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LBA-48 support anyone know anything 'bout this

post #1 of 4
12/5/03 at 4:13am
Thread Starter 
OKay i just got a 160GB maxtor for my system and my desktop uses an Epox EP-8K7A AMD 760chipset with a 1.33ghz amd athlon.

the thing is, i'm not sure if the bios supports lba-48bit support and i don't think it does since it was manufactured in 2001ish.

Now the maxtor manual says i must pick one of the two solutions to format/use a drive over 137gb. the first solution is to either have an ata/133pci card that will include lba48 support. the 2nd is to have windows 2000 sp3 update, windows xp sp1 update.

no where did it say i needed a system bios that supports 48-bit lba. i just installed windows 2000 SP4 on my desktop and succesffully split my 160FB into two 80gb partitions. Windows detected it perfectly and it seems like pretty much all 160gb is supported.

however, i just want to make sure, am i going to get data loss/corruption because i do not know if my bios is lba-48 compatible. but can you still see over 137GB if you dunt have an lba-48 bios? so technically its not possible to have a bios not be lba-48bit and have windows be able to see over 137GB right?

or which is which? i just want to make sure because i don't want data corruption/loss.

thanks
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post #2 of 4
12/5/03 at 12:23pm
Well, if you set your BIOS to auto-detect the HD's and it shows up correctly (size-wise) then it's OK. There should also be a setting to configure (manually) the HD's... go in there and do that, and see if LBA is an option.

If it is, just exit WITHOUT saving and you're fine (leaving HD detection on AUTO); if the LBA setting is NOT there, then you might want to invest in a PCI card, unless the loss of GB (to 137) is ok by you.

Also, the reason the updated Windows are requested is, WINDOWS can see larger HD's, even when the BIOS cannot, so you can split them in windows (which effectively ignores the BIOS report)

You will not lose data, because windows will only write to what it see's, and only reads what it see's.

-myrkat
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post #3 of 4
12/5/03 at 3:06pm
Thread Starter 
okay i found out that my bios indeed is NOT LBA-48 compliant.

so basicaly mkrat, what your're telling me is if I have my 160GB maxtor as 1 single partition, windows will recognize it but anything beyond 137gb, i will get data corruption?

and i i split that 160gb into two partitions/two hard drive letters, i.e. C: (80gb) D80gb) which is what i'm doing now, i'll have no problem with the BIOS and windows right?

this is what i'm doing now, i've split the partition into two with partition magic 8.
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post #4 of 4
12/5/03 at 5:20pm
Before you do anything, READ ALL OF THIS - it seems you still need a BIOS-supported 48bit LBA... I misspoke.

Peruse that site thoroughly.

-myrkat
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