(Very) Old XPS Pro 200n Question

Question

I am helping a friend install a new hard drive in a Dimension XPS Pro 200n desktop.  The system probably dates back to 1996 or so. The old hard drive was only 4 GB. The new hard drive I installed is 80 GB using Win98 SE.  The BIOS only sees 8 GB on the hard drive.  I selected AUTO under hard drive section in the BIOS page.   I cannot seem to get the entire 80 GB entered into the BIOS.  The service tag is 8187V and there is no support page available.   I was wondering if anyone has information to an updated BIOS update that will recognize a larger hard drive.  Right now I have Win98 SE installed on the '8 GB' hard drive and is working fine.  It would be nice to use the entire 80 GB.

Majestic · Answer

The problem you are encountering is with a limitation to the BIOS.  The only way around the problem is to either use disk overlay software from the drive's manufacturer, which isn't the most reliable or spend another $30 and buy a ATA Controller card for one or your available PCI slots.  The ATA controller card will then manage the drive instead of the computer's BIOS.  The controller card will also offer the side benefit of improving your hard drive's data transfer rate over that of the motherboard IDE controller.

cc6000 · Answer

Any suggestion on ATA PCI cards?  Something that will allow to boot up Win98?   Thanks again. Message Edited by cc6000 on 01-29-200605:54 PM Message Edited by cc6000 on 01-29-2006 05:54 PM

cc6000 · Answer

Thank you for your reply.  I did find a BIOS update on Dell.com.  It updated the BIOS from A05 to A06.  The drive size does not seem to change.  The idea of an ATA Controller card is excellent.  I will look into it.

cc6000 · Answer

Never mind I think I am going to give up. :smileymad: I ran over to CompUSA and got a $45 PCI ATA Ultra Card. It does not seem to be able to boot up. It needs a Win driver to find the PCI card. Thanks for all the help. :smileyhappy:

CC

NemesisDB · Answer

yes, you will need a controller card that supports your version of windows...   98SE is recent enough to likely still be supported by most products.  the original 98 is more questionable.

Majestic · Answer

CC6000, there is no BIOS update available to work around the limitation.  That's why I mentioned the overlay software or the controller card. As for a card..... a Promise ATA -100 card will work in your system with Windows 98 and doesn't require any driver to be loaded. The ATA -133 card on the otherhand will require a driver.  Besides there is no speed advantage to using the ATA -133 over a ATA -100.  As far as brands of cards....  Promise brand is probably the most reliable in a Dell.  Click here for NewEgg's web site as they offer a Promise ATA-100 card for $21.

cc6000 · Answer

Thanks for the info. I gave the PC back to my friend this morning with the system running on 8 gig of the 80 gig hard drive. Just for my own information.  If the ATA100 card does not need a driver, does that mean the hard drive attached to the ATA100 card can be used as the boot up hard drive? If I disconnect the hard drive from the motherboard and with the only hard drive in the system being the one attach to the ATA100 card, will it boot up? The boot up sequence can be selected as CD-ROM, Floppy, then hard drive in the bios.

Majestic · Answer

CC6000, at boot up the ATA Controller card's BIOS will load as well as the system's BIOS.  If there is a drive connected to the card the system should attempt to boot from that drive when the BIOS is done loading.  On a system as old as the XPS Pro you might have to move all the drives to the card and leave the IDE ports on the motherboard empty.  That way during boot up the system will seek out a bootable device and then find it on the controller card.  The ATA -100 controller card will work with MS-DOS as well as Windows.  When the card is used with Windows, that operating system will load a driver for it after Windows starts.  This driver is loaded with the rest of the drivers for the other hardware during the Windows start up process.

cc6000 · Answer

Thanks for the very clear explanation.  Too bad CompUSA did not have the ATA100 card. I guess I must have purchased the ATA133 card which needs a driver to work.  The suggestion on moving the other IDE devices to the card is noted. Thanks.

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