Gericom 250Gb External Hard Drive At Aldi [CLOSED]

mak_attack

lacie 250gb d2 for £119.99 matty66?

10.2.8? it works on 10.3 + fine

thanks,

MyUserNamesTaken

rainbowsden wrote:

Hi all,
This is my first message so 'Glad to meet you'
I bought a Gericom ext HDD from Aldi and I am certainly having installation problems with it. My PC is a desktop model and it's about 3yrs old. The specs are;
Windows XP home SP2......NTFS
CPU: AMD Athlon 2000+ XP
768 DDRAM
80GB HDD...75% free
USB 2.0 6 port hub (2 internal: 4 external)
USB 1.1....2 ports
I followed the makers instructions on 'how to install' and connected the cables in the right order and switched on. The first thing I noticed was a flickering Blue LED. the icon that should be installed in My Computer' didn't appear and a series of clicks/switches could be heard inside the ext HDD.
There's no sign that it is recognised in Device Manager or Disk Management.

To make sure that the thing wasn't broke I then tried to install it on a Laptop (14mths old) with similar specs but with SP1, although it was recognised in Device manager and Disk Management it still would not format/convert to NTFS. Nor could I save anthing to it, images etc
All help appreciated.
BTW. if anyone does have a fix please explain as though you're talking to a person who thinks slowly.
Thanks

The blue flickering light is normal - means the drive is starting up (checking itself). Once the drive has started up, the blue light will stop flickering.

How is your USB2 hub connected to your PC? If you've connected it through your USB1 ports, it won't go faster than USB1 speed. Your lappy has SP1 on, right? In which case, it won't recognise the drive as being 250GBs (as it's limited to 137GBs). This probably causes you the formatting problem - your lappy won't format past 137GBs. To solve this, you'd have to partition the drive or install SP2 on your lappy.

Neilly_Boy

thanks mynames..... Thats a big help thanks for the info, I haven't installed SP2 yet because I had heard that it caused conflicts and problems with certain software including video editing programs.
Am I right then in thinking that after I have installed SP2 and the Gericom HDD and then re-formatted to NTFS that I DONT have to partition because XP will acknowledge the full 250 GB???

Did you re-format to NTFS with ease??

Thanks in anticipation of your useful knowledge...

MyUserNamesTaken

Neilly_Boy wrote:

thanks mynames..... Thats a big help thanks for the info, I haven't installed SP2 yet because I had heard that it caused conflicts and problems with certain software including video editing programs.
Am I right then in thinking that after I have installed SP2 and the Gericom HDD and then re-formatted to NTFS that I DONT have to partition because XP will acknowledge the full 250 GB???

Did you re-format to NTFS with ease??

Thanks in anticipation of your useful knowledge...

Once you've installed SP2, you won't have to partition the drive, as the laptop will recognise it as the full 250GB HDD that it is. Reformatting to NTFS is easy (my computer, right click on the drive in question, click format, select quick format NTFS).

georgedawes

MyUserNamesTaken wrote:

Sounds to me like your laptop is a crock, rather than the HDD. If you've got problems running SP2, you've got a software or hardware conflict going on there. If that's the case, chances are it's stopping the HDD working too. Are you using USB or USB2? Are you even connecting the HDD correctly to the laptop? (Not using the USB ports at the front, as they are a separate USB hub.)

There are both usb2 and firewire on the lappy,yes i have the power supply hooked up to it,i have followed the installation manual and i have also rang the tech support line that's also a crock as it sounds like they are diverting you through to Germany and i waited 20 mins and still never got an answer

lipidicman

Just to clarify something....

Hardware aside, you must have XP SP1 or W2K SP3 to break the 137Gb limit
I have been running a 160Gb internal HD on my PC for a long time. The BIOS recognised it, but windows XP wouldnt see it as more than 137Gb until I installed SP1 (you dont need SP2 as some people have suggested)

AFAIK the situation is exactly the same for USB drives as for internal IDE drives

byb3

I've got a fair knowledge of computers, and I would be pretty confident in saying that USB hard drives are detected in a different way to IDE hard drives.

They are not usually accessible from DOS etc... which is what the BIOS is for.

So since they are accessed from XP, you probably won't have the 137GB limit problem.

Cheers,

Adam

lipidicman

byb3 wrote:

I've got a fair knowledge of computers, and I would be pretty confident in saying that USB hard drives are detected in a different way to IDE hard drives.

I agree

byb3 wrote:

They are not usually accessible from DOS etc... which is what the BIOS is for.

No, the BIOS is used by XP too! The Bios translate OS commands to the hardware. The BIOS is special software that interfaces the major hardware components of your computer with the operating system by providing a set of low-level routines that the operating system uses to interface to different hardware devices.

byb3 wrote:

So since they are accessed from XP, you probably won't have the 137GB limit problem.

No, the 137Gb limit was overcome by XP SP1 and W2K SP3. The limitations were in the OS and not the BIOS (My Bios was happy with the HD, but XP wasnt until I installed SP1. You can have a BIOS problem, but it wont work with the original XP even if your BIOS is compatible).

If you have any doubts see http://www.seagate.com/support/kb/disc/tp/137gb.pdf

The only current Windows operating systems that natively support the full capacity of ATA drives
larger than 137GB are:
Windows XP Home Service Pack 1 (SP1) or higher
Windows XP Professional SP1 or higher
Windows 2000 Professional SP3 or higher
Windows 2000 Server SP3 or higher
The original Windows XP (RTM or Release to Manufacturing) and previous Windows 2000 Service Packs do not support ATA interface disc drives larger than 137GB.

rainbowsden

Thanks for the response MyUser..., but as you can see from my post, the best response was from my Laptop which is loaded with SP1.
Apologies for mistakenly calling a USB 2.0 host controller a hub
In a sentence; I have an ext HDD that doesn't communicate with my PC.
What could be the reason?
One thing I didn't say in my first post was that this HDD that I'm having problems with is a replacement, I returned the first because of similar problems. I thought it was fried.

After reading several messages I was thinking it could be a BIOS setting, but one opinion seems to have scuttled that idea. So I'm still left hanging.
I don't want to take it back, but it would be better returned than having a £99.99 paperweight.

mak_attack

hi,

i finally got around to using this aldi hdd.

it works fine on mac osx 10.3 + / the transfer speed is fast around 1 gig a minute

seems to be running fine.

i am a bit disapointed by: it seems to make a random clicking noise every so often even though the device is not in use. it isnt totally silent either but tends to make a whirrrrrr noise which isnt too loud but aint silent either.

overall an excellent product with minor niggles. you cant have everything can you !!!