Free extra space? check this!!!

[Kynoch]

WD 8gig Xbox hdd, 4.99gb gained.

So much for tomorrow.
Put the seagate drive into a Dell 530 Workstation with 2k pro fully patched installed this time instead of xp.
With the extra partition added on the seagate the Hardware Monitoring built into the Dell bios comes up with a imminent harddisk failure warning on POST but when you continue with the boot into windows in loads up fine and logs in fine too. Usually the hardware monitor is accurate, as the last time it came up with the error the maxtor drive that was in the machine at the time failed shortly after.
Once the extra partition is removed the hardware monitor no longer issues a warning and posts as normal.

So obviously something is changing on the HDD other than another partition being created. Need to look into this more to find out whats going on.
Any1 else having similar problems?

[funnelhead]

i would guess that by forcing the redundant areas to become an available partition you are removing the hard drives ability to redirect bad sectors in the primary partition to this area. This leads to the bad sectors actually registering as non-working space, leading the dell to think this HD is about to fall apart...

[SilentDeath]

Doing this means the drive has NO spare sectors left incase others get damaged. This means if any do, ur hdd will start to shrink, or die, or both. If you do this, I would definatly make sure the drive always runs below 40c to reduce the risk of damage.

Quote form the linux guy, "So this is old news Although the host-protected area (HPA) can be used for insidious purposes such as DRM/CPRM that is completely hidden from the users"
This may be why windows doesnt like it. It may save the auth stuff on the hidden space, and formatting deletes it. when you remove the partition it is able to write it back? I dont know... but thats my guess...
I think for long term, its safe *if your drive is kept cool and you dont move it.* I wont be trying it on mine as I have plently of free space. I do however have a spare 4gb seagate i *might* try it on.

[unrealrocks]

Can I ask - can anyone confirm that this might/might not work on other versions of Ghost?

[dkmech]

Don't think i am going to try it, as i am a bit worried, and i got a 160gb drive recently, so got the space atm. Might have a go on my 3.2gb samsung, if i can be bothered. But i will follow the progress of everyone here - good luck.

[pedigree]

This is ALL <Snip>!!!

If you think that manufacturers could sell drives with more capacity by doing this, that they would??

All that this does is corrupt your partition tables

ie on a 200gb disk

Partition 1 : 0mb to 200gb
Partition 2 : 1mb to 200gb

Sure, it might look like you have 400GB but what you will have is data overwriting itself with data from the other drive.

WARNING - IF YOU DO THIS, YOU WILL DESTROY ALL YOUR DATA ! ! ! ! ! !

As pointed out before, there is unused space on your harddrive but if you think that your 200GB harddrive has 300GB of unused space, then stop smoking what youve been smoking. Unused space like this is used for the internal relocation of sectors found to be bad. The harddrive does this automatically and there is no way that windows can get access to data like this without special software that almost all the drive manufacturers keep to themselves. If you want to play with these sectors, then you'll have to get low level formatting tools to do it. You have been warned and personally, I'll laugh my ass off when someone posts here "it killed all my data"

[dkmech]

I am hoping that people are using clean/spare hard drives. I am pretty sure noone is trusting them with their data, they just get filled with rubbish to see if all is there afterwards.

I think everyone is approaching this VERY carefully and sceptically. We shall soon see what happens.

[spazman]

We ran scan disk and defrag for ages, i would reccomend people dont do this on new/important/expensive drives as it will probably bork them.

[pedigree]

We ran scan disk and defrag for ages, i would reccomend people dont do this on new/important/expensive drives as it will probably bork them.

Hello???!?!?!?!!?

No this WILL NOT bork your disk but IT WILL destory your data. STOP SMOKING WEED and come back to reality

[Stubzz]

pedigree, you got any proof of this? I'm not saying you are wrong, the 500gb claim certainly does sound like it was made outta thin air. Personally I do think it's too good to be true. But no one here is using this to store any important data, unless you include kez installing games (but thats another matter ) At the end of the day you never know for sure unless someone tries, and thats all we are doing.

Worst case scenario its fake, and weve wasted time. Best case some drives capacities can be upped slightly. Even if its only good for tempory storage (due to bad sector relocation etc) then it may stil come in handy sometimes.

[Steve]

Pedigree mate, calm down. I'm doing more tests as we speak (resumed about half an hour ago.)

My 13GB Seagate has a 20GB brother, so unlocking 6GB of space to give me 19GB is quite feasible (the 20GB brother will work out at 19 anyway...) Also, I've seen half-sized drives in a range with all the platters inside them - drive ranges don't use different platter data densities; they use more platters/sides.

I'm guessing for drives that have been sized down as smaller models due to errors or abnormalities this trick will work, but with differing results. Top of the range models probably won't have much leeway.

As for corrupted partition tables, there is a lot of reason to suggest this, but how the hell is another 6GB partition derived from a drive containing 13GB? There's no math or logic behind it!

[Agent]

pedigree - drop the attitude now.

The point of people experimenting is to find out if people are all getting the same results, problems that have occurred, and what was and wasn't successful.
If your not willing to contribute in a polite manner, don't contribute at all.

[Steve]

A bad sector chkdsk pass of the main partition just went by without error - surely if partition tables were nackered chkdsk would be picking up flurries of errors in the MFT?

Anyway I need some tea now, so I'll leave it scanning the extended partition - then go the whole hog and defrag the thing! If there's any errors that's bound the coax them out!

Red Alert 2 still runs too!

[Steve]

OK, the boot sector is nackered on the Seagate as I've just tried to boot from it (first time since mod), but it could be down to the crappy drive.

However I'm more inclined to believe the partition data has messed it up.

I am moving my efforts onto expanding the 6GB drive in that system, as it is a fully functional drive.

I have also found the switch list to GDisk, so I should be able to replicate the bug using just Gdisk rather than the ghost wizard.

[Proplus]

If you think about it, it all doesn't make sense.

If a manufacturer has made a 500Gb HDD, then they would release it out on the market and become a 'first' in sector. Its only now, Hitachi have launched a 400Gb HDD......

[Steve]

I'm with you Proplus - but I'm not testing a 250Gigasmeg drive, I'm testing a 13GB where it's quite feasible for another 6GB to exist, considering its placement within its product range.