I've been trying to fix this mess i created for the last few hours and i'm out of ideas.

I have Windows 7 64 bit and already have a 4TB drive in GPT Disk mode that has worked fine for years. I had another spare 3TB drive that i decided to enhanced secure erase as i wanted to get rid of it. I have used HDDerase (via UBCD) plenty of times over the years with no issues, but this time while trying to wipe the 3TB drive, which didn't really need to be wiped as it's barely used, i kept getting errors about how the drive cannot be unlocked even though i went through the standard procedures of setting IDE mode, hard shut down, etc.

Finally after reading the FAQ i decided to go for the 3rd option as the two other methods failed, third option being where you disconnect the drive, turn on the PC and just before HddErase is started you connect the drive thereby bypassing the BIOS lock. This did work and it showed 510 minutes as the time required for erase, but after 6 hours or so, an error showed up and erase was abruptly cancelled, and ever since then i've been unable to see the full 3TB and stuck with 746gb even in GPT Disk mode.


I think the issue is that when HDDErase usually completes it writes the LBA info at the end or something like that, but being that the procedure ended abruptly, it screwed things up. When i looked at LBA info, it shows around 1.5 billion while the hard drive label states it's around 5.8 billion.

Anyone know how to repair this and how i've managed to screw this up so badly? I've connected the drive to another computer and it still shows as 746gb. I tried using MHDD and the HPA command i found via google but i get an error saying this only works in LBA mode or i get an error that the drive hasn't been detected and the drive isn't even shown in the list rather just port connection numbers.

Any idea? Maybe even how i can successfully write the LBA info manually if that is the issue, as i failed to do that with MHDD...if that is the issue in the first place.

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GOOD News, fixed it

After hours of trying everything, came across HDD Capacity Restore (http://hddguru.com/software/2007.07.20- ... store-Tool) which doesn't seem to work in Windows 7 but fortunately i had Windows XP in dual boot, so loaded up, ran the software with a single click, it detected the actual factory drive size, did it's thing and then hard shut down. Restarted and i have the 3TB drive back. PHEW. Everything working great now.

Based on the fact that this software fixed my problem so easily, any idea what the problem was and whether it could have been fixed some other way if i couldn't get hold of this program? Also, any similar programs available that work with newer Windows if i end up ever needing them? Seems like a great, simple software that it's a shame if it just disappeared due to being old.

To me it looks like it may have been an issue involving a 32-bit LBA limit. This can happen when you switch to a different SATA controller mode (IDE/AHCI/RAID) in BIOS, or if you switch, albeit inadvertently, to a different software driver. In such cases the drive's physical capacity is still 3TB, but the system sees it as ...

3TB - 2TiB = 746GiB

http://www.google.com/search?3TB+-+2TiB+in+GiB

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

It's a HGST Drive - Hitachi Deskstar 7K3000 3TB - HDS723030ALA640

I can't see how it could be an LBA48/LBA28 problem. Instead ISTM that the BIOS or driver is limited to 32 bits.

The native capacity of the drive is 5,860,533,168 sectors/LBAs. This requires 33 bits.

5860533168 = 0x15D50A3B0

Because the driver cannot handle the 33rd bit, it sees the capacity as 0x5D50A3B0 LBAs.

0x5D50A3B0 x 512 bytes = 746.5 GiB

_________________
A backup a day keeps DR away.

I saw that, but the OP switched between 3 OS-es, amongst other things, so the HDD Capacity Restore tool may be just a red herring.

_________________
A backup a day keeps DR away.