Hard drive help.

[joeparaski]

I bought a new WD hard drive at 500 gig capacity for my daughters' computer. I installed it and created a partition of 100 gig for C.

I'm not sure where I screwed up...but I hadn't noticed she had an external hard drive attached to her comp via the usb port.

Somehow, drive letter F is assigned to the new 500 gig HD and letter C is assigned to the external HD. Checking in "my computer" shows F with 100 gig but no designation for the remaining 400 gig.

I tried reassigning the drive letter to the new HD but it doesn't work. Not sure what to do next. I also bought a new legal copy of Windows XP.

Joe

[petrym]

Unplug the external drive and start over, finish with the new drive (edit) when you start the win install, do your partitioning there and install the OS to the primary partition and then format the second partition after the OS is complete (/edit); then plug the external drive back in, that'll reassign the drive letters.

[joeparaski]

Thanks, I'll try that.

Joe

[joeparaski]

Ok, so now I've got the 500G HD reading as letter C and showing 100Gig. How do I go and format the remaining 400 gig?

Joe

[bobman1235]

Try reading here.

[SKsolutions]

Try clicking the disk you want to format from MY COMPUTER. You may get the option to format to NTFS from there. If not >>>

From start, click Run, then type: "compmgmt.msc"

Or from drop menu, right click MY COMPUTER, and select MANAGE

You can format from the console.

[petrym]

Go Start, Accessories, Windows Explorer, My Computer (click "+" sign), {right click the 400 GB partition} Format

[joeparaski]

Thanks for the suggestions guys, the format is underway.

Joe

[bdaley6509]

You may not even see that left over 400 gig partition in 'My Computer' to format it. If you don't, simply right click 'My computer'....'Manage'....and then 'Disk Management' (under the 'storage' section). Your partition will show up as unallocated, probably Disk 0. Right click the partition and there should be some options to allocate the space, create a drive letter, and then format it NTFS. Good luck.