Win98 can't use 80GB Maxtor Hard drive?

I have an extra Maxtor 80 GB hard drive that I want to use as a data drive, but when I boot to Win98 it can't see the drive in explorer. Looking in Device Manager I see it has a red X on it and looking in the properties of the drive, it says that the Hardware version is not available. It also states "This device is not working properly because a device it depends on. Primary IDE controller (dual fifo), has been dynamically disabled. "

When I look at the Primary IDE controller properties, it states:
"The device is either not present, not working properly, or does not have all the drivers installed [Code 10.]"

The IDE controller works FINE with another smaller hard drive (500MB) so it can't be the connections or the cable. And the 80 GB drive works fine in another computer. Can win98 work with an 80 GB hard drive? OR do I need different/better IDE Controller drivers for win98? If so, where do I get them??

Thx!

 

I may not have anything to do with the OS.

I ran into the same problem today. A machine with Win98 on it would not see a 40 gig HD.

Come to get down to basics the MB ( BIOS ? ) would not see it either. Even when booting to a Floppy.

BillyBob

 

My bios sees it fine and it IS appearing in device manager. But I did find this article on the MS website:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;151911

..although even after trying the suggested install of the Noide.inf file, I still have the primary controller coming up with a yellow exclamation mark.. still looking into the problem. It has NTFS on it so I'm wondering if that is causing the problem (which this article above seems to allude to).

 

Very possible.

BB

 

Well, going to try partitioning it 3 ways using fat32 and see if that works... off to fiddle ... <rome burns in the background ..>

 

I would be interested more in what hardware your PC consists of, particularly CPU type and motherboard age.

Many PCs BIOS have certain hard disk support limitations. Particularly if they are a few years old, or older.

Most motherboards up to Pentium 2 will not like over 8GB drives, and some motherbaords since then have simlar limitations, at different GB levels. It has nothing to do with Windows. If you had XP it would still fail.

IN some cases a BIOS upgrade will work, if available for your board and if you knwo how to install it without killing your PC. I wouldnt bother with PCs older than Pentium 2. Even thier latest BIOS update may not support such large drives.

You have these choices to overcome your problem (what i think it looks like):

If your hard disk manufacturer has it available for your model, you can get disk spanning software, or in simple terms software you can load onto the drive after booting with a boot disk to DOS, and before installing Windows. This will provide support for larger drives using a small program that is loaded each time Windows boots.

The second option you will have is the one i would suggest.

Buy a PCI ATA RAID controller card and plug the drives into it. The RAID card will support the drives and motherboard support will not be necessary. Not only that, most of the time a RAID card with recent chipsets on them will likely run much faster than what you have now, and if the need arises will also give you the option of running a RAID mirror, or striping drives which makes your PC perform much better.

A RAID will be inexpensive also. Here in Aussieland, they sell for about $50- $150 (US).

If you need advice on using / installing a RAID ask

BE AWARE NOT ALL RAID CARDS WILL BE 98 COMPATIBLE! Check when buying

 

I spoke to Maxtor support and it turns out, as you say (and I surmised), that it's the hardware. It's a Pentium 2 350mz (circa 1998).

So, I'm looking at a bios update and failing that may look into getting a PCI ATA-133 Controller Card ($35) with its own bios to allow use of the 80GB.


A Raid card sounds more expensive than it's worth for such an old machine. I basically just wanted to get some use out of an old (and dying) 80GB hard drive before it passes on

Thx for the corroboration!

 

a RAID controller is just a variety of ATA controller card, and not really any more expensive. Either a RAID or plain ATA controller will do the job for you.