New hard drive formatting

Worked with basic PCs for many years but am trying the easy task of upgrading a PC with a larger hard drive. I'm am learning that I am a true Novice at this:

Bought WD 500GB hard drive & installed in a Dell Dem4600. Did not format the drive right because now it shows I have 225Gb available space in drive "F". Need to get the HD back to original so I can allocate the entire hard drive. Using XP Home with add-on SP3 later. I have all my original disks; tried the XP start disk (original) but am lost on how to proceed. Can anyone offer suggestions?

Whiskered One
 
Not certain, but you may be up against a bios limitation.
My older Gateway would not recognize the full size of my new drive, because of this.
A work-around may be to partition the drive into three separate "logical drives", keeping each under that limit you have discovered. (Maybe 100-200-200).
In initializing the drive you should be presented and option to partition.
 
My problem is I'm not sure how to change the format and partitioning. I did manage to get the other half of the drive allocated and assigned to C; which it didn't have before. I tried to run Lifeguard before and it only diplayed the "F" drive where I messed up originally.

Can I use Lifeguard to address the multiple drives issue or do I have to use XP? Couldn't get Acronis to install.

I've installed most of the drivers but having a hard time installing SP2 and SP3 on the original windows XP home.

Thanks!

WO
 
The Lifeguard Tools User's Guide has really good directions.
See page six on section three...
Item 4 (at the bottom) addresses multiple partitions.
Note also the Caution on Item 5.

If you are working with a SATA drive, this guide might also be helfpful to you.
I hope this helps you.

However, you may have difficulty now, unless you are willing to start over with your OS installation.
Do you have any data that needs to be retrieved and stored in another location while you work on this drive?
 
I want to add that I do not know how to work with the bios other than what basic Windows allows. I did copy all my original settings on my portable HD.

WO
 
Was your note a response to mine(#4), or an addition to your previous(#3)?

Maybe I am in a fog here, but I am not sure why you are concerned about bios at this point.
 
I had already sent the mail before you replied. I got Lifeguard up but it only shows that I have one drive "F" at 128GB. When I formated the unallocated portion LG named it C: with 128GB and now it doesn't show the other portion at all ("F"). I did get XP installed and working on the new "C" drive but need to try your guide for multiple partitions, although don't know how that will workl.

Worked on it late and finally got Acronis installed this am. Backing up the HD now. I still only show 128GB and am not sure how I will add the hard Drive letters on the remaining unallocated disk space or how to get to it.

I'm still a little lost but, thanks to you, I'm starting to get somewhere. I am on a time frame and was supposed to have this up and running by today. Better half will kill me. I am reading the manual on LG. may need your advise on the multiple partition setup. Glad I found this site!!
Thanks,
WO
 
Addendum to last message I sent: per your reply (#4): I have no problem starting from scratch if that will make things easier. I only have windows and the service packs installed at this time. Please advise which would be easier and best.
Thanks,
WO
 
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