I just wish I had known that it would take 31 hours...

Is there any possible way to clone the HD minus the size parameters?
If I have no other option but to buy a recovery disk, how can I copy over the registry when I copy over the program files?

**linderman** · 02-29-2008, 06:04 AM

I know of no such "easy" way to clone the hard drive minus the drive geometry its forcing down your throat.

The only method or procedure I can think of to suit your needs is to install a fresh operating system of the exact one you have on the 55gig drive / then import and replace your registry with your old windows registery from the old drive. then when you copy all the contents only of your hard drive over to the new drive >>>>> they will then all work

not really a "beginners" class

you will have to research how to back-up and restore the windows registry

RazgrizSeed · 02-29-2008, 03:49 PM

omg...

I just took a peek at my hard drive to make sure boot n nuke worked after waiting those horrible 31 hours:

It did NOTHING.

**linderman** · 02-29-2008, 04:53 PM

something is wrong

dban never wipes only partitions and not the whole drive

it doesnt take 31 hours to wipe a 120gig drive with dban >>>> it takes about 3 hours !

I would retrun the drive to the vendor and get another one

RazgrizSeed · 03-01-2008, 11:48 PM

The 30-day return has expired.

Would I be able to get CMS to replace my hard drive considering it was their product that started this whole thing?

Also, that's why you didn't receive a reply from me for a while. I was waiting for the nuke to finish.

**oldmn** · 03-02-2008, 12:38 AM

XXclone will clone drives no mate what the size.
It will also make a boot able clone.

**linderman** · 03-02-2008, 06:17 AM

you can send the hard drive directly to the hard drive manufacturer for replacement

RazgrizSeed · 03-02-2008, 12:20 PM

I'm just trying to find a cost free option considering it was the CMS data transfer program that came with the kit that FUBAR'd the hard drive in the first place.

RazgrizSeed · 03-03-2008, 09:14 PM

Anyways, thank you for your assistance. I just hope I can get this thing replaced without having to spend too much.

**linderman** · 03-05-2008, 11:12 AM

you should have to spend nothing but the cost of shipping the drive to the manufacturer!

sumbit an RMA form on their website

magistr · 03-05-2008, 01:50 PM

God, good thing I never tried any of this, because I've thought about it. I have a dell media direct laptop and I was thinking about putting a bigger drive in it. Mine is different though, I can see the media direct partition inside windows disk management. Maybe my setup is more current. However I don't have the dell media direct reinstall cd. Funny how you spend money on a computer and they don't give you the software you need if you get in a jam. I paid an extra 10 dollars for a xp media center install disk, but no dell media direct disk! Oh well, it's the last dell I'll ever buy! I have a dell desktop I just took out of service too. CRAP CRAP CRAP! I do however hope you get your issue resolved. I was just reading the thread getting angry at Dell and had to vent!

They sell you a computer that blows up if you try to modify your h/w configuration. I have a dimension 8300 I was going to put a 7000 series geforce card in it, and I read online that for whatever reason the particular card I bought wouldn't post or boot in my particular Dell and no one knows why. Don't even get me started on that pethetic clam-shell case design! All this about the video card I found out of course after paying a lot of money for a new power supply to go in their stupid proprietary case! O I am so done with DELL! DELL ROTT IN HELL!

There I'm done. TTFN.

**oldmn** · 03-05-2008, 02:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by magistr

God, good thing I never tried any of this, because I've thought about it. I have a dell media direct laptop and I was thinking about putting a bigger drive in it. Mine is different though, I can see the media direct partition inside windows disk management. Maybe my setup is more current. However I don't have the dell media direct reinstall cd. Funny how you spend money on a computer and they don't give you the software you need if you get in a jam.
Most manufactures provide the instructions for making a recovery CD set which will include all the OEM software. I paid an extra 10 dollars for a xp media center install disk, but no dell media direct disk! Oh well, it's the last dell I'll ever buy! I have a dell desktop I just took out of service too. CRAP CRAP CRAP! I do however hope you get your issue resolved. I was just reading the thread getting angry at Dell and had to vent!

They sell you a computer that blows up if you try to modify your h/w configuration. I have a dimension 8300 I was going to put a 7000 series geforce card in it, and I read online that for whatever reason the particular card I bought wouldn't post or boot in my particular Dell and no one knows why. Don't even get me started on that pethetic clam-shell case design! All this about the video card I found out of course after paying a lot of money for a new power supply to go in their stupid proprietary case!
This is why you do the research first. O I am so done with DELL! DELL ROTT IN HELL!

There I'm done. TTFN.

Is there supposed to be something in your comments that is constructive or contributing to this thread?

magistr · 03-05-2008, 02:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oldmn

Is there supposed to be something in your comments that is constructive or contributing to this thread?

Nope, just a rant. Personally I don't think you should be responsible for creating your own recovery disks. For a premium price paid, they can include a disk. Mine came with disks, just not the required disk to install the media direct partition if needed. I inquired about that, that's $30 extra. Most users anyway will simply ignore making new recovery disks and resort to panic when it's too late.

As previous posts stated, if the media direct partition is invisible, how would software see it to back it up? The fact is OEM's don't always provide all the tools to recover from catastropic failure. That constructive enough?

RazgrizSeed · 03-10-2008, 01:03 PM

I'm sure partition magic could see it.

It's a shame Alienware was bought out by Dell.

Also, I was fixing an old Gateway desktop and I noticed that the XP disk (for that specific pc) includes formatting software. I noticed that things running through DOS are able to see through things. Would a DOS based formatter be able to see though this 55 GB lock and perhaps see the true 120 GB size? Or is it possible that data was coped over to the hard drive and then locked off in some way that even the Nuker couldn't wipe?

RazgrizSeed · 03-11-2008, 05:55 PM

I just got word back from CMS.

Instead of replacing my hard drive, they sent me this little guide and a program to fix this problem:

Restoring a Drive to Full Capacity after the BIOS has Clipped it

Symptom: After cloning your system with the data transfer software and you go to swap the drives the system will not boot. When you swap the drives back you find that the backup drive is now showing up as the same size as your source drive.

Cause: There is an issue on the following Dell Systems E1505, E1705, Inspiron 6400, Inspiron 9400 where the BIOS is not handling Dell’s hidden partition correctly and is clipping the drive to match the capacity of the source drive.

Resolution: In order to fix this problem after the drive has been clipped you will need to download a free utility online to assist in unclipping the drive. Here are the instructions for unclipping your drive.

1. Download this file from the link below.
http://www.hdat2.com/files/hdat2iso_4_53.zip

2. Unzip the file to extact the iso file

3. Burn the iso file to a CD. If you don’t have a program to burn iso files then you can download a free one here
http://www.download.com/3001-2646_4-10612384.html

4. Put the hard drive that was clipped back into your computer.

5. Boot from the CD you burned.

6. The first screen you see will be an MS-DOS 6.22 Startup Menu. Just select the default option of CD-ROM driver only or just wait for it to be automatically selected.

7. After the software loads you will see this command prompt [ATAPI] X:\>
At this command prompt type HDAT2

8. The next screen you should see once the software has completed its installation process should look like this.

Highlight your drive and press enter.

9. The next screen will look like this

Select the Set Max (HPA) Menu

10. Next you will see a menu like this

Select “Set Max Address” and press enter.

11. You should then see a screen that looks like this

Here just press S to set and then Y to accept the changes.

12. Now just keep pressing esc until the program is exited and the drive should now show up at normal capacity.

**oldmn** · 03-11-2008, 07:21 PM

Thank for letting us in on that info.

**linderman** · 03-11-2008, 08:29 PM

wow thanks for taking the time to share that info

I have been around the park many times and have never seen that trick / am tucking that one away in my notebook >>>>>

why do OEM systems make things so difficult ??????

I cant begin to count how many times I have had customers come in that activated an OEM restore only to find all data they have put on the drive was lost !

the recovery partition puts the system back to the day it was new in the box >>>>> not recover what YOU had before the machine burped

to me; thats not recovery!

drive images; now thats recovery!!!!!!!!!!!!!

magistr · 03-11-2008, 08:39 PM

I agree. Out of the box computers are horribly bloated with software that is not needed. Some computers even ship with known spyware/malware installed!

RazgrizSeed · 03-12-2008, 02:59 PM

ARG! It didn't work. Some issue related with my model of laptop. I'm waiting on an update from CMS.

The program did work, and it was pretty cool (minus the internal speaker beeps). I thought my hard drive was truly 119 GB but it's actually 120.03 GB! Woohoo! 30 extra MB!

RazgrizSeed · 03-18-2008, 12:13 PM

I reflashed/updated my BIOS (considering that was what I was told to do). I was worried about my laptop becoming a "boat anchor," but dell has integrated compatibility checks into all their BIOS updaters. I went from an A12 to an A17. I disabled the HPA on my hard drive using LBA 28-bit mode. It seemed to work, considering everything was reading it at 120 GB now. However, when I started Windows, it reverted back to 50 GB with the HPA. Now I have no idea what to do. It's like my BIOS is recalling some script and putting the HPA back or something.

02-28-2008, 11:40 PM	#21 (permalink)
RazgrizSeed Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 56 OS: Windows XP Media Center Edition	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! Well, I finished the boot n nuke, I just wish I had known that it would take 31 hours... Is there any possible way to clone the HD minus the size parameters? If I have no other option but to buy a recovery disk, how can I copy over the registry when I copy over the program files?

02-29-2008, 06:04 AM	#22 (permalink)
linderman Moderator, Hardware Team Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 20,403 OS: win 2000 pro / Win XP pro My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! I know of no such "easy" way to clone the hard drive minus the drive geometry its forcing down your throat. The only method or procedure I can think of to suit your needs is to install a fresh operating system of the exact one you have on the 55gig drive / then import and replace your registry with your old windows registery from the old drive. then when you copy all the contents only of your hard drive over to the new drive >>>>> they will then all work not really a "beginners" class you will have to research how to back-up and restore the windows registry __________________ Even a Broken Clock is Right Twice a Day ! Power Supply Selection LEARN TO BACK-UP YOUR DATA FREE & EASY YouTube - Runtime Software DriveImage XML tutorial

02-29-2008, 04:53 PM	#24 (permalink)
linderman Moderator, Hardware Team Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 20,403 OS: win 2000 pro / Win XP pro My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! something is wrong dban never wipes only partitions and not the whole drive it doesnt take 31 hours to wipe a 120gig drive with dban >>>> it takes about 3 hours ! I would retrun the drive to the vendor and get another one __________________ Even a Broken Clock is Right Twice a Day ! Power Supply Selection LEARN TO BACK-UP YOUR DATA FREE & EASY YouTube - Runtime Software DriveImage XML tutorial

03-01-2008, 11:48 PM	#25 (permalink)
RazgrizSeed Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 56 OS: Windows XP Media Center Edition	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! The 30-day return has expired. Would I be able to get CMS to replace my hard drive considering it was their product that started this whole thing? Also, that's why you didn't receive a reply from me for a while. I was waiting for the nuke to finish. Last edited by RazgrizSeed; 03-01-2008 at 11:49 PM.

03-02-2008, 12:38 AM	#26 (permalink)
oldmn TSF Enthusiast Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Gig Harbor Wa Posts: 2,150 OS: XP Pro SP3 X 3 My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! XXclone will clone drives no mate what the size. It will also make a boot able clone. __________________ AVG \| MEMTEST86 \| Zone Alarm \| XXCLONE \| Adaware \| Beyond Compare \| Everest If TSF has helped you, Tell us about it! or Donate to help keep the site up! Sorry no PM's for problems.[/center]

03-02-2008, 06:17 AM	#27 (permalink)
linderman Moderator, Hardware Team Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 20,403 OS: win 2000 pro / Win XP pro My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! you can send the hard drive directly to the hard drive manufacturer for replacement __________________ Even a Broken Clock is Right Twice a Day ! Power Supply Selection LEARN TO BACK-UP YOUR DATA FREE & EASY YouTube - Runtime Software DriveImage XML tutorial

03-02-2008, 12:20 PM	#28 (permalink)
RazgrizSeed Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 56 OS: Windows XP Media Center Edition	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! I'm just trying to find a cost free option considering it was the CMS data transfer program that came with the kit that FUBAR'd the hard drive in the first place.

03-03-2008, 09:14 PM	#29 (permalink)
RazgrizSeed Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 56 OS: Windows XP Media Center Edition	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! Anyways, thank you for your assistance. I just hope I can get this thing replaced without having to spend too much.

03-05-2008, 11:12 AM	#30 (permalink)
linderman Moderator, Hardware Team Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 20,403 OS: win 2000 pro / Win XP pro My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! you should have to spend nothing but the cost of shipping the drive to the manufacturer! sumbit an RMA form on their website __________________ Even a Broken Clock is Right Twice a Day ! Power Supply Selection LEARN TO BACK-UP YOUR DATA FREE & EASY YouTube - Runtime Software DriveImage XML tutorial

03-05-2008, 01:50 PM	#31 (permalink)
magistr Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Location: Maryland Posts: 60 OS: Windows XP SP3 & Vista x64 Ultimate SP1 My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! God, good thing I never tried any of this, because I've thought about it. I have a dell media direct laptop and I was thinking about putting a bigger drive in it. Mine is different though, I can see the media direct partition inside windows disk management. Maybe my setup is more current. However I don't have the dell media direct reinstall cd. Funny how you spend money on a computer and they don't give you the software you need if you get in a jam. I paid an extra 10 dollars for a xp media center install disk, but no dell media direct disk! Oh well, it's the last dell I'll ever buy! I have a dell desktop I just took out of service too. CRAP CRAP CRAP! I do however hope you get your issue resolved. I was just reading the thread getting angry at Dell and had to vent! They sell you a computer that blows up if you try to modify your h/w configuration. I have a dimension 8300 I was going to put a 7000 series geforce card in it, and I read online that for whatever reason the particular card I bought wouldn't post or boot in my particular Dell and no one knows why. Don't even get me started on that pethetic clam-shell case design! All this about the video card I found out of course after paying a lot of money for a new power supply to go in their stupid proprietary case! O I am so done with DELL! DELL ROTT IN HELL! There I'm done. TTFN.

03-10-2008, 01:03 PM	#34 (permalink)
RazgrizSeed Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 56 OS: Windows XP Media Center Edition	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! I'm sure partition magic could see it. It's a shame Alienware was bought out by Dell. Also, I was fixing an old Gateway desktop and I noticed that the XP disk (for that specific pc) includes formatting software. I noticed that things running through DOS are able to see through things. Would a DOS based formatter be able to see though this 55 GB lock and perhaps see the true 120 GB size? Or is it possible that data was coped over to the hard drive and then locked off in some way that even the Nuker couldn't wipe?

03-11-2008, 05:55 PM	#35 (permalink)
RazgrizSeed Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 56 OS: Windows XP Media Center Edition	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! I just got word back from CMS. Instead of replacing my hard drive, they sent me this little guide and a program to fix this problem: Restoring a Drive to Full Capacity after the BIOS has Clipped it Symptom: After cloning your system with the data transfer software and you go to swap the drives the system will not boot. When you swap the drives back you find that the backup drive is now showing up as the same size as your source drive. Cause: There is an issue on the following Dell Systems E1505, E1705, Inspiron 6400, Inspiron 9400 where the BIOS is not handling Dell’s hidden partition correctly and is clipping the drive to match the capacity of the source drive. Resolution: In order to fix this problem after the drive has been clipped you will need to download a free utility online to assist in unclipping the drive. Here are the instructions for unclipping your drive. 1. Download this file from the link below. http://www.hdat2.com/files/hdat2iso_4_53.zip 2. Unzip the file to extact the iso file 3. Burn the iso file to a CD. If you don’t have a program to burn iso files then you can download a free one here http://www.download.com/3001-2646_4-10612384.html 4. Put the hard drive that was clipped back into your computer. 5. Boot from the CD you burned. 6. The first screen you see will be an MS-DOS 6.22 Startup Menu. Just select the default option of CD-ROM driver only or just wait for it to be automatically selected. 7. After the software loads you will see this command prompt [ATAPI] X:\> At this command prompt type HDAT2 8. The next screen you should see once the software has completed its installation process should look like this. Highlight your drive and press enter. 9. The next screen will look like this Select the Set Max (HPA) Menu 10. Next you will see a menu like this Select “Set Max Address” and press enter. 11. You should then see a screen that looks like this Here just press S to set and then Y to accept the changes. 12. Now just keep pressing esc until the program is exited and the drive should now show up at normal capacity.

03-11-2008, 07:21 PM	#36 (permalink)
oldmn TSF Enthusiast Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Gig Harbor Wa Posts: 2,150 OS: XP Pro SP3 X 3 My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! Thank for letting us in on that info. __________________ AVG \| MEMTEST86 \| Zone Alarm \| XXCLONE \| Adaware \| Beyond Compare \| Everest If TSF has helped you, Tell us about it! or Donate to help keep the site up! Sorry no PM's for problems.[/center]

03-11-2008, 08:29 PM	#37 (permalink)
linderman Moderator, Hardware Team Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 20,403 OS: win 2000 pro / Win XP pro My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! wow thanks for taking the time to share that info I have been around the park many times and have never seen that trick / am tucking that one away in my notebook >>>>> why do OEM systems make things so difficult ?????? I cant begin to count how many times I have had customers come in that activated an OEM restore only to find all data they have put on the drive was lost ! the recovery partition puts the system back to the day it was new in the box >>>>> not recover what YOU had before the machine burped to me; thats not recovery! drive images; now thats recovery!!!!!!!!!!!!! __________________ Even a Broken Clock is Right Twice a Day ! Power Supply Selection LEARN TO BACK-UP YOUR DATA FREE & EASY YouTube - Runtime Software DriveImage XML tutorial

03-11-2008, 08:39 PM	#38 (permalink)
magistr Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Location: Maryland Posts: 60 OS: Windows XP SP3 & Vista x64 Ultimate SP1 My System	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! I agree. Out of the box computers are horribly bloated with software that is not needed. Some computers even ship with known spyware/malware installed! __________________ ...I wanna go fast! - Ricky Bobby, Talladega Nights

03-12-2008, 02:59 PM	#39 (permalink)
RazgrizSeed Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 56 OS: Windows XP Media Center Edition	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! ARG! It didn't work. Some issue related with my model of laptop. I'm waiting on an update from CMS. The program did work, and it was pretty cool (minus the internal speaker beeps). I thought my hard drive was truly 119 GB but it's actually 120.03 GB! Woohoo! 30 extra MB!

03-18-2008, 12:13 PM	#40 (permalink)
RazgrizSeed Registered User Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 56 OS: Windows XP Media Center Edition	Re: Help! New hard drive thinks it is half its true size! I reflashed/updated my BIOS (considering that was what I was told to do). I was worried about my laptop becoming a "boat anchor," but dell has integrated compatibility checks into all their BIOS updaters. I went from an A12 to an A17. I disabled the HPA on my hard drive using LBA 28-bit mode. It seemed to work, considering everything was reading it at 120 GB now. However, when I started Windows, it reverted back to 50 GB with the HPA. Now I have no idea what to do. It's like my BIOS is recalling some script and putting the HPA back or something.