Maxtor 160GB ATA IDE problem

I have a new 160GB Maxtor disk, my bios reports it as 137GB, presumably because of the LBA limitations. There isn't a bios upgrade for my K7AMA mobo. Windoze XP sees the full size of the disk and can partiton with NTFS and/or FAT32 but whatever I do with Knoppix (3.3 rel 2004-02-16) I can't seem to make it happy with my hard drive. Has anyone any suggestions please? I would ideally like to HD install and then setup my Alcatel Speedtouch330 DSL modem. I've been searching for help with both these problems, I've found a lot of suggestions to get the modem working but obviously I'd like to get the HDD problem sorted first. Any clues would be greatly appreciated, "H"

You might want to look at:
http://www.dewassoc.com/kbase/hard_d...e_barriers.htm

Seems like the Maxtor 160 used to ship with a controller card for old systems, but nowadays they probably charge extra for it :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Markus

You might want to look at:
http://www.dewassoc.com/kbase/hard_d...e_barriers.htm

Seems like the Maxtor 160 used to ship with a controller card for old systems, but nowadays they probably charge extra for it :(

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Thanks for the above, a very useful and interesting link.
I read what they have about size limitations and it lead me to Maxtors own info. on the topic. Basically it seems there are 3 solutions (unless Knoppix or Linux offers an alternative? PLEASE!).
1) Use WindozeXP with Maxtors "Big Drive Enabler" - yes this fixes the problem in Windoze - but not Knoppix.
2) Download and Install: The Intel Application Accelerator which provides 48-Bit LBA compliant ATA/ATAPI controller drivers (IntelATA.mpd) BUT only if you have an Intel chipset (guess what... mines ALI M1645!)
3) Buy an Ultra ATA adapter card OR a new mobo - if only I had the money, unfortunately I just spent my savings on a new 160Gb hard drive!

Maybe Knoppix3.4 with the latest Linux Kernel will provide the solution?

I wait in hope for a solution, meanwhile I can still use 128GiB or 137GB of my disk.

Regards "H"

P.S. Scan had a Highpoint Rocket Accelerator on their "Today Only" page at the weekend, so I dug deep and bought one (only £14.68 ) I now have a much faster and complete 160Gb+ disk. I've decide to use my original 45Gb disk just for Linux so I'm now going to set it up to dual-boot.