On Oct 19, 2008, at 8:42 PM, joplinfan wrote: > Bought a generic (no label) 40gb HD at a computer show yesterday for > cheap. Put it in my G4 Digital Audio and 10.4's Disk Utility > identifies it as a 19gb Maxtor 6E040L0. This is a valid model number > for a Maxtor Diamondmax 8 40gb hard drive, though this info is not > printed anywhere on the drive. I've verified, erased, and partitioned > the HD with Disk Utility without issue. > > Any ideas why this drive is reporting 19gb when it should (or at least > I "think" it should) be 40gb?
I think I know the problem and the solution, but it's relatively difficult. These 40GB drives were made at a time of transition of ATA standards. I believe the problem is that the HD itself has firmware that is older and perhaps purposefully set to an older standard so that it would work with older PCs. Also, some OEM PC manufacturers bought 40GB HDs in bulk and then crippled some in firmware to read as only 20GB. Then they'd offer an "upgrade" to 40 GB which was simply running a firmware program for about 1 minute and charging you a small fortune for this "upgrade". Anyone who never purchased the "upgrade" had a HD with crippled firmware that read half full. (Aside: this type "upgrade" is identical to what happens with vans and trucks, they place a large fuel tank in EVERY van & truck, and then put a "standard" filler nozzle that extends down halfway into the tank so that the tank will only fill halfway. Then they sell you an "oversize" tank by simply replacing the "standard" nozzle with a shorter "oversize" nozzle that allows the tank to completely fill. Both the HD upgrade and fuel tank upgrade are scams in my mind, and I guess you could toss QuickTime Pro into that genre also). Maxtor made a flash program to reset the firmware on these HDs, but it is an old DOS program that runs on a PC only. There were several versions of this program. If you have a PC, I can email you a copy of the flash program off-list. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
