Can't obtain 10/20GB Hard Drives

[celtish]

My C: drive harddisk is 10GB and my D: harddisk is 20GB and I don't go in for partitioning. All that suits me fine. My problem is that I detest those monstrous mega harddisks they are making these days but I'm finding it difficult to find 10/20GB disks any longer. With a view to possible future breakdowns, does anyone know where to obtain them?

Edited September 3, 2007 by celtish

[spazmire11]

i dont think anywere is gona sell you a 10gb hard drive anymore, heck 80gb is becomeing rare

i dont see why you dont just get the cheapest available, td has a 80gb for 40$, not the best deal ever but so what:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/Se...1&CatId=134

or how bout the egg? 160gb for 47$

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16822144453

[dencorso]

Well, celtish, nowadays you'll only find them used, in the rare occasions they are to be found. I service some old computers for which they are handy, so I still buy them when they appear, usually through second-hand goods sites. But this is a trial and error game, as you have to buy them blindly in an "as-is" basis, and then test them for integrity and usability by yourself, with Spin-Rite or any other suitable test program. It is best to rig up some old hardware to use it as a test machine in a pemanent basis, and be ready to accept the fact that about 1/3 of the HDD's you'll ever buy will be unusable or stop working right away during the test. The remaining usually do work well for years, although this is one endeavour where YMMV for sure...

[Atmosphere XG]

Ebay still has a good amount of small drives available.

Click Here To View

[Andromeda43]

Forgetaboutit!

You also can't buy a brand new '51 Studebaker.

And, why would you want to?

In my business, I regularly see people with 20 to 30 gigs of stuff on their Xp hard drives.

That's C: drive, and there will be more on D: if they have one.

Ten gig or even twenty gig drives have not been made in YEARS! Any one you find will be

used and abused and ready to crash.

Another problem with the old drives, is that they are slower than molasses.

As HD's got bigger, they also got faster.

The only caveat is that if you're also using an OLD mobo, it probably won't support

a large HD of over 40 gigs.

Good Luck,

B)

[BenoitRen]

Forgetaboutit!

You also can't buy a brand new '51 Studebaker.

And, why would you want to?

Bad comparison. What you mention is ancient, and is no longer sufficient for today. Hard drives, however, are another story. Not everyone needs 100+ GB.

FAT works best on drives that aren't huge. You will have smaller clusters. It's more efficient and faster that way.

Another problem with the old drives, is that they are slower than molasses.

That's relative.

I'm happily getting by with a 6.2 GB HDD.

[herbalist]

I pick up used small hard drives ranging from 4 to 20GB at the local computer shop on a regular basis. Been paying from $5 to $20, depending on the size. Many of my clients have old PCs so I keep a few on hand.

Some are slow and worn, but some are quite good. My "C" drive is a used 5.1GB and is quite fast. Old doesn't always mean worn out.

Rick

[RJARRRPCGP]

I pick up used small hard drives ranging from 4 to 20GB at the local computer shop on a regular basis. Been paying from $5 to $20, depending on the size. Many of my clients have old PCs so I keep a few on hand.

Some are slow and worn, but some are quite good. My "C" drive is a used 5.1GB and is quite fast. Old doesn't always mean worn out.

Rick

You can get a brand new 40 GB (or fairly new at least 2006) and look for a jumper setting to limit the capacity to 32 GB.

Also, even the bigger HDDs likely have a jumper to limit it to 32 GB.

The pre-2001 motherboards likely are fine up to 32 GB.

There's an issue where HDDs bigger than 32 GB cause a HDD detection failure or the OS gives you disk errors for the remainder of the HDD and ScanDisk reports bad clusters.

If you always get disk errors after a certain cluster under Windows 95, it's a known issue, according to Microsoft.

If you always get disk errors after a certain cluster under Windows 98, it's the BIOS' fault!

Edited September 6, 2007 by RJARRRPCGP

[PassingBy]

Hmmm .....

My C: drive harddisk is 10GB and my D: harddisk is 20GB and I don't go in for partitioning. All that suits me fine. My problem is that I detest those monstrous mega harddisks they are making these days but I'm finding it difficult to find 10/20GB disks any longer. With a view to possible future breakdowns, does anyone know where to obtain them?

Those mega hdds you're referring to are the result of stiff competition and end-user demands for mega storage .... One basic reason why there's no longer 10/20GB hdds being produced is due to disk surface density ... I have not seen desktop drives with surface density lower than 80GB per platter in production (1 platter = 2 surface; each surface approx 40GB) in the last two years ... Newer drives are made using 200GB platters ... It is simply not cost effective to mass produce smaller drives where there is little demand ...

If you really do feel strongly about monstrous mega hdds, then there is one alternative that I can think of ... get a new hdd make and model that you trust and perform LBA cut-down to the size that you like .... Perhaps making brand new 80GB hdd into a 10GB/20GB/30GB that you want ... There's several freeware tool that can do this ... This may be usefull on older systems with BIOS with certain usable hdd limits (ie. 32GB or 128GB) ...

Rgds

[RJARRRPCGP]

Hmmm .....

My C: drive harddisk is 10GB and my D: harddisk is 20GB and I don't go in for partitioning. All that suits me fine. My problem is that I detest those monstrous mega harddisks they are making these days but I'm finding it difficult to find 10/20GB disks any longer. With a view to possible future breakdowns, does anyone know where to obtain them?

Those mega hdds you're referring to are the result of stiff competition and end-user demands for mega storage .... One basic reason why there's no longer 10/20GB hdds being produced is due to disk surface density ... I have not seen desktop drives with surface density lower than 80GB per platter in production (1 platter = 2 surface; each surface approx 40GB) in the last two years ... Newer drives are made using 200GB platters ... It is simply not cost effective to mass produce smaller drives where there is little demand ...

If you really do feel strongly about monstrous mega hdds, then there is one alternative that I can think of ... get a new hdd make and model that you trust and perform LBA cut-down to the size that you like .... Perhaps making brand new 80GB hdd into a 10GB/20GB/30GB that you want ... There's several freeware tool that can do this ... This may be usefull on older systems with BIOS with certain usable hdd limits (ie. 32GB or 128GB) ...

Rgds

I have a Western Digital Caviar 40 GB laying around that was made in 2006!

[awergh]

If you always get disk errors after a certain cluster under Windows 95, it's a known issue, according to Microsoft.

this isnt an os problem it is a bios problem, llxx found out this ages ago thats why theres a 48bitlba patch for 95

[Sfor]

If you always get disk errors after a certain cluster under Windows 95, it's a known issue, according to Microsoft.

this isnt an os problem it is a bios problem, llxx found out this ages ago thats why theres a 48bitlba patch for 95

No. It is not a BIOS problem.

Windows 95 does use it's own drivers to access HDD without the BIOS support. In my case the BIOS was working fine with the drive. The DOS was able to work correctly while Windows 95 was doing terrible things with the data structure.

If you really do feel strongly about monstrous mega hdds, then there is one alternative that I can think of ... get a new hdd make and model that you trust and perform LBA cut-down to the size that you like .... Perhaps making brand new 80GB hdd into a 10GB/20GB/30GB that you want ... There's several freeware tool that can do this ... This may be usefull on older systems with BIOS with certain usable hdd limits (ie. 32GB or 128GB) ...

HPA (Hardware Protected Area) is the feature used by the disk tools. It's a part of the ATA specification, and it is present in all new disk drives on the market.

Edited September 7, 2007 by Sfor

[888]

few years ago I found a store liquidation on the web, they had dozen of brand new fujitsu 8gigers. I bought them all for $50 including shipping

I doubt you can find'em nowadays, but 40gigers should be available.

And check out all the small computer stores in your area too, sometimes they have such old junk and they will be more than happy to get rid of it for a low price

[celtish]

My C: drive harddisk is 10GB and my D: harddisk is 20GB and I don't go in for partitioning. All that suits me fine. My problem is that I detest those monstrous mega harddisks they are making these days but I'm finding it difficult to find 10/20GB disks any longer. With a view to possible future breakdowns, does anyone know where to obtain them?

Thanks, all you guys. There have been some enlightening and constructive comments here (and of course the usual one or two inevitable, unhelpful 'too bad, feller, you're in the s***, get over it' posts!).

There are a couple of things in particular I need to follow up on: What is LBA, what does it do, where do I get software which does it? And what is the best HDD 'make' (manufacturer) for Win98SE? Again, thanks guys.

Edited September 9, 2007 by celtish

[eidenk]

There is probably a monthly computer fair in Southport where you should find some.