SONY Vaio MBR problem

[Cybercut]

Hello,

I'm trying to install a toshiba MK4018GAP 40GB hard drive into this little machine. THe bios is updated and the bios always posts the HD as
65535MB or C/H/S 22272; 15; 63 (10776MB)
I enter C/H/S as; 16383; 16; 63 (8455MB)

ONE IMPORTANT FACT: I do not have the CDROM for this machine. I have the floppy though.


I've tried Partition magic8, BootBG, MBRtool, another words, I have about 45 disks piled infront of me and nothing seems to get this to boot into anything or save a proper MBR.

It partitions and runds absolutely fine (of course) n my desktop PC with an adaptor and then POOF!, nothing when it goes back into the notebook. I understand that WINxpSp2 hates the HD shuffle from machine to machine, but that is certianly not the issue here.

Toshiba took the drive back at the drive service center and sent it back cleared for take off saying there was nothing wrong.
I do notice when I use the windows MMC snap on for hard drive management that it puts the LBA equivelants in brackets as a note for me.) Still the note book refuses to see the drive or any partitions I've added.

Can anyone please boil this down for me? I'm nuts over it and about to send the HD for a swim in the ocean here in South Miami Beach. The time I've soent certianly outways just buying another drive. But it seems a senseless waste to do that. The original drive. IBM Travelstar 6.49 GB died on the previous owner.

Thanks folks,

Feeling crazy in SOBE.

James

 

[Triple6]

Well it appears your BIOS does not support a 40GB drive. If you have the latest BIOS and it won't detect the drive properly at its full 40Gb capacity then thats your issue. If you can manually set the drive parameters in the BIOS then thats a first step. Then you'll need some drive overlay software to put on the drive to get its full 40GB. If you don't mind loosing 80% of the drive you can just FDSIK and Format the drive at its recognised size of 8GB. Or find a used 8GB drive on Ebay to stick into the laptop.

Partitioning and formatting the drive in another computer is useless. It would work if the BIOS properly supported the drive, which it doesn't. It'll need to be partitioned and formatted in the laptop. Then you could possibly move it to another computer and copy the Windows installation files onto it. I would bother with XP, try Windows 98.

 

[Cybercut]

Nothing works I can find. It read 40GB the first time I put it in the machine. That was the last time though. Has not since. It still thinks its a 65GB dirve for some reason. The only overlay I can't get ahold of is Ontrack. The rest out there I have tried. Seriously. I'm ready to paerweight it or just sell it on ebay and get another of aother brand.

There HAS TO be a better way to have it read the MBR I set to it.
even on auto it reads it as a 65GB drive.

Thanks for your response. If you have a kewl tweak software for this please tip me off.
James....

 

[Triple6]

Leave it on AUTO and Partiton and Format the drive IN THE LAPTOP. FDISK will create the MBR, and then it still won't be bootable until you run the FORMAT C: /s command. Then check the space on the drive. If 40GB then its just some silly BIOS glitch. Don't mess with drive parameters.

Might also help if you post the model of the Vaio.

 

[Cybercut]

SONY VAIO PCG-Z505S ;
http://esupport.sony.com/perl/model-documents.pl?mdl=PCGZ505S&LOC=3

TOSHIBA MK4019GAP
http://www.sdd.toshiba.com/main.asp...0000057c/8182000001b9000000010000659c0000057d

I have the tech PDF, like 65 pages on the drive.

THe bios update is: PhoenixBIOS 4.0 Release 6.0 Copyright 1985-1998 Bios version R0205Z0 from SONY's website.

any form of FDISK, AEFDISK, Partition Boot Manager, leaves it just the way it was, using them in the notebook. I know there is something I'm missing over and over and I wish my brain would see it. I am familiar with hard drive formatting and the like. I work on and upgrade all kinds of disaster-area-0type machines. Most look like the inside of a shop vac and they go out, good as new and upgrated. Never saw such an animal. Like I said, and yourself, I can certainly get another drive. But why? LOL I'm teased by this.

Again thanks. Send aspirin.

 

[Triple6]

I don't fully understand. What happens when you run FDISK? Does it see a hard drive? Does it let you create a Primary Partition? Are you able to format the drive after running FDISK and rebooting?

 

[Cybercut]

when I try to run FDISK it aks the normal ...full capacity? "Y" , you must reboot, balh blah, then when I go back there are no partitions to format at all. All is the same. Same with AEFDISK, it can read it's own MBR but gives the WARNING, invalid boot record signature.

Again, I'm giving it until the end of the month for me. I'm like a mad scientist and wasting tons of hours on it.

So with a reg WIN98SE boot disk it takes like an hour to "FDISK" then after restart it's same as is was before. So I suppose the answer is no, it does not fdisk properly.

Partition Magic is sorta weird for me, maybe I'm just in over my head.

I'd be happy to do video conference and follow instructions step by step.

 

[Triple6]

I think you may just need to get your hands on an 8GB drive, or the laptop is faulty. What happened to the old hard drive? Not the same problem?