Deleted partition without formatting hard drive....

[Corran]

Hey guys

Right, i'll start at the beginning...

Two days ago my girlfriend somehow downloaded some kind of virus to my system. Norton missed it and said that it couldnt' find anything, despite these random windows opening, trying to connect to the internet. I looked through the registry and couldn't find what was causing it, so i figured, what the hell, i'll just install windows again and delete everything.
So, i put the windows disk in and restarted. I went through the reinstallation up to the point where it asks what partition i want to install windows to! Of course, all my previous windows and software and the like were on the big partition (186gb) So i thought, i'll just delete the partition and make a new one.
I pressed the confirm and the partition disappeared leaving me with 127gb of unpartitioned space. This coincided with the the fact that I had about 60gbs used on the old partition.
So, now i have got a 200gb hard drive tht will only let me access 127gb. Is there anything that i can do to rediscover the extra memory? I've tried using the device manager and the windows interface, but my pc simply tells me that the extra space doesn't exist.

Please help....

Corran

 

[Rik]

If you are using xp, right click on "my computer", select manage, then storage, then disk management, and see if you can re-activate the missing partition there.

 

[Corran]

hey there i just tried what you suggested but it only reads one partition and that is the one i am using, the 127gb one. It doesn't mention the drive having any more unpartitioned space that i could try to use, it's as if the remaining space has disappeared. Funny enough though, if i check the drive in my BIOS it tells me that it is a 200gb drive, so the space must be somewhere....??

Thanks for your help, any other idea's???

Corran

 

[N3051M]

you need to update to winxp service pack 2 to get the full hdd space back. SP1 only takes up to 125gb each partition.
Also read some of those who had similar problems in the hdd section of the forum, relating to the 127gb hdds.. alternativly just do a search for it...

 

[Corran]

Oh smeg...

Well, in that case i'm stuffed because my comp won't install windows xp service pack 2 because when i try it says:
The product key used to install Microsoft Windows may not be valid....blah blah blah...
Annoyingly, i am using the same windows and the same code that i used when i previously installed windows and it worked absolutely fine the first time and i installed SP2 without any problems.

So, basically without SP2 i'm looking at losing 70gb's from my hdd?

Smeg!!

Thanks for your help though, i'll have to find out what it thinks is wrong with my code...

Corran

 

[falconace]

google it... this was an issue that was solved way before service pack 2 was out... i just dont remember what it was.

 

[Coolmatt]

Oh smeg...

Well, in that case i'm stuffed because my comp won't install windows xp service pack 2 because when i try it says:
The product key used to install Microsoft Windows may not be valid....blah blah blah...
Annoyingly, i am using the same windows and the same code that i used when i previously installed windows and it worked absolutely fine the first time and i installed SP2 without any problems.

So, basically without SP2 i'm looking at losing 70gb's from my hdd?

Smeg!!

Thanks for your help though, i'll have to find out what it thinks is wrong with my code...

Corran

Well, call Microsoft up and tell them your problem. They will give you a new key you can use. Problem solved.

 

[Corran]

Yeah will do.

It gives contact details when you do the howtotell.com thing so i'll give em a shout and hopefully end these problems. Thanks to everyone!

Rock on...

Corran

 

[N3051M]

oh yeh.. also try going to the hdd's manufacturer's page.. maybe they also have the registry fix for it.. but i cant remember what SP it was for.. worth a look though..

and alternatively you can partition the 70gb for apps or storage.......

 

[Samstoned]

this should be in service pk 1 so sounds like boot leg disc
or a bad install HAHA
heres one I saved awhile back from this group
1. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe).
2. Locate and then click the following key in the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Atapi\Parameters
3. On the Edit menu, click Add Value, and then add the following registry value:
Value name: EnableBigLba
Data type: REG_DWORD
Value data: 0x1
4. Quit Registry Editor.
this is part of what you can edit in bios also enable lba
go to MS website there are a few more fixs you may need

PS:
set your OS up with a 15gb partition and the rest for storage and what not