Need help formatting unallocated hdd space

[blaze739]

hey guys,
i recently installed windows xp service pack 1 on a new system i built.  I have a 250GB hdd but as we all know, old versions of XP can only read 131gb.  so i updated to sp2 and now it shows my hdd is 250GB, but only 131gb are usable because the rest isnt formatted.  i ran disk management and selected to format all the unallocated space to a new X: drive.  however as soon as the formatting finished, the computer crashed.  i couldnt get it to boot again until i shut off the machine and turned it back on.  now it shows the X: drive in My Computer, but it still isnt formatted.  i tried formatting it again as NTFS by right clicking but again it crashed upon completion.  does anyone know what i can do to get the rest of my hard drive space usable?  thanks alot for the help

[patio]

If the machine has a floppy drive you could DLoad a WinME file from bootdisk.com. Extract the file to a clean floppy to create the bootdisk and then put it in and re-boot.
You could then run FDisk to create the partition with the unused space and then when it's done format it also from the bootdisk.
Then remove the floppy and re-boot and you should have a second partition containing the un-used space.

An Excellent FDisk tutorial can be found Here

[blaze739]

thanks a lot.. ill install a floppy drive and give it a shot.. would it be possible to burn the file to a cd and boot with the cd install so i dont have to install a floppy?

[patio]

Yes. Depending on the burner program you are using the procedures are a little different. You will find the documentation at the bootdisk site...
Did you look at the FDisk tutorial yet ? ?
You don't want to accidently FDisk your existing drive...you will lose all your data.

[blaze739]

no but thanks for the warning. i'll review it carefully and try formatting tomorrow

[patio]

There are third party programs that claim they can combine partitions without data loss but i've had issues with them so i don't recommend that route for everyone.
The safest way if you want it all one drive would be to use an imaging program such as Acronis True Image or Ghost and burn the image after verifying it to CD/DVD.
Then using FDisk delete the existing partitions and re-create the drive with one 250G partition.
But you could always just use the other partition for syorage. You may find it very handy this way.
Let us know either way...

[blaze739]

Well i've tried everything.  i used partition magic to add the unallocated space to my C: drive and that didnt work.  i tried to create two separate partitions but that didnt work.  i tried slipstreaming my xp cd to include sp2 so i could do a clean install with one 250GB partition but that still didnt work.  It seems like windows can only handle a drive thats 131GB.  even thought it acknowledges the rest of my harddrive, once i format it it crashes.  it would format completely, but the instant it reaches 100%, i get an error saying it couldnt format the drive and then goes to blue screen.  i figure its either my windows cd, the harddrive, or the mobo but i dont know what else to do.  im running a Gigabyte p35-ds3l mobo with 250gb SATA Seagate hd on windows xp pro. if anyone can help me that will be awesome

[patio]

For slipstreaming and unattended install CD's i highly recommend NLite

Works for me complete with a tutorial.

Let us know.