PCI IDE Controller Dos Mode Drivers

[crud]

I trying to install a new 40GB HDD to an old Dell V400 Pentium II running Windows ME. The Dell onboard IDE controller wont recognise HDDs over 8GB even after updating to latest bios.

I purchased a SKYMASTER PCI IDE Controller to make full use of the 40GB, but alas the controller and HDD are not recognised in DOS Mode under Windows ME, therefore I cant do fdisk/format/ghost operations without resorting to other tricks. I need to have a DOS mode function to allow Ghost image backup/restore.

Chipset on the SKYMASTER controller is Intel 82371AB/EB.

Has anyone ever solved this problem by sourcing suitable DOS mode drivers to activate via config.sys and autoexec so that the HDD and controller are functional outside of windows ?

Unfortunately SKYMASTER dont provide documentation or even have a web site !

thanks in advance

[Darthtanion]

While Skymaster may not have a website, Intel does. Do a seacrh of the chipset used and you may find some suitable DOS drivers that are generic to the chipset used on the PCI card. Not a guarantee, but worthy of checking in to.

If that doesn't work, then you might want to look in the archive files of the drive manufacturer. When this was a common issue, you could often download a utility that loaded a CMOS supplemental utility in the background that extended the motherboard's ability to read drives larger than 8.4GB