WD hd started reporting wrong size

  • Thread starter Thread starter Jorabi
  • Start date Start date
J

Jorabi

WD400, master w/cable select. 40GB with XP and FAT32.

Suddenly reporting itself as an 8.4GB drive with no
partitions! Tried in more than one PC that definitely
support larger HDs.

Is everything lost? I hear it power/spin up without
clicking.
 
Jorabi said:
WD400, master w/cable select. 40GB with XP and FAT32.

Suddenly reporting itself as an 8.4GB drive with no
partitions! Tried in more than one PC that definitely
support larger HDs.

Is everything lost? I hear it power/spin up without
clicking.
Click to expand...

How old is the computer? When was the last time that the CMOS battery
was replaced? In addition, was a bios overlay used for installation of
Windows XP? If Windows XP was an upgrade, what was the prior OS?
 
Jorabi said:
WD400, master w/cable select. 40GB with XP and FAT32.

Suddenly reporting itself as an 8.4GB drive with no
partitions! Tried in more than one PC that definitely
support larger HDs.

Is everything lost? I hear it power/spin up without
clicking.
Click to expand...

Sounds like you are using a drive overlay manager on this drive. The drive
is not being read at boot, so the software never loads. This would limit an
old computer to an 8gig drive, depending on the BIOS.

Check the BIOS to see if the drive is still configured there. If the BIOS
settings were lost, the PC may be using different geometry to read the drive
now.
 
...
D/load the HD test tools, and run them on the drive.
http://support.wdc.com/download/downloadxml.asp
Click to expand...

Every version of WD diagnostics and Data Lifeguard tools
that I've tried report the drive is a WD102BB 8.45GB, even
though the drive is a WD400. Then the software crashes
with hex dumps on the screen (version 11.0), or Error 0132
(version 11.2 and 11.3).

Their kb says that 0132 means that some drives can't be
used with some diag versions, so I went backward in versions.
 
...

Sounds like you are using a drive overlay manager on this
drive. The drive is not being read at boot, so the software
never loads. This would limit an old computer to an 8gig
drive, depending on the BIOS.
Click to expand...

The BIOS also reports the drive is a WD102BB 8.5GB. Shouldn't
the BIOS be correct regardless of a boot manager being used?
Check the BIOS to see if the drive is still configured
there. If the BIOS settings were lost, the PC may be using
different geometry to read the drive now.
Click to expand...

Would that be the case if the BIOS still sees the drive, but
now it thinks it's a different type of drive?
 
WD400, master w/cable select. 40GB with XP and FAT32.
The BIOS also reports the drive is a WD102BB 8.5GB. Shouldn't
the BIOS be correct regardless of a boot manager being used?


Would that be the case if the BIOS still sees the drive, but
now it thinks it's a different type of drive?
Click to expand...

Check the label on the drive... I'm not the only one who stuck the wrong
drive into a chassis.

: )

But barring that, if the CMOS is autodetecting it wrong, it sounds like teh
drive is failing.
 
Check the label on the drive... I'm not the only one who stuck
the wrong drive into a chassis.
Click to expand...

:) Definitely the WD400! I have another WD400 which works fine
and detects properly in the same pc. Only difference is the mfg
date (bad one is 2001, good one is 2005).
But barring that, if the CMOS is autodetecting it wrong, it
sounds like the drive is failing.
Click to expand...

:( Do HDs have firmware that is reloadable?
 
Jorabi said:
...

:) Definitely the WD400! I have another WD400 which works fine
and detects properly in the same pc. Only difference is the mfg
date (bad one is 2001, good one is 2005).


:( Do HDs have firmware that is reloadable?
Click to expand...

Yes, there have been flash upgrades for hard drives. But the drive
was working, so I wouldn't focus on that right now.

A couple of things come to mind.

1) I had one hard drive failure, where the declared size of the disk
changed one day. It was a 40GB drive, and it changed to 10GB. I
believe the identity info was different, too. It seems, that the
full identity of the drive, was contained on a platter. I don't know
if all drives work that way, but the size change could be a sign that
some critical data is no longer readable from the platter. In my case,
no data was recoverable after that.

2) Check your jumper plugs. There is a jumper that can be used to
restrict a drive to 32GB size. But in fact, if the jumper is present,
the size is interpreted differently. Depending on the age of the
BIOS, the clip jumper can make the drive look like 2GB, 8.4GB, or 32GB
or so. I was reading this on a forum just a day or two ago, but
cannot find it now. In any case, I'd check for the limit or clip
jumper. Sometimes, that jumper is not documented on the hard drive
label, and you have to go to the manufacturer web site, to get
a full description of all jumpers. It could be you moved the jumper
off by one position.

I would want to place the drive, into another computer, and see if the
BIOS identifies it in the same strange way.

Paul
 
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