Delete a partition to recover space to drive C:

[solon fox]

Situation
Drive C: (NTFS) 5GB free space
contains OS, program files, program data, some users application data

Drive D: (NTFS) 8GB free space
contains Users, Contacts, Desktop, Documents, Downloads, Favorites,
Links, Music, Pictures, Saved Games, Searches, Videos, program files
(miscellaneous utility types of programs that are easily recoverable),
maildata (.pst archives, personal folders), MSOCache

Objective
Increase free space on drive C: by merging and completely deleting
drive D

Options
A) Move all data from drive D to an external drive F, change Outlook
files to C drive, modify settings for location of D:\Users\* to C:
\Users\* in Vista

Use Vista Computer Management, Disk Management to delete volume D: and
then extend volume C. It isn't clear that deleting volume D would
allow the now unallocated space to be extended to volume C. It looks
like one might be stuck without being able to add the space to volume
C and that the unallocated space could only be used to create new
partitions. Is this correct? It is definitely not what I want.

B) Use Symantec's PartitionMagic, Acronis Disk Manager, or Paragaon
Partition Manager. Any comments about any of these products? After
using these products will I have a single partition as desired? Will I
find myself forever married to the product until I scrap the hard
drive or the system?

C) Bite the bullet. Copy contents of D: to F:. Remove the partitions
format the drive, reinstall Vista and all programs building a new
install from scratch and then recover data only from external drive F
to new drive C.

Any suggestions? Option A would be preferred, except that I don't
think it will work. When it comes to option B, I would spend the $40
to $70 bucks if I knew that a) it would not leave me with a virtual
drive manageable only with the software, b) it would facilitate the
software configuration and make the move painless. My fear is that in
the end I would be sacrificing some portion of my drive to
PartionMagic (or whichever) and still have to manually configure
MSOCache, maildata, etc as well as do some app reinstalls. If that is
the case, then I might as well just bite the bullet on option C.

Thanks in advance,

-solon fox

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

Option A will work fine so long as the newly unallocated space (formerly D
is immediately after C:. If not, then option B will work as you will need to
slide the partitions around before you can extend C:.

13GB is still too small for a Vista installation.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[solon fox]

Hi,

Option A will work fine so long as the newly unallocated space (formerly D
is immediately after C:. If not, then option B will work as you will need to
slide the partitions around before you can extend C:.

13GB is still too small for a Vista installation.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVPhttp://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Windows help -www.rickrogers.org
My thoughtshttp://rick-mvp.blogspot.com















- Show quoted text -

Hi Rick,
You have made me very happy to learn that Vista will allow me to
recover that space, I hope. Between C and D there is 8 MB unallocated
space - not my doing, I'm sure that it is an artifact of the original
partitioning.Do you think that will be a problem?

Yes, 13GB unused space is not enough. I could be more agressive about
archiving data to an external drive and likely won't move everything
from the original drive D: back to the newly extended drive C:.

The drive is smaller than I would like, but since it is a laptop owned
by my employer, I won't be purchasing a new internal drive. My mistake
was not to remove the partions and reformat the day it was issued to
me. I don't mind spending my own money on stuff that will make me more
productive, but I'm not going to battle with them about the small
internal drive either.

Thanks!
-solon fox

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

The 8MB of unallocated space is just the result of partition alignment, it
should not be an issue.

Contact your employer's IT department and tell them you continue to run out
of space and need a larger drive as you spend too much non-productive time
connecting external drives and copying off files, they really aren't all
that expensive.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

Hi,

Option A will work fine so long as the newly unallocated space (formerly
D
is immediately after C:. If not, then option B will work as you will need
to
slide the partitions around before you can extend C:.

13GB is still too small for a Vista installation.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft
MVPhttp://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Windows help -www.rickrogers.org
My thoughtshttp://rick-mvp.blogspot.com















- Show quoted text -

Hi Rick,
You have made me very happy to learn that Vista will allow me to
recover that space, I hope. Between C and D there is 8 MB unallocated
space - not my doing, I'm sure that it is an artifact of the original
partitioning.Do you think that will be a problem?

Yes, 13GB unused space is not enough. I could be more agressive about
archiving data to an external drive and likely won't move everything
from the original drive D: back to the newly extended drive C:.

The drive is smaller than I would like, but since it is a laptop owned
by my employer, I won't be purchasing a new internal drive. My mistake
was not to remove the partions and reformat the day it was issued to
me. I don't mind spending my own money on stuff that will make me more
productive, but I'm not going to battle with them about the small
internal drive either.

Thanks!
-solon fox

 

[solon fox]

Hi Rick,

Clearly good advice. You do a better job than I of answering questions
out here. Each time I ask a question, I try to give back by answering
a few questions as best I'm able. I see your contributions and
appreciate your posts.

On my problem, my take is that I can/should request a larger hard
drive from my employer, but that I shall probably go ahead and remove
the partition on this drive because it will then be easier to transfer
to the new drive of just one partition. Although I've always had
partitioned drives, I don't see a reason to move forward with that
strategy. The one advantage I see to partitioning is keeping all data
and personal programs on a separate partition, but I think it has
limited value these days. All my data is neatly organized in my user
profile anyways.

My plan of attack to remove partition D from my internal drive:

create a new/updated image backup to external F: drive
backup the registry (full) to F: drive
Uncatalog all archive pst's in Outlook
Make a list of all programs installed on D drive
Move all data from D drive to backup F: drive
Move primary .pst personal folders to C: drive associate in Outlook
Have all the install disks for vista and office at hand (just in case)
change location of users from D drive to C drive (Documents, Music,
etc now empty)
backup the registry (at this point, the D drive should exist, but not
be used by anything significant)
scan registry for references to D drive
remove the partition/extend the C: volume
check disk and defrag
restore data to c: drive from f: drive
configure personal folders and archive folders in Outlook
install programs that used to be on D drive
defrag
create a new backup
check for updates

Of course, I'll have to roll with the punches in case I discover
something along the way. If I run in to trouble, then I can always put
the partition back and restore from image.

Do you see any obvious flaws in the plan? I'll probably do it later in
the week when I have more time.

Thanks,
-solon fox

 

[Rick Rogers]

Your plan looks good, maybe a bit of overkill but you'll be well prepared in
the advent of disaster.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

Hi Rick,

Clearly good advice. You do a better job than I of answering questions
out here. Each time I ask a question, I try to give back by answering
a few questions as best I'm able. I see your contributions and
appreciate your posts.

On my problem, my take is that I can/should request a larger hard
drive from my employer, but that I shall probably go ahead and remove
the partition on this drive because it will then be easier to transfer
to the new drive of just one partition. Although I've always had
partitioned drives, I don't see a reason to move forward with that
strategy. The one advantage I see to partitioning is keeping all data
and personal programs on a separate partition, but I think it has
limited value these days. All my data is neatly organized in my user
profile anyways.

My plan of attack to remove partition D from my internal drive:

create a new/updated image backup to external F: drive
backup the registry (full) to F: drive
Uncatalog all archive pst's in Outlook
Make a list of all programs installed on D drive
Move all data from D drive to backup F: drive
Move primary .pst personal folders to C: drive associate in Outlook
Have all the install disks for vista and office at hand (just in case)
change location of users from D drive to C drive (Documents, Music,
etc now empty)
backup the registry (at this point, the D drive should exist, but not
be used by anything significant)
scan registry for references to D drive
remove the partition/extend the C: volume
check disk and defrag
restore data to c: drive from f: drive
configure personal folders and archive folders in Outlook
install programs that used to be on D drive
defrag
create a new backup
check for updates

Of course, I'll have to roll with the punches in case I discover
something along the way. If I run in to trouble, then I can always put
the partition back and restore from image.

Do you see any obvious flaws in the plan? I'll probably do it later in
the week when I have more time.

Thanks,
-solon fox

 

[solon fox]

I thought I'd let you know how it worked out. In case, anyone else
wants to do the same, maybe they will find this helpful.

Here are the actual steps that I followed to remove my D partition
entirely and regain all of the space to the C partition.

Admittedly, my plan of attack was overkill, but it worked well for me
and made me feel secure.

Situation:
C drive contained Vista Ultimate and program files with little space
(less than 5 GB) left.
D drive contained user data - all of the special folders like,
Documents, Music, Pictures, etc. Plus mail data (Outlook .pst files)
and a number of applications in D:\Program Files

Objective:
Have a single C drive with all data and program files and over 20GB
free space.

Steps:

I began with a complete backup using Vista's utility to an external
USB drive F:

I opened Outlook and removed the archive .pst's, then moved them from
D: to F:

I then moved the main .pst to the C drive and configured Outlook data
file to find the .pst on the C drive.

I uninstalled all applications on the D drive and then moved all files
from the D drive to the F drive.

Through Computer Management>Storage>Disk Management, I deleted the D
drive, deleted the partition and extended the C drive (the
presentation in the extend a drive dialog was confusing, but just
next, next, take the defaults and finish).

Restart, defrag.

I then took a full registry backup to the F drive

Using a text editor, I replaced all occurences of 'D:\' in the
registry with 'C:\' and imported the new registry.

Restart

Modify all data files on the F drive so as they do not have the 'read
only attribute' that gets applied when you copy them.

Copy all files from the F drive to the C drive in their appropriate
locations.

Assume full ownership of Documents, Pictures, Music, Video, etc - for
some reason when copied back these had owner of 'System'. I like to
own my documents.

Install the handful of applications I had uninstalled.

Restart, defrag, success.

A few notes: the extra step of modifying the registry isn't strictly
necessary, but it did have the benefit of putting everything back to
exactly the way I had it. Otherwise, certain file locations wouldn't
be found and some application settings would need to be redone.
Programs that had been uninstalled found their old settings due in
part to the registry hack and when they were reinstalled, they worked
as if they had never been gone.

I'm glad I did it.

-solon fox