320GB drive format to 232GB!???

[dave9296]

I have a 320GB Seagate external harddrive that shows 298GB in the Windows XP Explorer window (as it should) but when I right-click the drive and select "Format..." it only offers the "Capacity" option of 232GB! (as if it thinks I have a 250GB drive).

Is this a Windows problem?

Is there a way for me to format to the full 298GB?


Many thanks in advance for your help!

 

[mscrx]

you could try to boot your computer with the gparted live cd. it is a linux based boot cd with a very good disk utility which will handle, format and partition your drive.
not sure if this is a windows error. I don't have drives larger than 160gig but I didn't hear about a behavior of hdd's like this before.

 

[Tedster]

read: https://www.techspot.com/vb/topic36678.html

 

[mscrx]

its neither 32gig nor 137gig barrier in this case