Installing a DDO... HOW!?! Please help

[Mark M]

Well, you hold the key to that: stop asking
questions where you yourself hold the answers.


Presumably because of that article below.


That is what it says.


Presumably WinXP is acting holier than the Pope by preventing
you from creating partitions that might not be fully accessible
from other LowLevel OSes like DOS or bootable applications that
depend solely on the BIOS.


Well, there you go again, asking questions where you hold the
answer yourself. Does it or doesn't it?

Thanks Folkert. I had got the impression from your other posting in
this message <that it was possible for the BIOS not to be able to see more than
137GB and for the OS to see more than 137GB.

You can partition the drive in a 137GB partition and a rest
partition. The 137GB partition will be fully available from
DOS/BIOS. The rest partition can be backed-up from within the
OS. Partitioning should be done from within the OS that can see
the full drive.

I guess that last sentence of yours does not apply to WinXP because
from what we have just said WinXP needs 48 bit support from the BIOS
to be able to see above 137GB and that is exactly what the original
poster (and I) do not have. Maybe some other OS can see the full
drive without BIOS support?

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

I find that debatable.

Does it or doesn't it?
Well?


Thanks Folkert. I had got the impression from your other posting in
this message <that it was possible for the BIOS not to be able to see more than
137GB and for the OS to see more than 137GB.

Yes, and?

I guess that last sentence of yours does not apply to WinXP

Oh, and why is that?

because from what we have just said WinXP needs 48 bit support from the
BIOS to be able to see above 137GB.

Nope, that is not what we said. We only agreed that that is in that article.

and that is exactly what the original poster (and I) do not have.
Maybe some other OS can see the full drive without BIOS support?

How about WinXP? Did you try?
Oops, forgot, you don't try, you ask questions, asking someone else
to try it for you.

 

[Mark M]

I find that debatable.



Well?

PM8 can not see the partition I created using Bootit. Nor can PM see
any of the additional partitions created using XP's disk management
utility.

Between that and launching PM a second time and also changing the
volume labels using Windows Explorer, all of the partitions were
lost.

So if I may ask my original question again .. does PM have problems
because of lack of support from my BIOS?

Yes, and?

"Yes, and?" And if I ask XP to see beyond 137GB then in certain
cicumstances I may lose all of my partitions on that drive (see
above) due to unknown causes. So, Mark, why not post to csiphs and
see if anyone knows about this because losing 160GB of data is not
something you want to do. Heh!

Oh, and why is that?

Why? Because your statement does not name WinXP explicitly and may
be a reference to Linux and such other OSes. The Microsoft article
seems on my reading, for some reason, not to support what you write.

Nope, that is not what we said. We only agreed that that is in
that article.

OK, let me try and follow this. We agree that that is what is
says in the article. You seem to say that although the article seems
(to me) to say that XP needs 48 bit BIOS support that in fact XP does
not really need this. Am I right in saying that you think the
article is either wrong or misleading?

How about WinXP? Did you try?
Oops, forgot, you don't try, you ask questions, asking someone
else to try it for you.

Not at all. As you can see above. I particularly don't want to lose
all my partition spanning nearly 160 GB when they are being used to
carry live data. Can't see anything wrong with trying to prevent
that and to understand what ubnderlies any problems which may occur.

It seems to me that you know the answers to somwe of these points so
maybe you can advise me.

 

[a user]

OK, let me try and follow this. We agree that that is what is
says in the article. You seem to say that although the article seems
(to me) to say that XP needs 48 bit BIOS support that in fact XP does
not really need this. Am I right in saying that you think the
article is either wrong or misleading?


Not at all. As you can see above. I particularly don't want to lose
all my partition spanning nearly 160 GB when they are being used to
carry live data. Can't see anything wrong with trying to prevent
that and to understand what ubnderlies any problems which may occur.

It seems to me that you know the answers to somwe of these points so
maybe you can advise me.

I am running a wd 160 gig drive and installed about 2 weeks ago.

WD came included an ide adapter card, instructions and drivers for 2k/xp.

The instructions say to install the adapter after doin the needed settings
on the drive; install 2k or xp and press the f6 (?) when asked if added
drivers are needed and install the drivers when prompted and use the
"unsigned" driver from the wd diskette drivers.

2k/xp install worked (had to install 2k 1st as my xp is an "upgrade".

A problem was encountered after the initial part of the install of xp
as it couldn't find the drive (!!!!); I then removed the adapter and
connected it back to the motherboard which I had updated the bios to
handle 160 gig drives. The rest of the xp install went fine; the
1st 120 gig is xp (29 & 85 gig) and the last approx 40 gig is linux.

I believe that 2k/xp doesn't do 160 gig is that the "m$" drivers are
not available and appears not forthcoming until the next "upgrade"
for a price. Even tho my bios was 160 gig capable, xp still could not
see more that the 137 gig until the driver install.

If I had known, I would have just started with an install of the drivers
for 2k/xp and not go thru using the adapter...oh, the adapter is a
Promise Ultra 100 card.....

You need to check if your mb has a 160 gig bios upgrade and find who
made the chipset for the mb ide controller (usually promise?) and then
also check if the harddrive mfg has 160 gig drivers.....

If no mb bios update, then an adapter card would probably be needed
in conjunction with newer drivers than supplied or acknowledged by m$.

 

[Rod Speed]

I am running a wd 160 gig drive and installed about 2 weeks ago.

WD came included an ide adapter card, instructions and drivers for 2k/xp.

The instructions say to install the adapter after doin the needed settings
on the drive; install 2k or xp and press the f6 (?) when asked if added
drivers are needed and install the drivers when prompted and use the
"unsigned" driver from the wd diskette drivers.

2k/xp install worked (had to install 2k 1st as my xp is an "upgrade".

A problem was encountered after the initial part of the install of xp
as it couldn't find the drive (!!!!); I then removed the adapter and
connected it back to the motherboard which I had updated the bios to
handle 160 gig drives. The rest of the xp install went fine; the
1st 120 gig is xp (29 & 85 gig) and the last approx 40 gig is linux.

I believe that 2k/xp doesn't do 160 gig is that the
"m$" drivers are not available and appears not
forthcoming until the next "upgrade" for a price.

Thats just plain wrong.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;303013

Even tho my bios was 160 gig capable, xp still could
not see more that the 137 gig until the driver install.

If I had known, I would have just started with an install
of the drivers for 2k/xp and not go thru using the adapter...
oh, the adapter is a Promise Ultra 100 card.....

That approach is doable, but it makes
more sense to do it the other way.

You need to check if your mb has a 160 gig bios upgrade and find
who made the chipset for the mb ide controller (usually promise?)

You're confusing the standard motherboard IDE
controller and the motherboard RAID controllers.

and then also check if the harddrive mfg has 160 gig drivers.....

If no mb bios update, then an adapter card would probably be needed
in conjunction with newer drivers than supplied or acknowledged by m$.

Thats just plain wrong too.

 

[Bill Funk]

I believe that 2k/xp doesn't do 160 gig is that the "m$" drivers are
not available and appears not forthcoming until the next "upgrade"
for a price. Even tho my bios was 160 gig capable, xp still could not
see more that the 137 gig until the driver install.

That's wrong.
I have a 160 Gig and a 200 Gig drive, both on an ABIT AT7 mobo with XP
Pro. They are both on the RAID channels.
With the RAID drivers loaded (necessary for ANY drives to be seen
while on the RAID channel), XP sees them just fine.

 

[J.Clarke]

As another poster implied, I missed reading all of the original
posting saying that the problem was with RAID; my xp was done on a
"regular" IDE drive system. AND my older MSI PRO-2A with the updated
160 gig bios saw all the 160 gig BUT the XP Pro only recognized 137
gig when the 160 gig drive was 1st installed.

If there is a difference between the RAID and IDE drivers for the
160 gig drives, then m$ is still in the wrong. The doc that came
with my WD 160 gig (jb model) states that windows 98, nt me 2k, xp
"do not have native support for hard drives larger than 137 GB".
The doc also says that ScanDisk or DeFrag may not handle more than
137 gig and could cause data loss.

I don't see how Microsoft is "in the wrong". The limit is on the
standard IDE driver, and this limit exists mainly because there was no
standard for large IDE drives when XP shipped. If there is such a limit
due to a third party driver that is the fault of whoever developed the
driver. Windows has been used with large SCSI drive arrays that appear
as single drives as large as several terabytes for years--there's
nothing inherent in Windows that prevents the use of large drives, just
as long as you have a driver that supports them.

There is a patch for XP to correct this, which patch can be downloaded
from Microsoft's Web site at no charge, and there is a procedure
published on the Microsoft site for installing from a patched version,
so Microsoft has done about all they reasonably can to deal with it.

 

[a user]

That's wrong.
I have a 160 Gig and a 200 Gig drive, both on an ABIT AT7 mobo with XP
Pro. They are both on the RAID channels.
With the RAID drivers loaded (necessary for ANY drives to be seen
while on the RAID channel), XP sees them just fine.

As another poster implied, I missed reading all of the original posting
saying that the problem was with RAID; my xp was done on a "regular"
IDE drive system. AND my older MSI PRO-2A with the updated 160 gig
bios saw all the 160 gig BUT the XP Pro only recognized 137 gig
when the 160 gig drive was 1st installed.

If there is a difference between the RAID and IDE drivers for the
160 gig drives, then m$ is still in the wrong. The doc that came
with my WD 160 gig (jb model) states that windows 98, nt me 2k, xp
"do not have native support for hard drives larger than 137 GB".
The doc also says that ScanDisk or DeFrag may not handle more than
137 gig and could cause data loss.

Whatever, when I tried to do a fresh install of xp pro onto an
unformatted drive(?) because I expected to have the xp install
to prompt for partitioning and formatting, xp pro only said that
only 137 gig was available when I didn't use the provided IDE controller.

 

[Bill Funk]

As another poster implied, I missed reading all of the original posting
saying that the problem was with RAID; my xp was done on a "regular"
IDE drive system. AND my older MSI PRO-2A with the updated 160 gig
bios saw all the 160 gig BUT the XP Pro only recognized 137 gig
when the 160 gig drive was 1st installed.

If there is a difference between the RAID and IDE drivers for the
160 gig drives, then m$ is still in the wrong. The doc that came
with my WD 160 gig (jb model) states that windows 98, nt me 2k, xp
"do not have native support for hard drives larger than 137 GB".
The doc also says that ScanDisk or DeFrag may not handle more than
137 gig and could cause data loss.

The RAID drivers are required because XP doesn't know how to handle
the RAID natively. It has nothing to do with the drive size.

Whatever, when I tried to do a fresh install of xp pro onto an
unformatted drive(?) because I expected to have the xp install
to prompt for partitioning and formatting, xp pro only said that
only 137 gig was available when I didn't use the provided IDE controller.

That's a function of the chipset on the Mobo instead of XP.
The controller card has the firmware to handle the larger drive size.

I should probably add that XP's SP1 is required for this.
Those who are using XP without SP1 are only asking for trouble. SP1
should be considered a necessity for using XP.

 

[J.Clarke]

And how does one turn on support for drives over 137 GB
for a NEW xp install on a NEW harddrive that has no os?

You have to do a multiple step process using a second drive and the
sysprep utility. Q303013 summarizes the procedure--essentially you
install XP on a second drive, install SP1, do what is described, run
sysprep, copy the resulting image to the target drive, and then boot up
off the new drive, enter the required information, and you should be
there. The procedure is really intended for large-scale corporate
deployments but it works to set up a single machine.

 

[Rod Speed]

As another poster implied, I missed reading all of the
original posting saying that the problem was with RAID;
my xp was done on a "regular" IDE drive system.

I wasnt saying anything about RAID as far as
support for drives over 137GB in XP is concerned.

I JUST said that MS does support those drives in XP NOW.

AND my older MSI PRO-2A with the updated 160 gig
bios saw all the 160 gig BUT the XP Pro only recognized
137 gig when the 160 gig drive was 1st installed.

The MSKB article does say that support for drives over
137GB has to be turned on in XP. Did you do that ?

If there is a difference between the RAID and IDE drivers
for the 160 gig drives, then m$ is still in the wrong.

They aint wrong at all. You are.

The doc that came with my WD 160 gig (jb model)
states that windows 98, nt me 2k, xp "do not have
native support for hard drives larger than 137 GB".

Thats correct in the sense that you do need SP1 with XP.

The doc also says that ScanDisk or DeFrag may not
handle more than 137 gig and could cause data loss.

And thats not specific to XP.

Whatever, when I tried to do a fresh install of xp pro onto an
unformatted drive(?) because I expected to have the xp install to
prompt for partitioning and formatting, xp pro only said that only
137 gig was available when I didn't use the provided IDE controller.

What did you do about SP1 and enabling support for those large drives in XP ?

 

[a user]

I wasnt saying anything about RAID as far as
support for drives over 137GB in XP is concerned.

I JUST said that MS does support those drives in XP NOW.


The MSKB article does say that support for drives over
137GB has to be turned on in XP. Did you do that ?

And how does one turn on support for drives over 137 GB
for a NEW xp install on a NEW harddrive that has no os?

I didn't see any prompt for settings
during the install process; if the support is to be
turned on AFTER the install, I am still correct in saying
that xp has no native support. SP1 doesn't exist on my
cdrom as it wasn't available until a time AFTER I got
xp.

They aint wrong at all. You are.


Thats correct in the sense that you do need SP1 with XP.

Then I'm correct in the xp install with MY xp cdrom as
xp version don't have the SP1 already patched in. The use
of SP1 doesn't help when install xp to a FRESH out-of-the-box
harddrive; unless you know of a method to install SP1 before
the "main" xp os.

In your comments, you needed to specify what has to be installed
for xp to see all 160GB; and you keep missing the point that I
was installing xp onto a brand new hard drive out-of-the-box
where the only xp available is the cdrom without SP1.
I have no idea when ms is putting SP1 as part of the xp os
so that the installer won't need to install the SP1 nor do
the "average" person buy another copy of xp just to have the
xp os already updated.

And thats not specific to XP.


What did you do about SP1 and enabling support for those large drives in XP ?

I had thought that xp would be smart enough to use what the bios say
is the large drive; my mistake as I had forgotten that m$ ignores what
the user/customer wants to or have set in the bios configuration,
e.g. the pci irq.

Anyway, I did install the SP1 right after the xp install as I didn't want
the SP1 to mess up any subsequent driver install as in the Matrox drivers
for video or even the m$ own drivers for the trackball explorer. Don't
know the "latest" warnings from m$ but the other SP installs say that
"3rd party" drivers need to be reinstall after installing the SP.

 

[Rod Speed]

And how does one turn on support for drives over 137 GB
for a NEW xp install on a NEW harddrive that has no os?

The simplest approach is to use an XP CD that has SP1
slipstreamed so you basically install XP thats already at SP1.

You dont have to do it that way, you can also enable it as described in
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;303013

I didn't see any prompt for settings during the install process;
if the support is to be turned on AFTER the install, I am still
correct in saying that xp has no native support.

Depends entirely on how you define native support
and your original claim that MS doesnt support
drives over 137GB with XP is just plain wrong.

SP1 doesn't exist on my cdrom as it wasn't
available until a time AFTER I got xp.

It isnt that hard to fix that.

Then I'm correct in the xp install with MY xp cdrom
as xp version don't have the SP1 already patched in.

But your claim that MS doesnt support drives over 137GB
is clearly just plain wrong. That support came with SP1.

The use of SP1 doesn't help when install xp to a
FRESH out-of-the-box harddrive; unless you know
of a method to install SP1 before the "main" xp os.

Thats what the slipstreaming of SP1 onto the CD is about.

In your comments, you needed to specify what
has to be installed for xp to see all 160GB;

I did, I listed that MSKB article. You ignored it.

and you keep missing the point that I was installing
xp onto a brand new hard drive out-of-the-box where
the only xp available is the cdrom without SP1.

Didnt 'miss' that at all, I cited the MSKB article that
tells you how to enable support for drives over 137GB.

I have no idea when ms is putting SP1 as part of the
xp os so that the installer won't need to install the SP1

Its already done that.

nor do the "average" person buy another copy
of xp just to have the xp os already updated.

You dont have to do that to get support for drives
over 137GB which you claimed MS doesnt provide.

I had thought that xp would be smart enough
to use what the bios say is the large drive;

Then you should have read that MSKB article
and discovered that you were wrong on that.

my mistake as I had forgotten that m$ ignores what the user/
customer wants to or have set in the bios configuration, e.g. the pci irq.

Utterly mangled all over again. You can in fact set
that PCI IRQ stuff up in EITHER the bios OR in Win.

Anyway, I did install the SP1 right after the xp install as I didn't want
the SP1 to mess up any subsequent driver install as in the Matrox
drivers for video or even the m$ own drivers for the trackball explorer.

Then you should have done the rest thats spelt out in that MSKB article as well.

Don't know the "latest" warnings from m$ but the other SP installs
say that "3rd party" drivers need to be reinstall after installing the SP.

You dont need 3rd party drivers for internal IDE drives, even those over
137GB if you have installed and enabled SP1 support for drives over 137GB.

 

[Alexander Grigoriev]

Or you can use XP CD with SP1 "slipstreamed" - added into the installation
files. There should be a procedure to do it, described in MS KludgeBase.

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

PM8 can not see the partition I created using Bootit.

At what size?

Nor can PM see any of the additional partitions created using XP's disk
management utility.

That apparently *did* see it. Makes one wonder, doesn't it.

And what happened to
"but the option in XP's Disk Management to partition the new drive is grayed out"?

Between that and launching PM a second time

Which you know how?

and also changing the volume labels using Windows Explorer, all of the
partitions were lost.

Well, it is not uncommon that one needs to reboot after one has partitioned
a drive. Failing that can have annoying consequences when you write to
structures that the OS hasn't updated itself on.

So if I may ask my original question again .. does PM have problems
because of lack of support from my BIOS?

Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. Sofar you haven't done anything with
it except opening the program, if I read you right.

"Yes, and?" And if I ask XP to see beyond 137GB then in certain
cicumstances I may lose all of my partitions on that drive (see
above) due to unknown causes. So, Mark, why not post to csiphs and
see if anyone knows about this because losing 160GB of data is not
something you want to do. Heh!

And how difficult would it be to check that out?

Why? Because your statement does not name WinXP explicitly and may
be a reference to Linux and such other OSes. The Microsoft article
seems on my reading, for some reason, not to support what you write.

Indeed, it doesn't.

OK, let me try and follow this. We agree that that is what is
says in the article. You seem to say that although the article seems
(to me) to say that XP needs 48 bit BIOS support that in fact XP does
not really need this.

Yup. It is suggesting that XP is using the bios to access the drive.
What about drives that are attached to controllers that have no bios
(or have it disabled). They are not supported? I don't think so.

Am I right in saying that you think the
article is either wrong or misleading?

After the mess they made of the same issue for w2k, yes. (Q305098)

There still are some sentences that are conflicting with later sentences.
lso when someone refers to IDE drives specifically as "ATAPI Disk
Drives" that doesnt really help inspire my confidence in the author(s).
And what on earth is an "48-bit LBA 'compatible' BIOS"?

Or in other words, there is still too much chaos for me in that article.

Not at all. As you can see above.

Yes, AFTER I nagged you about that.

I particularly don't want to lose all my partitions spanning
nearly 160 GB when they are being used to carry live data.

Actually the article is quite (superficially) clear on that:

"If you enable 48-bit ATAPI support in the registry and
you have a hard disk that has a capacity that is greater than
137 GB, but you do not have a 48-bit LBA compatible BIOS,
only the first 137 GB of the hard disk are addressable.
The remainder of the hard disk is not used."

Needless to say that I don't trust that sentence either.

Can't see anything wrong with trying to prevent that and to
understand what underlies any problems which may occur.

Then better find out oneself than relying on others.

It seems to me that you know the answers to some of these points so
maybe you can advise me.

No answers, just one line from the W2k article (Q305098) that
actually made sense and nuanced that socalled 'necessary conditions':

"The operating system must be installed on the first partition that
is less than or equal to 137 GB and the rest of the hard disk divided
into one or more remaining partitions when the EnableBigLba registry
value is enabled on a computer without a 48-bit LBA compatible
BIOS that has a hard disk with a capacity of more than 137 GB."