Partition Magic

[Franklin]

Well, kind of. Think about it for a moment and you'll realize
that it has to have some way to "remember" what it was doing
across a reboot--and not just one, but two reboots, at that.
What it does is setup a fake partition, sticks a script there so
it can remember what it wants to do (hopefully nothing changes
before it gets to run the script), saves the state of Windows,
makes temporary changes to your partition table to boot back
into this fake partition, follows the scripted tasks, makes more
temporary changes to your partition table again to boot back
into Windows, recovers the Windows state where it left off
(hopefully all that manipulating in DOS didn't mess this up),
and finally removes the fake partition.

That's not the same thing as running PM from DOS. All that
sleight-of-hand trickery is notoriously fragile and much less
reliable than straight from DOS. I'm not sure why that isn't
intuitively obvious to many people.

Renan, I fully agree with you.

And if Partition Magic happens to go wrong because of some unforeseen
event during the reboot then the outcome simply doesn't bear thinking
about!

I use Partition Magic in XP to view the partitions and to check
things out and so on. But for real partition work I would never want
to issue the commands in the Windows version.

I always work on my partitions with a boot version of some utility or
another. The boot version of PM 8 is fine (but darned slow to load)
but I prefer BootIt.

 

[Franklin]

Partition magic is a great software.. it works while you are
still in windows...
and only boots to make changes (if needed).

I have not seen another that can do this.. these others the
other posters say are boot disk parition managers.. in
otherwords you have to boot with them (CD).

ISTR Acronis have something like this.

I might be mistaken though.

 

[Peter Seiler]

Franklin - 13.02.2006 18:06 :

ISTR Acronis have something like this.

absolutely, but the wonderful "DiskDirectorSuite" isn't freeware :-(

 

[Al Klein]

there is no dos in XP, but it does work without windows loaded

If there were no dos, XP couldn't access disks.

 

[Al Klein]

The main magic of partition magic is that anyone can use it....
its just a program you start in windows and it does the rest.

Therefore, for the masses it is better than the other solutions.
For the geeks.. well.. they can go ahead and write their own program if they
like!

The fact that you prefer to saw off the limb you're sitting on doesn't
make that the best (or even a good) solution. But that's what using a
partition manager while booted into a partition is doing.

 

[Gary R. Schmidt]

If there were no dos, XP couldn't access disks.

Really?

So all the UNIX variants I've run on peecees over the last 20 years
were unable to access any of the disks because the didn't have DOS?

That explains why they all worked perfectly, doesn't it.

Of course, just which "dos" are you talking about?

There was an IBM DOS for the System3? mainframe, perhaps that's what you
mean.

Cheers,
Gary B-)

 

[Renan]

char *poster[] = Al Klein:

If there were no dos, XP couldn't access disks.

Windows NT/2000/XP/2003 are fully 32-bit. Hardware access, I think, is
done via the Hardware Abstraction Layer.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardware_abstraction_layer

 

[Al Klein]

Really?

Really - the part of the OS that handles disk I/O is called the dos.

So all the UNIX variants I've run on peecees over the last 20 years
were unable to access any of the disks because the didn't have DOS?

No, they all have doses.

Of course, just which "dos" are you talking about?

The one in the operating system, whatever that happens to be.

There was an IBM DOS for the System3? mainframe, perhaps that's what you
mean.

There was a DOS for just about every computer since the SOL (and for
quite a few before that). That's what I mean, because that's what
"dos" means - the disk handling part of the OS, the [D]isk [O]perating
ystem..

 

[David]

Really?

So all the UNIX variants I've run on peecees over the last 20 years
were unable to access any of the disks because the didn't have DOS?

That explains why they all worked perfectly, doesn't it.

Of course, just which "dos" are you talking about?

There was an IBM DOS for the System3? mainframe, perhaps that's what you
mean.

Cheers,
Gary B-)

DOS stands for Disk Operating System. It is contained on a disk and it
operates a disk thus you can say that all operating systems are a DOS
even though they may be called something else entirely. You touched on
this when you asked which DOS was being talked about.

 

[Gary R. Schmidt]

Al Klein wrote:
[SNIP total bumpf about what a DOS is...]

Disks are accessed by a subsystem of the OS. Calling that a "DOS" is wrong.

Unless something has changed since I took CS-101 back in 1980...?

Cheers,
Gary B-)

 

[Renan]

char *poster[] = Gary R. Schmidt:

Al Klein wrote:
[SNIP total bumpf about what a DOS is...]

Disks are accessed by a subsystem of the OS. Calling that a "DOS" is wrong.

I'm no computer scientist, but AIUI, the part of the OS that accesses
the disks is simply the "Disk I/O" (which could be a driver).

 

[Chris Lee]

Is there a freeware equivalent? I've drilled so deep into Google I
thought
I'd strike something, but no joy.
TIA

Troll elsewhere loser.

 

[Chris Lee]

You view the world through your own perception of it.
I view the world through the perception of many others.

The main magic of partition magic is that anyone can use it....
its just a program you start in windows and it does the rest.


-K

Yeah. If you *WANT* to either destroy or create defective partitions.

There's a *REASON* why this stuff is normally *NOT* done under Windows.

 

[Lou]

Really?

Really - the part of the OS that handles disk I/O is called the dos.

So all the UNIX variants I've run on peecees over the last 20 years
were unable to access any of the disks because the didn't have DOS?

No, they all have doses.

Of course, just which "dos" are you talking about?

The one in the operating system, whatever that happens to be.

There was an IBM DOS for the System3? mainframe, perhaps that's what you
mean.

There was a DOS for just about every computer since the SOL (and for
quite a few before that). That's what I mean, because that's what
"dos" means - the disk handling part of the OS, the [D]isk [O]perating
ystem..

What we have here is semantics issue.
Your "dos" is different from a "DOS". There have been, and are, many DOS
systems which is a general name for a disk based operating system. ALL
operating systems that access disk MUST have some code that gets to the disk
drives at some level. Argument is a waste of time <sigh>

Lou

 

[Gary R. Schmidt]

What we have here is semantics issue.
Your "dos" is different from a "DOS". There have been, and are, many DOS
systems which is a general name for a disk based operating system. ALL
operating systems that access disk MUST have some code that gets to the disk
drives at some level. Argument is a waste of time <sigh>

No, it is an "incorrect use of terms" issue, and as such, not an argument.

There is no "dos" or "DOS" _inside_ an OS.

There is, on those OSs that have disks, a sub-system that accesses the
disks. (And, of course, if the OS runs _from_ a disk, then it _is_ a
DOS, as in a "Disk-based Operating System".)

The sub-system is not, and has not been, called a "dos". Except
possibly by journalists. And TAFE lecturers.

There is so much mis-information about computers spread by those with a
little knowledge, which is why an old an honourable title such as
"Hacker" now has such unpleasant overtones.

Cheers,
Gary B-)

 

[dadiOH]

The sub-system is not, and has not been, called a "dos". Except
possibly by journalists. And TAFE lecturers.

Was when I used TRS-80 computers. Wasn't a "sub-system" though...

--
dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico

 

[Daniel Mandic]

No, it is an "incorrect use of terms" issue, and as such, not an
argument.

There is no "dos" or "DOS" inside an OS.

Hi Gary!



I think Al and other subcribers meant:

bootsect.dos [Windows NT File]

Dateityp : DOS-Datei

Open with : unknown app




unpleasant overtones.

Cheers,
Gary B-)

But Windows NT is pure 32bit, and nothing other. Maybe 64bit too, but
not 16bit. Even NT3, 3.1 and 3.5 and 3.51 is 32bit, but poor (weak),
IMO. XP is O.K.




Best Regards,

Daniel Mandic

 

[David]

No, it is an "incorrect use of terms" issue, and as such, not an
argument.

There is no "dos" or "DOS" inside an OS.

Hi Gary!



I think Al and other subcribers meant:

bootsect.dos [Windows NT File]

Dateityp : DOS-Datei

Open with : unknown app




unpleasant overtones.

Cheers,
Gary B-)

But Windows NT is pure 32bit, and nothing other. Maybe 64bit too, but
not 16bit. Even NT3, 3.1 and 3.5 and 3.51 is 32bit, but poor (weak),
IMO. XP is O.K.

Which has no bearing on the fact that NT is a DOS. It resides on a
disk and handles the I/O of disks.

Early DOS were 8 bit, 16 bit and 32 bit if we are talking about the
IBM, MS and DR/Novell versions of operating systems for IBM PCs and
the various clones. Other operating systems, such as Linux and many
Unices, are also DOS. They are just not called DOS since IBM & MS
seemed to pre-empt the name and they wish to distance themselves from
the negative connotations.

 

[Gary R. Schmidt]

Was when I used TRS-80 computers. Wasn't a "sub-system" though...

TRS-DOS _was_ a Disk[-based] Operating System.

(This is what I meant about "a little knowledge")

Cheers,
Gary B-)

 

[Al Klein]

The sub-system is not, and has not been, called a "dos". Except
possibly by journalists. And TAFE lecturers.

And the people who actually WRITE the systems. The software section
that interfaces with the disks is known, and has been known for
decades, as the BDOS (Basic Disk Operating System - and long before
IBM marketed a little desktop computer) - to everyone, apparently,
except those who don't actually write it.

There is so much mis-information about computers spread by those with a
little knowledge

Case in point is the post to which I'm responding. You've written HOW
MANY operating systems?