Topic: installing hard drive help....

[save]

i bought a western digital 160 gig hard drive a while back and i am having problems installing it.  it comes w/ a ultra ATA controller card so pc's can recognize hd over 137 gig.  when i install the card and start it up and it keeps restarting right before windows starts up?  so i tried it w/ out the controller card and it starts up fine.  but the hard drive doesn't show up in my computer.  when i go into my control panel it shows the hard drive and says it's working fine, but i can't get to it.  i have a feeling that's b/c its over 137 gig and the pc isn't reconizing it.  is there a way i can partition the hard drive so i can have 2 partitions under 137 gig?

Thanks!
justin

[MattD]

If you can see it in Windows, but can't do anything with it, you probably have to format it. Which version of Windows are you using? Do a search on Windows online help for enable large disk support or something of that nature. There is a tweak I had to do in Windows2000 to get that enabled.

-Matt

[Sean Gallemore]

set the master/slave pins correctly?

[save]

i'm running windows xp pro.  ya the master/slave pins are set correctly.  i'll do a search on windows online and see if i can find anything.

thanks,
justin

[Joe w.]

you'll have to partition it when it is bigger than 120 gigs

[save]

this maybe a stupid question but how do u partition it when u can't see it in my computer?

[chase]

i thought i read somewhere that windows XP SP1(service pack 1) corrects for the need of an ata controller card.  could be wrong.

[firmdragon]

check if there's an installation disk.  the last WD hard drive i got had the same type of deal.  i fixed it when i ran the installation disc.

[B]

my idiot friend partitioned his 60 gig hard drive into 8 different drives.  i laughed at him. and then i didnt.
then i started to laugh at him again.  and i continue to.
idiot

[save]

i finally got my pc to start up w/ the controller card installed.  now it's not recognizing the controller card.  when i first started my pc up after installing the card it didn't recognize the new hardware that i installed.  i still need to install the drivers for the card, but i can't figure out how to install it b/c it's not listed in the device manager?  any ideas?

peace,
justin

[Sean Gallemore]

my idiot friend partitioned his 60 gig hard drive into 8 different drives.  i laughed at him. and then i didnt.
then i started to laugh at him again.  and i continue to.
idiot

waits for sparge to chime in

[Cooker]

is there an installation program for the card? if not, you might be able to right-clikc the card'd .inf file and select install. or you might be able to let windows search for new components....  
is there a new entry in device menager for unknown device?
wd should have a knowledge base on their website for this sort of thing, very common problems. most likely, you will have to install the drivers before inserting the card.
if nothing else works, try moving the card to a different PCI slot. sometimes these things need an exclusive IRQ - and i know in many PCs the first slot shares IRQs with the AGP bus

[save]

finally got my hd figured out!  +t to everybody who helped.  it ended up being easier than i had thought.  the instructions that come along w/ the wd hard drives is shit btw.  all i had to do was start up my pc w/ the data lifeguard tools disk in and it recognized my hd and formatted it.

peace,
justin