Another Dell Problem..
 

Don't worry, it's not my dell, it's a friends.

Anyways, time to spill it, I need some help.
It's a Dell OptiPlex GX280 Mid-Mini Tower I believe.

Anyways, he recently had a major hard drive failure, but I got the data back.
But the drive, is unusable, won't stay active, and under a little load (file browsing) for a good 5 minutes, and will crash, trust me, it was a bi-:whistle: to get back 40GB..

Anyways, he bought a Western Digital Blue Caviar 320GB SATA - 7200RPM, from newegg. He also bought two sticks of unbuffered 1GB a stick, 5300 RAM, which I have already installed. (already tried the ram thing, switched back to old ram.. etc)

He has a firewire, linksys wireless, and a video card.
So now here's the problem.

Upon booting, I went into BIOS, and the BIOS recognized the SATA 320GB, no problem.

When getting ready to install XP (Format/Partition Area) [This is the XP boot way], it only sees about 131GB, and not 320GB.
I know it's not a mislabel, because when hooked up on my computer, it detects right around 320GB..

I have tried different SATA ports, etc.

So my question is, why is the Dell only seeing 130GB (during XP installation), while my computer (custom build), can see all 320GB?

Yes, I have already partitioned it as a full 320GB partition, hoping it'd recognize that, format it, repeat, etc, and toss it in as a full format, etc. No go.

One of the dell reps told me to reflash/update the BIOS, but I don't see why that would work, considering the BIOS sees 320GB, while XP says 130...

I don't think it would be the XP CD... or ram... would it?

I need to know! :no:

He must not have a XP disc with service Pack 2 which allows XP to see drives larger then 120gigs. He will have to partition out the extra space once XP is updated. Even updating the BIOS won't fix it as because he's loading an older version of Win XP, its still will not see HDD's beyond 120gigs until SP2. You will also need to format the HDD in NTFS, not FAT32 to be able to use drives larger then 120gigs

Oh really....
So it would be the old CD's fault?
Hm, interesting, I was wondering that when I submitted it, I'll try my SP2 CD when I get home.
Gotta love browsing the web when you're weeks ahead of your computer class :)

IIRC, you can slipstream SP2 into the original installation, and then create a final XP disk. That might get around this problem.

split the drives up into partitions. so then you will see multiple drives in windows but have access to all your space.

Tried that before Ben, forgot to mention it.

Freezebyte got it right on the head, I slapped in my SP2 disk, and it's seeing all 320GB!

I've encountered same thing - had 4 hard drive failures this year on 2 laptops and 2 desktops. Thank goodness for Ghost backups, thats all I can say!!

I upgraded the size of all and wondered why some would see all the new drive and others wouldn't. In most cases it wasn't big deal since I was installing a 160Gb replacement, but still, I'd like to have it all.

Mine are all Dells that don't come with orig XP Discs, but a system restore disc. Can I use the PCs restore disk that saw all 250gb to format the one I really need all the space on? I was under the impression these restore disks were PC specific and couldn't be used on another??

If I can, then since the Ghost image I'm restoring from that PC is SP3, there shouldn't be probs should there??

In my experience, Dell discs should just dump right into whatever HDD is available and not care about the size other then its big enough but with Dells, you just never know for sure either.

Took the easy way out (least amt of time too) and partitioned that drive space above 137gb so I have it all, just in 2 pieces, which is fine, the important thing is having it.

One of the 4 drives I've bought included a CD by WD "Data Lifeguard Tools" and using this, it took about 30sec to make the partition.

Yup, WD also has some goodies on their harddrive..

Glad to hear everythings working for ya!

I don't think slipstreaming sp2 into the cd will help, as the first thing it needs to do is format the drive and copy the files. after it installs windows is when it installs sp2(if slipstreamed). I create custom XP dvds for clients with certain software "slipstreamed" into the build, like firefox, AVG, etc.

Format it as NTFS for the 131gb you have. install xp, install sp3, dell sata drivers, etc. then go into control panel>administrative tools>computer management>disk management and you can expand the partition without having to format it(a feature of the NTFS partition, why you cant use FAT32). You may have to convert it to a dynamic disk before you do so. If that doesn't work you need to use some sort of bootable disk manager. I personally like Apple Disk Utility, but that won't really work for you. I have some stuff up my sleeve incase you need utilities.