PowerBook 1400: Why Does 1GB Hard Drive Show As 750MB?

TECHINFO-0020750

TOPIC

I have a PowerBook 1400c computer which was supposed to have come with a 1 gigabyte (GB) Hard drive. However, from what I can tell in the hard drive window, there is only a total of 750 megabytes (MB) of hard disk space. What's wrong?

DISCUSSION

Issue

If your computer was supposed to have come with a 1 GB hard drive, it probably did, but it may have been formatted improperly. The improper formatting, in this case, causes 1 GB hard drives to appear to have less total disk space. The total space showing in the hard drive window is 750 MB. This formatting issue has been noted and corrected at Apple's manufacturing site. This issue should no longer be a factor in any new PowerBook computers.

Which Models Shipped With A 1 GB Hard Drive?

Not all PowerBook 1400 computers shipped with 1 GB hard drives. Only the following models shipped with 1 GB hard drives.

M4856 Macintosh PowerBook 1400c/117 M5576 Macintosh PowerBook 1400c/133

How Can I Tell If My 1 GB Hard Drive Is Formatted Improperly?

If you aren't sure whether or not your hard drive has been improperly formatted, do the following:

Step 1

Open the hard drive window.

Step 2

Pull down the View menu.

Step 3

Select "by icon" from the menu.

Step 4

Add up the numbers for "in Disk" and "available". If these numbers add up to approximately 750 MB, then the drive will need to be reformatted to obtain the full size of 1 GB.

Resolution

If your PowerBook computer has an improperly formatted hard drive, you will need to follow these steps to reformat* the drive:

* Note:

Step 1

Back up the important data from your hard drive to another hard drive or to floppy disks. All of the software that came with your computer is contained on the CD that came with it, so you only need to back up the files you have created.

Step 2

Startup from the PowerBook System CD.

Step 3

Run Drive Setup to reformat/initialize the hard drive.

Step 4

Restore all the software from the PowerBook 1400 CD.

Step 5

Restart

When you open your hard drive window now the amount of space "in disk" and "available" should show that you have approximately 1 GB of hard drive space.

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