[an error occurred while processing this directive]
| Hard Disk installation guide |
|
( by MS)
|
 |
|
page 2 |
page 3
|
|
One of the supposedly easiest procedures in upgrading a computer is the installation of a new hard disk. Nevertheless, it can give the inexperienced user quite a few headaches or even destroy the new acquisition if the necessary precautions are ignored. One of the most common sources for malfunction originates in the installation software included in most retail hard drives, and in a short moment we'll see why.
|
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
There are several ways of how a new hard drive can be installed and the first steps are usually the same independent of which way you go.
The BIOS has to be configured to enable the detection of the HDD. Almost all new mainboards come now with 2 IDE connectors, each of which is capable of supporting up to two IDE/EIDE devices such as HDD, CDROM or internal Zip drive (IDE version). The devices are configured as either master or slave so that the maximal IDE capacity contains four devices, i.e.:
Primary Master
Primary Slave
Secondary Master
Secondary Slave
The individual role of a given component within this group of four is determined by the channel the device is connected to as well as the jumpers on the device used to configure it as either master, slave or cable select (there are exceptions which also allow the master with slave or master without slave configuration).
In the BIOS settings there is usually the option "CMOS setup" or "main", depending on the make of the BIOS, e.g. "Award" or "American Megatrends". In either case there should be the date, time etc listed as well as several options for the individual master/slave peripherals.
By clicking on the desired device, it is possible to accept one of the options that usually pop up automatically, as long as the device has not previously been "user defined" as "none". Most BIOS versions have further the option PCI/IDE autodetection, which automatically screens the IDE channels for connected devices and usually displays several options about the possible configuration of a given HDD. In most cases, it is necessary to select the option with mode set to "LBA" in order to ensure using the full capabilities of the HDD, even if the numbers for cylinder, heads and sectors are different from those printed on the top of the HDD or the enclosed manual.
After this step has been completed, save the new values to CMOS and exit. The computer will reboot and display the type of HDD in the POST screen.
Still, the new HDD is not accessible and when you type e.g. c:, you get the message in the DOS prompt "invalid media reading drive C". The reason is that the new HDD is not formatted yet. Moreover, the drive is not partitioned and in many cases, there are some limitations to the maximum partition size supported by the file allocation table (FAT). In the case of FAT 16 the limit is 2 Gbyte and even if your HDD is larger than that you cannot use more than this amount unless you divide the total capacity of the HDD into several partitions. In case you use FAT32, this problem does not exist but there may still be some preinstalled factory settings which prevent you from using the full capacity of the HDD. The other possibility is that the BIOS itself does not allow the recognition of more than a certain size which can be either 2Gbyte or 8.4 Gbyte.
Fortunately there are ways to correct this. The easiest way is to use the often included installation software, however, there is a drawback to that procedure. This software often modifies the BIOS and further writes some codes onto the HDD that later are almost impossible to remove. I have ruined myself 2 brand new HDDs like this because the codes at some point started to interfere with W9x and could not be removed completely, even with a routine included in the enclosed utilities called "zero fill" or "write zeroes to all sectors". Thus, my advice is to stay away from these installation packages, even though they are easy to handle, they often turn into a "Pandora's Box" which after a week or two slowly wrecks the HDD because of conflicts with M$ operating systems. Related to this, another drawback of the installation utilities is that HDDs configured with them often only run in "DOS compatibility mode", that is substantially slower than they could. A notable exception appears to be Maxtor's MaxBlast but I have no personal experience with this utility and can rely only on second hand recommendations.
Regarding the size limitation of the BIOS, one way around this is to update the BIOS to the lastest version by flashing it. The detailed procedure is described here. The other possibility is to use the so called "dynamic disk overlay" which are software drivers that overlay the BIOS setting with a set of new instructions in MS-DOS. The major drawback again is that the drives are running in DOS compatibility mode and, further, need to be loaded which can take up to one minute, depending on the overall speed of the system.
|
| => next page => |
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
|
|
|