Expanding C:

[David]

I have a Gateway notebook, originally installed with XP. Of course it came
with the small restore partition (E. Since I've upgraded to Vista, I no
longer need that restore partition and would like to expand C:, but I
haven't been able to do so. I've gone into Disk Management, shrunk E:,
deleted E:, but neither of these maneuvers resulted in the option to expand
C:. Is it possible that the problem is that there is no free space in C:
that is contiguous with E:? Would it help to defragment C:? Would that
open up free space at the end of drive C:?

Thanks.

 

[Dave]

You can only use Vista Disk Manager to expand a partition if the free space
is to the right of it.
Like you, I had a small recovery partition that I wanted to eliminate.
However it was to the left of my C: partition. I used BootitNG to "slide"
the C: partition to the left, and to expand it. It took quite a while to
move the 470 GB partition.
http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/bootit-next-generation.htm
I'm not sure defragging would help, but Disk Cleanup would.

 

[Gordon]

I have a Gateway notebook, originally installed with XP. Of course it came
with the small restore partition (E. Since I've upgraded to Vista, I no
longer need that restore partition and would like to expand C:, but I
haven't been able to do so. I've gone into Disk Management, shrunk E:,
deleted E:, but neither of these maneuvers resulted in the option to expand
C:. Is it possible that the problem is that there is no free space in C:
that is contiguous with E:? Would it help to defragment C:? Would that
open up free space at the end of drive C:?

Thanks.

Disk Management won't expand partitions.
You need a third-party application like BootIT NG to do this.

 

[Charlie42]

I have a Gateway notebook, originally installed with XP. Of course it came
with the small restore partition (E. Since I've upgraded to Vista, I no
longer need that restore partition and would like to expand C:, but I
haven't been able to do so. I've gone into Disk Management, shrunk E:,
deleted E:, but neither of these maneuvers resulted in the option to expand
C:. Is it possible that the problem is that there is no free space in C:
that is contiguous with E:? Would it help to defragment C:? Would that
open up free space at the end of drive C:?

In order to accomplish what you are trying, you have to use a partition tool
like Acronis or manipulate the volumes from a different OS, such as a Linux
Live-CD.

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/diskdirector/partitioning.html

Charlie42

 

[David]

That sounds about right. When I right-click on E:, I have the option to
"Extend Volume", but when I do the same on C: that option is greyed out.
Frankly, it's a minor point so I will just leave well enough alone and use
E: to store photos, or something like that.
Thanks

 

[Rick Rogers]

Disk Management won't expand partitions.

Yes it will, but the free (unallocated) space must be adjacent to and
immediately after the volume being expanded.

You need a third-party application like BootIT NG to do this.

The third party utilities like the above can slide the partitions around so
that the free space is in the correct position to expand a volume.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

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