LBA mode & SATA drives not visible?

ABTsportsline

Solid State Member
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18
Hi guys,
Quick recap - i had Vista loaded on my PC and two SATA drives - a WD 250 Gb and a Maxtor 300 Gb. both were setup just fine on Vista. However, my Vista version was just so buggy i finally gave up and decided to put XP Pro back on my computer. The Maxtor 300 Gb drive was my data drive with all my files - the WD 250 was the standard windows files. So i re-load XP Pro, and now (with the same hardware), i have lost LBA mode (Windows only "sees" 137 Gb of the drives.
I can see the maxtor and navigate it, however there are NO files on it and it is only 137 Gb.... what happened to my files? can i recover them? what is the best freeware file recovery software? Now if i use the Maxtor utility disk that came with the drive, it wants to format it right off the bat - no other options.... i don't want to format it though, as its FULL of my information (all my music, photos, videos, documents, what have you). The information is there, it was setup properly under Vista. i didn't delete or change anything.
The hardware i'm using: Biostar TForce 550 mobo, 3 Gb RAM, AMD 4200, etc, etc, etc.... also running SP2. Bios is updated with latest.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Both drives are SATA and ran JUST FINE under Vista.... so i doubt its a hardware error. I think there is something different required with setting it up under XP Pro (i have never had this setup under XP - i purchased these HDs and set them up under Vista.)

ANY help is greatly appreciated. i tend to think it has something to do with LBA mode, but everywhere i've searched has turned up fruitless.
 
Have you installed SP2? Also, im not to sure about Vista but it might use a different file system to XP, im sure someone will tell ya. Also, whats it say about your drives in computer management?
 
yeah i have SP2.

if i go to "manage" after right-clicking my computer, i can get to drive manager.

there it sees both drives, and even reports correct drive size. however if i "explore", it doesn't see my files (empty), and it only shows it as 128 Mb in size. ???
 
Does it say the drives are Basic and online in disk management, or something different?
 
here where it is weird.... it says they are all Basic, NTFS. in the top window pane, where it gives the "detail" view, it shows my main C drive (the WD250) as being 128 Mb, healthy, and system.

My "D" drive, (the maxtor300) shows as NTFS, basic, healthy (active), and 128 Mb.

Now, if i look in the lower pane, which gives the bar graph showing disk size, it shows Disc 0 being "basic", and 232.88 Gb (this would most likely be the WD250). It is broken into two sections: C: being 128 Mb (i guess windows automatically partitioned this during load, because i never specified), then a second "unallocated space" which i just setup as another partition, being volume "L" and 105 Gb. no big deal, this is all on the WD250.

Now it shows "Disc1" beneath that, and it says it is 279.48 Gb (this is the maxtor 300), and it shows it as "D:" and displayes a full 279.48 Gb NTFS there.... but up above in the details view it only shows 128 Mb. and again, if i "explore", its empty.
 
well there are conflicts to unrelated equipment (something USB). no conflicts to the hard drives and they both appear ok in the DM
 
What version of vista were you using? How exactly did you install XP, was it a clean install. Also did you use bitlocker drive encryption on the drives?
 
i was using Vista RC1 - i got it when it was first released in like June of last year. (buggy). i moved back to Windows XP Pro, did a clean install.

no idea what bitlocker drive encryption is... so i would guess no, i didn't use it, unless it is automatic
 
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