hard drive losing space?

i have a WD 80GB hard drive. the first time i used it was to install windows xp, but i was too busy. so i cancel the installation when it was copying system files. the next time i went to install windows xp again, i noticed that the hard drive's size has decreased to slightly lesser. And when i reinstall windows again, the file size will always decrease. I used Quick Format to install windows. What is the problem? How do i get back the lost drive space? please help. This is urgent.

That is one part of the problem, never a quick one, when you do format take your time and erase all, quick formatting will keep some info, no good!

ok thanks. but is there anyway i can get back the lost drive space?

I ‘m not sure what you mean by “get back the lost drive space”, like I said you will have some back by doing a good format, but all 80gig, hmmmm! Not sure you can, because there’s always a portion reserved when you install the OS, and that is apart of what the OS needs when installed, plus if you think that you have a full 80gig, you make a mistake, its never exactly what's written on papers.

Examples,
If you have an 120gig, you won’t have more than 118.xxx gig
If you have an 80gig, you won’t have more than 78.xxx gig
If you have a 40gig, you won’t have more than 38.xxx gig
If that is what you meant, you can’t get the exact number, that’s the way it is.

ok. but when i first use the hard drive, i saw 80000MB, if i'm not wrong. well, never mind. it's not important. what do u recommend i use to format the hard drive properly and how to?
i thought of fdisk, but i don't know how to use it, starting from the opening of the program in DOS mode to the end. please advise

Well to make it easier on you, you can do it via the XP CD that you have.

1-simply insert your XP disc into your CD reader
2-Just before XP boots, press the spacebar on the keyboard to avoid going into Windows
3-when your are in the installation mode, a moment or another, it will ask you if you want to install windows, do not choose repair or something else, select “fresh install”
4-When asked choose format with “NTFS” system, please do not choose “Quick format” or FAT32.
Just keep in mind, NO Quick format and choose NTFS file system.
You should have a nice Windows installation and all of your hard disk will be at is prime.
But I understand your concerns about the time it takes,
so what I recommend you in the future is to buy a nice and dependable partition maker like “Acronis partition expert” and make a few partitions on the same drive, afterwards each time you want to format you will only format a small portion, thus making it less painful to wait for a full disk format, especially if you have a slow processor.

Example
I have a Maxtor 80g divided into 3 partitions

Partition 1, C:\ about 10.7gig for Windows
Partition 2, D:\ about 33.7gig for my working files
Partition 3, E:\ about 33.8gig for my archives, things that you don’t need often.

So you can see that when its time to format I have only the 10.7gig to reformat and not a full drive.

And as much there’s people on earth as much possibilities you will see, it’s up to you to create your preferences in how you make the partitions. Good luck!

thanks

A portion of your hard drive is also allocated to a boot sector when it is formatted.

ok thanks

my friend had the same problem. that is the best solution to take the time and slowly erase every file. Then reinstall that partition you want to use. Never cancel windows install ever.