Problem with laptop hardware

selfbuildkk

Hi guys i hope someone can help me on this. I have a compaq presario c310ea according to system information the total capacity is only 24gb. I have been on to tech support and the only help they could offer was to defragment.

Having done this it hasnt made any difference. what I am wondering is why the storage is so low in the first place? I had a problem with the hard drive a while ago but this was sorted using the system restore disks. The computer should have 80gb according to the product code and serial number. the computer is only 3 yrs old. Any suggestions greatly welcomed. Any other info required ill try to give as best i cannot extremely technically minded.

Pshemko

How many partitions have you got? Only disc C?

Check that:
Right click on My computer > Manage

When new window appears find "Disc Management" on left site list.
Klick on it and that shows you how your HD is shared and how many partitions you have.

selfbuildkk

firstly thanks for the reply, in disk management in the bottom right there are two boxes, primary partition (C)
24.02 GB NTFS 50.51 GB
Healthy (system) Unallocated

spartacus93

selfbuildkk wrote: »

firstly thanks for the reply, in disk management in the bottom right there are two boxes, primary partition (C)
24.02 GB NTFS 50.51 GB
Healthy (system) Unallocated

It looks like when doing the system restore something went wrong and it only formatted 24Gb of the hard drive for use. The other 50 is there, but unformatted so cannot be used by windows. There's two solutions...

1. The easy option is to format this unallocated space so it can be used by you. This has one disadvantage in that your one physical hard drive will show up as two in my computer etc. One 24gig and one 50.5 gig (Drive C and some other letter depending).

To do this right click on the unallocated space in disk management and click on make new partition. You want to make this new partition a primary partition and have the size equal the maximum size allowed (This will make more sense when you're in the partition wizzard.). If you are using Windows XP or Vista you should format it using NTFS. There should be an option to perform a quick format, don't do this (It's usually a box you can click). It could take a couple of hours to do this so don't worry.

2. You could redo the system restore paying more attention to formatting options and partition sizes. When this is done correctly you will be left with one 80 gig drive again. You will however loose all your information so you will have to make sure it is backed up.

Using the first option you will not loose any files, you are tinkering with advanced settings tho, so make sure anything vital on your machine is backed up before you proceed!

selfbuildkk

I think ill do the whole restore it seems to be the easiest option,and with such a small amount of space on the comp theres not a whole lot of stuff on it to lose,thanks again for the replies, greatly appreciated.

spartacus93

selfbuildkk wrote: »

I think ill do the whole restore it seems to be the easiest option,and with such a small amount of space on the comp theres not a whole lot of stuff on it to lose,thanks again for the replies, greatly appreciated.

No problem... When you're doing the restore it will ask you which partition you want to install windows on (the 24 or the 50). You will have to delete the 24gig partition and then create a new partition as big as they will allow you ~74Gb

Pshemko

It's mean you need to create new partition.

Click right on the Unallocated box and choice New simple volume...

When new window appears hit 4 times Next and Finish.

You created new partition and now when you go to My computer you will see one more Disc. The disc is the missing space.