Putting 40 gig hard drive into a 1996 PC

  • Thread starter Thread starter Adrian C
  • Start date Start date
A

Adrian C

Dureing the weekend, I installed a 40gb Seagate hard drive into
friend's old computer. The date of the BIOS was 1996.

As I was running Fdisk after installing the drive, the program told
me that the BIOS could be configured to recognise the "new large hard
drives bigger than 2gb" and did I want that option? I selected "yes".

Later on, after loading Windows 98, I noticed that as the PS was
booting up (before getting to Windows), the on-screen text reported
the hard drive as being only 8-something gb.

Stupidly, I forgot to note what size Windows reported the hard drive
as. I can't telephone her to ask her, but have to go back next weekend
to finish setting the PC up.

Should I take along any special software to get the PC to report the
size of the hard drive correctly?

Thank you

Adrian
 
Dureing the weekend, I installed a 40gb Seagate hard drive into
friend's old computer. The date of the BIOS was 1996.

As I was running Fdisk after installing the drive, the program told
me that the BIOS could be configured to recognise the "new large hard
drives bigger than 2gb" and did I want that option? I selected "yes".

Later on, after loading Windows 98, I noticed that as the PS was
booting up (before getting to Windows), the on-screen text reported
the hard drive as being only 8-something gb.

Stupidly, I forgot to note what size Windows reported the hard drive
as. I can't telephone her to ask her, but have to go back next weekend
to finish setting the PC up.

Should I take along any special software to get the PC to report the
size of the hard drive correctly?
Click to expand...

PS, does anyone know what kind of RAM a PC of that (1996 approx) age
would take, and how much? It only had one RAM slot.

Thanks again,

Adrian
 
A bios update for that exact motherboard
PS, does anyone know what kind of RAM a PC of that (1996 approx) age
would take, and how much? It only had one RAM slot.
Click to expand...

Download the manual for that motherboard when you download the drivers
and BIOS update.
Thanks again,

Adrian
Click to expand...


--
spammage trappage: remove the underscores to reply

I'm going to die rather sooner than I'd like. I tried to protect my
neighbours from crime, and became the victim of it. Complications in
hospital following this resulted in a serious illness. I now need a bone
marrow transplant. Many people around the world are waiting for a marrow
transplant, too. Please volunteer to be a marrow donor:
http://www.abmdr.org.au/
http://www.marrow.org/
 
You're not going to want to buy memory for that thing. It has to be sdram so
you ought to go to newegg.com or memory.com and look at how much sdram
pc2100 at just 128mb costs. And I am being liberal by saying it is pc2100.

Download this and run it:
http://www.cpuid.com/download/cpu-z-131.zip

It might tell you what your motherboard is and what type of memory is
already in there. I say might because it won't read my pc from 1998,
although it does tell me what chipset and cpu I have. You might get lucky
though.

You should also be able to take a panel off your computer to see if there
are any markings or writings or numbers on the motherboard that might
indicate what you got inside that thing. Also, when you boot up, do you see
anything on the screen that says "bios"?

One more piece of advice. If you haven't already, go to the Windows 98 group
and post your question there about your hdd problem. Your problem was
actually quite common back in the day :)
 
Adrian said:
Dureing the weekend, I installed a 40gb Seagate hard drive into
friend's old computer. The date of the BIOS was 1996.

As I was running Fdisk after installing the drive, the program told
me that the BIOS could be configured to recognise the "new large hard
drives bigger than 2gb" and did I want that option? I selected "yes".

Later on, after loading Windows 98, I noticed that as the PS was
booting up (before getting to Windows), the on-screen text reported
the hard drive as being only 8-something gb.

Stupidly, I forgot to note what size Windows reported the hard drive
as. I can't telephone her to ask her, but have to go back next weekend
to finish setting the PC up.

Should I take along any special software to get the PC to report the
size of the hard drive correctly?

Thank you

Adrian
Click to expand...

The motherboard's BIOS apparently has the 32GB limitation so it numerically
wraps around leaving 8GB. You need to check for a BIOS update.
 
Dureing the weekend, I installed a 40gb Seagate hard drive into
friend's old computer. The date of the BIOS was 1996.

As I was running Fdisk after installing the drive, the program told
me that the BIOS could be configured to recognise the "new large hard
drives bigger than 2gb" and did I want that option? I selected "yes".

Later on, after loading Windows 98, I noticed that as the PS was
booting up (before getting to Windows), the on-screen text reported
the hard drive as being only 8-something gb.
Click to expand...


Look on the drive, it probably has a jumper to limit the size to 32gb.
If you can't find a bios update that you know is right, I'd just use
the jumper and forget about the extra space.
 
That 40 GB harddrive is too large to be recognized by that old motherboard's
BIOS. It will not work.
 
I don't know guys. I have a recent Asus motherboard with the current bios.
Although it has been two years, I remember distinctly having this problem
with Windows 98 with a drive over 40gigs that I tried. I still have the
drive, and there are no jumpers on it limiting its size. XP runs it like it
is supposed to.

Of course, the bios and possible jumpers should be checked anyway just to
say that that is not the problem. But I am pretty sure the problem is a
result of what he selected or did not select when he installed. I just can't
remember the solution. But someone in the Windows 98 group will be able to
tell him.


David Maynard said:
The motherboard's BIOS apparently has the 32GB limitation so it
numerically wraps around leaving 8GB. You need to check for a BIOS update.
Click to expand...
CHRIS HILL WROTE
If you can't find a bios update that you know is right, I'd just use
the jumper and forget about the extra space.
 
Xu said:
I don't know guys. I have a recent Asus motherboard with the current bios.
Although it has been two years, I remember distinctly having this problem
with Windows 98 with a drive over 40gigs that I tried. I still have the
drive, and there are no jumpers on it limiting its size. XP runs it like it
is supposed to.

Of course, the bios and possible jumpers should be checked anyway just to
say that that is not the problem. But I am pretty sure the problem is a
result of what he selected or did not select when he installed. I just can't
remember the solution. But someone in the Windows 98 group will be able to
tell him.




CHRIS HILL WROTE



If you can't find a bios update that you know is right, I'd just use
the jumper and forget about the extra space.
Click to expand...
Even if his mobo bios is limiting him can't he use an overlay?
 
Adrian C said:
Dureing the weekend, I installed a 40gb Seagate hard drive into friend's
old computer. The date of the BIOS was 1996.

As I was running Fdisk after installing the drive, the program told me
that the BIOS could be configured to recognise the "new large hard drives
bigger than 2gb" and did I want that option? I selected "yes".

Later on, after loading Windows 98, I noticed that as the PS was booting
up (before getting to Windows), the on-screen text reported the hard drive
as being only 8-something gb.
Click to expand...
The key thing here is what motherboard is installed in the machine.
Any clues/ideas?

Is the machine a 486 or a Pentium?

It is /probable/ that the limiting factor is the BIOS.

BIOS's in PCs of this age tend to have a limit of 33GB or if you're unlucky
it may be limited to only 8.4GB.

As someone else has said, some (many?) hard drives that size have a jumper
on them that can limit their size (as far as the machine is able to detect)
to 32GB so as to still work with BIOS's that have the 33GB limit.

If you can find out what motherboard you've got then it may be possible to
download a BIOS upgrade from the manufacturers website which /may/ remove
this limitation (or at least push it further up the scale to about 133GB).

If you can't find out what board it is and the drive has no 32GB jumper, or
if the board BIOS is limited to only 8.4GB, then you're probably not going
to have much fun!

Cheers!
 
Xu said:
I don't know guys. I have a recent Asus motherboard with the current bios.
Although it has been two years, I remember distinctly having this problem
with Windows 98 with a drive over 40gigs that I tried. I still have the
drive, and there are no jumpers on it limiting its size. XP runs it like it
is supposed to.
Click to expand...

Well, you might have had the problem with Win95 because it can't handle
over 32 gig, or at least Microsoft won't support it, but Windows 98 will
work if you get the scandisk 32gb fix.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q243450/
 
I had an older pc with an AMD (k6). I guess it could definitely be a bios
thing, but I had a 10gig drive that gave me the same error this guy is
getting when I tried to put windows 98 on it. I am pretty sure I did
something wrong with Fdisk, just like I think the OP did, but my memory sure
is hazy now.
 
can't you get around this with a hard drive controller card?

I remember doing something with a win98 system and a 120gig hard drive on my
son's machine a couple of years ago. It was a software fix that loaded on
the drive if I remember right. Later, it was a real bear to remove it when
we used it in his xp system. It may have been called Easy Bios. I just
googled easy bios but couldn't fine anything relevant.

Mike
 
Xu said:
I had an older pc with an AMD (k6). I guess it could definitely be a bios
thing, but I had a 10gig drive that gave me the same error this guy is
getting when I tried to put windows 98 on it. I am pretty sure I did
something wrong with Fdisk, just like I think the OP did, but my memory sure
is hazy now.
Click to expand...

I don't know what you did to have so many problems with hard drives but
there sure as heck is not a windows98 problem with a 10 gig.
 
Right, which is why I said Fdisk and operator error was probably the
problem. This is also why I said he needs to go to the Windows 98 group with
his problem. Just like me in one instance, I am sure he went wrong with the
Fdisk. And I know enough to know that nothing offered here thus far is going
to solve this guy's problem when he goes back to work on that computer.

Right now he would be better served to go back with a spare hdd that already
has windows 98 installed on it and boots fine.

And if Fdisk is used wrong, there certainly can be a problem with HDD's and
Windows 98.

I did not have so many problems with HDD's. There were just two instances:
one with an old amd (k6) and one with a Pentium 2. Don't distort the thread
and let's stay on focus please and not make this about me.
 
Xu said:
Right, which is why I said Fdisk and operator error was probably the
problem. This is also why I said he needs to go to the Windows 98 group with
his problem. Just like me in one instance, I am sure he went wrong with the
Fdisk.
Click to expand...

Ok. I just don't understand what 10 gig and 40 gig drives have to do with
it if all you're trying to say is he screwed up.
And I know enough to know that nothing offered here thus far is going
to solve this guy's problem when he goes back to work on that computer.
Click to expand...

Sure there is. For him to go get an updated BIOS and flash it so the
motherboard properly handles drives greater than 32 gig.

His BIOS date is 1996. That's a typical problem for a 1996 BIOS.

Right now he would be better served to go back with a spare hdd that already
has windows 98 installed on it and boots fine.
Click to expand...

It won't work either if it's over 32 gig and what does he do with the 40
gig he's got?
And if Fdisk is used wrong, there certainly can be a problem with HDD's and
Windows 98.
Click to expand...

Anything can go wrong but 'accidentally' specifying you want an 8 gig
partition instead of just saying 'yes' to the maximum size question isn't
an easy one to make.
I did not have so many problems with HDD's. There were just two instances:
one with an old amd (k6) and one with a Pentium 2. Don't distort the thread
and let's stay on focus please and not make this about me.
Click to expand...

My mistake. I thought there was some purpose to it.
 
Graham said:
old computer. The date of the BIOS was 1996.
told me that the BIOS could be configured to > recognise the "new
large hard drives bigger than 2gb" and did I want that option? I selected
"yes".
up (before getting to Windows), the on-screen > text reported the hard drive
as being only 8-something gb.
The key thing here is what motherboard is installed in the machine.Any
clues/ideas?

Is the machine a 486 or a Pentium?

It is /probable/ that the limiting factor is the BIOS.

BIOS's in PCs of this age tend to have a limit of 33GB or if you're unlucky it
may be limited to only 8.4GB.

As someone else has said, some (many?) hard drives that size have a jumper on
them that can limit their size (as far as the machine is able to detect) to
32GB so as to still work with BIOS's that have the 33GB limit.

If you can find out what motherboard you've got then it may be possible to
download a BIOS upgrade from the manufacturers website which /may/ remove this
limitation (or at least push it further up the scale to about 133GB).

If you can't find out what board it is and the drive has no 32GB jumper, or if
the board BIOS is limited to only 8.4GB, then you're probably not going to
have much fun!

Cheers!
Click to expand...

Graham:
Can he use something like Partition Magic and create multiple
drives?
Regards
hg
 
harsha said:
Graham wrote:




Graham:
Can he use something like Partition Magic and create multiple
drives?
Regards
hg
Click to expand...

Not if the BIOS doesn't understand drives larger than 32GB because it still
has to know where to put the heads even if it's a separate partition.
 
Yes partition magic is one solution, but there is a huge learning curve
there that I doubt he wants to fool with. If anything, he ought to buy an
older cheap 10gig drive and start over. He could then put that second drive
in as slave, reformat it, and use it for storing files. Install Windows 98
first, and then put in the drive that is messed up now.

Or if he already has windows 98 working on the first drive, he could just go
ahead and slide in a new bigger drive as slave. That would be even quicker.
 
Back
Top