richardhula Posted July 15, 2008 Report Share Posted July 15, 2008 Recently fitted a larger WD2500BEVE 250GB IDE hard drive to my Acer TravelMate 8006LMi laptop running XP Pro + SP3.The drive is partitioned into three under NTFS. Initially after boot only the first 131GB (first two partitions) is seen, suggesting 48bit LBA issue (this size is right on the older 24-bit LBA limit). After cycling machine through standby, if I check again using any hard drive info tool, the full size of hard drive is shown & I can access the third partition normally, i.e. the partition table is read correctly & accepted. In fact to get the drive working initially within my machine I had to format & load system files across from my old drive using only the first 131GB, with the remaining space left unallocated, otherwise the drive would not mount. When extra space appeared (after standby) I was able to create third partition & use it normally.All tests I run including using HDInfo from 48bitlba.com website indicate that BIOS, drivers & system all have 48bit LBA enabled. I thoroughly checked the drive before installing whilst in USB caddy, including the full Western Digital diagnostic taking nearly three hours. No errors found so I don't suspect drive itself, especially as the intermittent problem reproduces consistently after boot & then clears after using standby.I suspect a registry tweak will fix this issue. Any suggestions?Regards - Richard Wood Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-pops- Posted July 15, 2008 Report Share Posted July 15, 2008 It's a long time since I've come across 48bitLBA. I thought it had gone by the wayside after the introduction of SP2 in XP and the overcoming of the hard dive size restriction imposed by the earlier versions of Windows.I have three machines each of which have hard drives in excess of 320GB and I also build computers for others, including for my son's business purposes and I've never had to worry about this aspect of block addressing since SP2 (and not at all on Vista).My point is that I'm not sure what you are trying to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
richardhula Posted July 15, 2008 Author Report Share Posted July 15, 2008 It's a long time since I've come across 48bitLBA. I thought it had gone by the wayside after the introduction of SP2 in XP and the overcoming of the hard dive size restriction imposed by the earlier versions of WindowsSo did I, but it may not be the issue although can't help but think it's relatedMy point is that I'm not sure what you are trying to do.Simply to be able to use the full drive reliably at all timesRichard Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
richardhula Posted July 16, 2008 Author Report Share Posted July 16, 2008 Extra info:This is situation after re-boot or recovery from hibernate:Full drive not seen/available This is situation after recovery from standby:Full drive available :D100% reproducableRichard Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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