HDD problem on Laptop

fatboy88

Hi, just purchase my new viao and its got vista on which i'm not used to, cant find where anything is.

Anyway i'm supposed to have a 200gb drive on my viao but when i start it up for the first time it only has 176gb and its used some and only 164gb is free which i presume means thats what vista has taken.

Can anyone tell me if i need to return this or is this a partition thing? I dont really want to format the drive if possible as i dont know how to replace all the things on it now

many thanks
will

ichiban1962

normally a 200gb hdd thats been formatted for windows loses space,
setting up the structure for the files,MBR etc. so i would expect a loss of about 15gb on a 200gb drive, also windows settings for recycle bin and system restore will also remove working space.
not sure if vista uses a partition for installation files did you receive a vista disc with the laptop?
not a repair one this just accesses the hidden partition but a full install dvd

does sound a bit excessive but windows vista is a big install i believe

fatboy88

thanks for the reply

I got some kind of vista upgrade disk but its pre installed already, so must be a backup. I think vista must have taken the 12gb from the 176gb.