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bbales · Jul 29, 2004, 01:53 PM

I'm mulling the purchase of an external HD. I know many Macs can only "see" 120 GB of a drive, no matter how big the drive actually is. I'm nearly certain my Mac (gigabit ethernet, purchased in late 2000) is one that will only let me use 120 GB. So -- my question is, as I found a pertty good deal on a 160 GB drive from Other World Computing -- if I reforjmat the drive into two sections, will I be able to see both?

I did do a search, by the way, but was coming up kind of empty on this topic. I know I've seen it before -- I just can't find it!

Thanks in advance.

ratlater · Jul 29, 2004, 02:12 PM

I'm pretty sure that won't work. Its the IDE controller that is the problem. If you buy a PCI IDE card you should be able to use a bigger drive.

-matt

bbales · Jul 29, 2004, 02:59 PM

Hmmm, I was afraid of that. I did some more research after posting my initial question.

HOWEVER -- what if I partitioned the drive while it's hooked up to my 12-in PB? Would that somehow provide a way around it, so that when I rehooked it up to my desktop, it woudl see both partiions?

Luca Rescigno · Jul 29, 2004, 03:14 PM

No. The drive controller can only see 127 GB per drive, no matter what you do. Partitioning does no good.

Mithras · 05:22 PM

However, if you buy a Firewire case for the drive, it will work fine (as long as the case is reasonably modern and has a recent IDE controller chip).

Moreover, the fact that you talk about hooking it up to your Powerbook indicates to me that you intend this to be a Firewire drive to begin with. In which case you have no problem whatsoever, since Firewire cases contain a Firewire/ATA bridge chip, which will be newer than the one in your Powermac.

tooki · Jul 29, 2004, 05:14 PM

Originally posted by bbales:
Hmmm, I was afraid of that. I did some more research after posting my initial question.

HOWEVER -- what if I partitioned the drive while it's hooked up to my 12-in PB? Would that somehow provide a way around it, so that when I rehooked it up to my desktop, it woudl see both partiions?

It would see both partitions. But then, when you tried to write past the 128GB limit... bad. Very bad.

Like a road sign saying "Red Light Ahead 1000 Feet", and the road ending 200 feet ahead. At a cliff. With no railing.

tooki

DimeTech · Jul 29, 2004, 07:42 PM

check out the FAQs on cubeowner.com......i'm certain that the have some sort of firmware or something that enables the computer to be able to write to the whole drive.

bbales · Jul 29, 2004, 08:30 PM

Originally posted by Mithras:
However, if you buy a Firewire case for the drive, it will work fine (as long as the case is reasonably modern and has a recent IDE controller chip).

Moreover, the fact that you talk about hooking it up to your Powerbook indicates to me that you intend this to be a Firewire drive to begin with. In which case you have no problem whatsoever, since Firewire cases contain a Firewire/ATA bridge chip, which will be newer than the one in your Powermac.

Yes, this is an external firewire drive -- I must not have made that as clear as I needed to! My looking around on various sites is making me think the only seeing 128 GB is an issue only with internal drives, not firewire external ones. Correct? Tooki has me scared!
(Although I appreciated the humor of the remark.)

tooki · Jul 29, 2004, 08:42 PM

The 128GiB/137GB limit is a function of the IDE controller chip the drive is connected to. If you provide a newer chip, either via PCI card, or via a FireWire enclosure, then the limit is not there. Nor is it applicable to SCSI drives. So an external FireWire drive should work fine.

There is no firmware update to fix this. It is a limitation of the controller chip, not the firmware.

tooki

bbales · Jul 29, 2004, 09:34 PM

Thank you for the very clear explanation. I hadn't quite understood the limitation before.

Thanks for the help.