Hardware

Here is a link to remedies suggested by Samsung if the capacity is limited to 32GB:
http://www.samsung.com/au/products/harddiskdrive/support/faqs/faqs_20030909_0000013351.htm

Does the HDD detection and the POST show only 30 GB or the full 160GB?

If the BIOS is only showing 30GB, then you need to check for a BIOS update for the motherboard.

Also, check the drive jumpers. Some drives have jumpers that limit the capacity for use on legacy systems.

Which version of XP are you using to set up this drive?

Also, what file format are you using?

The initial release of XP had a drive size limit of around 126GB.

When formatting a drive as a FAT32 volume, XP has another limit. Which I thought was around 40GB.

Keep in mind, that once a partition is set and formatted, you will need to remove the partition before you can set up a larger partition.

Chas

It can be a number of possible issues. Have you tried adding it as a slave to another computer and format it there then bring it back to your computer and install windows? If it makes you angry you can use it as a paper weight and buy a new more powerful hard drive