SATA Hard Drive only shows 9 GB

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I have a used Barracuda 7200.8 – 250 GB SATA hard drive. I use a USB hard drive dock to access it. It only shows 9 GB of space. It was in a HP as the drive is entitled HP RECOVERY – so I am assuming this was the Recovery Partition. How can I remove this partition and then create a new single partition. Thanks.

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It only shows 9 GB of space.

Do you mean 9GB of free space? Does it show used space? More than one partition?

Joe

--Joe

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Do you mean 9GB of free space? Does it show used space? More than one partition?

Joe

It shows one partition of 9 GB. That is all.

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It shows one partition of 9 GB. That is all.

You didn’t explain which it you used! What does Disk Management show? (Many ways in, Right cick on My Computer, choose Manage, then click on Disk Management; or run diskmgmt.msc in a command prompt window, or Run.)

BATcher

Plethora means a lot to me.

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You didn’t explain which it you used! What does Disk Management show? (Many ways in, Right cick on My Computer, choose Manage, then click on Disk Management; or run diskmgmt.msc in a command prompt window, or Run.)

DISK MANAGEMENT shows the following:

Disk 1 Basic 232.88 GB Online

Then it shows the two partitions as follows:

HP Recovery (E:) 9.50 GB Fat 32 Healthy

(F:) 223.37 GB Healthy (Active)

There is a DELETE PARTITION within the Disk Management options – if I delete both partitions, how do I then create a new single partition?

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There is a DELETE PARTITION within the Disk Management options – if I delete both partitions, how do I then create a new single partition?

See if How to use Disk Management to configure basic disks in Windows XP helps.
Much more technical – Disk Management

Joe

--Joe

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See if How to use Disk Management to configure basic disks in Windows XP helps.
Much more technical – Disk Management

Joe

Using the Disk Management process, I was able to delete both partitions and then created a single partition. Once that was done, I formatted the new partition. I got an error message saying that “the format did not complete sucessfully.” I formatted it a second time and got the same message. When I right click on the hard drive listing and then go to properties, it takes about 5 minutes to finally show it and then it said that all of the space was used (RAW). I think there is a problem with the hard drive and will dump it (properly recycled, of course).

Thanks to all for your help.

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I think there is a problem with the hard drive and will dump it (properly recycled, of course).

You’re welcome. Sorry you went through all that and the drive turned out to be bad.

Joe

--Joe

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Using the Disk Management process, I was able to delete both partitions and then created a single partition. Once that was done, I formatted the new partition. I got an error message saying that “the format did not complete sucessfully.” I formatted it a second time and got the same message. When I right click on the hard drive listing and then go to properties, it takes about 5 minutes to finally show it and then it said that all of the space was used (RAW). I think there is a problem with the hard drive and will dump it (properly recycled, of course).

Thanks to all for your help.

I have two Vista HP Pavilion 3 GB desktop computers, one a dual-core with a 500 GB drive and the other a triple-core with a 640 GB drive. The reason I have two is that I had to leave one behind at one address, so I bought a replacement at the next address. Now the first has caught up with me and I have both. My installed software is worth far more than the computers, which is the reason for not selling one.

I had an installation for the first computer for Vista Ultimate and it had to be installed in full, not as an upgrade to the OEM, hence I had to format the HP drive, exactly as you have tried to do, and I was successful. If you haven’t disposed of the drive, I suggest you hang on to it. I doubt that it is bad. (I don’t think you have merged the partitions, as you seem to think you have done.) You might try to find out if it was for Vista, as that could make a difference.

I will try to post some relevant links or suggestions when I get around to it, but in the meantime, I suggest you perform your own searches. Third-party utilities are often helpful, and if you are lucky enough to find a copy of PowerQuest PartitionMagic 8 you can probably buy it for next to nothing. The company was bought by Symantec and the ‘old’ CDs ended up in computer junk shops.

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DISK MANAGEMENT shows the following:

Disk 1 Basic 232.88 GB Online

Then it shows the two partitions as follows:

HP Recovery (E:) 9.50 GB Fat 32 Healthy

(F:) 223.37 GB Healthy (Active)

There is a DELETE PARTITION within the Disk Management options – if I delete both partitions, how do I then create a new single partition?

At this stage, this looks perfectly normal to me. 9.50 GB is about the same as the HP Recovery partition on my HP Vista, and it is a drop in the bucket relative to the healthy Active partition F:, all of which was available to you. E: is Fat32 where F is NTFS. E: has all sorts of protection and you can’t conveniently explore it, but you should have been able to explore and modify F: with no trouble.

(Ed. by peterg):

I think that what has happened is that you have successfully deleted F, which is fine because it means that F is still there but it is in the form of unallocated free space, which just happens to be what you want if you can format E:. If E is raw, then just try to format it, preferably as NTFS, and giving it a drive letter if it has lost it.

If you succeed at that, then you want to INCREASE FREE SPACE (to the max) on E:, which will combine all of the unallocated free space that was previously F: with the 9 GB that you have on E:. Depending on your planned use, you may find it useful to give the drive a NAME and a dedicated drive letter. Those options can be very useful with external drives, especially if you have more than one.

Because this is a used drive you should run CHKDSK and correct all errors. You may already have utilities with their own versions.

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See [post=”770370″]Post 770370[/post].

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Your intention is unclear. If it appeared that it was the end of the thread, I felt that I might keep it alive because my post was soon enough after the previous post to do so and the drive might not have been trashed for good. If it was to draw my attention to the KB articles, I did read them. I was going chiefly by my 3rd party management program (Acronis Disk Director), with which I am more familiar but for which the principles are the same. My initial comments were to one post, which I said I considered normal, and subsequent paragraphs to the situation at ‘the end’ as it then was (Joe’s post). The reason I felt I had something to offer is that I have an HP computer with a 500 GB drive which has the same partition size for the restore portion, and I successfully converted that in the way in which Trebor is trying to do even, as I recall, with the partition labelled as RAW. If it isn’t physically in the garbage, I suspect it can be saved.

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Since your reply was aimed at an earlier post from Trebor, I was simply pointing out to you that he DID get the drive partitioned into one partition but then could not successfully format that partition. He has concluded that it’s a bad drive and I thought maybe you didn’t notice that post.

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Joperez.
If you still have the drive??

I have saved a few drives with the same or simler problem.
Sounds like it has a bad sector or 2.
If you boot to dos using a boot disc such as win98 [only have the bad drive conected]
Use fdisk and delete all non dos partitions then format it, may fix the drive.
Then it may not.

Gus..

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Joperez.
If you still have the drive??

I have saved a few drives with the same or simler problem.
Sounds like it has a bad sector or 2.
If you boot to dos using a boot disc such as win98 [only have the bad drive conected]
Use fdisk and delete all non dos partitions then format it, may fix the drive.
Then it may not.

Gus..

I never had the drive to begin with.

Thanks for the suggestions though.

Joe

--Joe

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I never had the drive to begin with.

Thanks for the suggestions though.

Joe

Joe.
One of those moments!!

Gus..

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I never had the drive to begin with.

Thanks for the suggestions though.

Joe

Hi Joe, Surprise – surprise. I had not yet recycled the hard drive and was working on another one with my drive dock so I decided to try formatting it again. Using Disk Management, I formatted it again and it came back that the formatting was successful and the drive was “healthy”. So now I have a working 232 GB hard drive. Thanks to everyone who offered suggestions and ideas.

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Hi Joe, Surprise – surprise. I had not yet recycled the hard drive and was working on another one with my drive dock so I decided to try formatting it again. Using Disk Management, I formatted it again and it came back that the formatting was successful and the drive was “healthy”. So now I have a working 232 GB hard drive. Thanks to everyone who offered suggestions and ideas.

That is a pleasant surprise. I’d be sure to back up frequently and if the drive is a SMART drive monitor the status regularly.

Joe

--Joe

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