Hard Drive Partitioning

[cp in arlington]

i just bought a new laptop and the 140 gig hd came partitioned into (2) 70
gig drives. Is it possible to enlarge the C drive and shrink the D drive at
the same time? Any help is much appreciated.

 

[BurrWalnut]

Right-click Computer > Manage > Storage > Disk Management then right-click
the drive to be changed.

The shrink partition utility can only decrease the partition size down to
the first unmovable/locked system file. To get round this, temporarily turn
off System Restore, do the shrink and turn System Restore back on. Running a
defrag may also move some of the ‘unmovable’ files.

Alternatively, you can shrink partitions by running the diskpart command
from the Vista DVD.

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

Unfortunately, it's not that easy. You will need to first shrink D:, then
slide D: backwards into the free space, then expand C: into the gap between
them. While Vista's disk manager can do the shrinking and expanding, it
cannot do the slide manuever. For that you need a third party partitioning
program like BootIT NG or Acronis' Disk Director.

In addition, you may run into unmovable blocks with Vista's disk manager.
The other mentioned utilities will not have that issue.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

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

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Hi,

Unfortunately, it's not that easy. You will need to first shrink D:,
then slide D: backwards into the free space, then expand C: into the gap
between them. While Vista's disk manager can do the shrinking and
expanding, it cannot do the slide manuever. For that you need a third
party partitioning program like BootIT NG or Acronis' Disk Director.

Alternatively, the OP could also simply delete the "D:" partition,
expand the "C:" to the desired size, and then recreate the "D:" in the
remaining space.


--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:


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[Rick Rogers]

True, provided they move any data they don't wish to lose from D: to C:
prior to beginning. Actually, it's wise to backup any data before beginning
due to the inherent danger in manipulating any volume.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

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

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Does anyone have any advice for what is a good maximum size of
partition?

I have a 500GB SATA WD drive and wondered if I need to partition it at
all, or if I should what size(s) of partition would be optimal?

First, a word on the terminology: to partition a drive is to create
one or more partitions on it, and you can not use the drive unless it
has at least a single partition (normally C.

So you *must* partition it. Your question is really should you have
more than one partition on it.

There is no "optimal," and it's entirely up to you. For more
information to help you decide how to partition/organize your drive,
read this article I recently wrote: "Understanding Disk Partitioning"
at http://www.computorcompanion.com/LPMArticle.asp?ID=326

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Thanks Ken, very interesting artical.

You're welcome. Glad you liked it, and glad to help.

 

[Che]

Hi guys
I bought a dell laptop with 320 GB HDD and the OS is Vista Home Premium.I
have tried to make c drive smaller and make another drive, i have used
partion

manager, partition commander and the shrinking feature of vista itself but
none of them wokrd, partition magic and partition manager resize my c drive

but when i want to create a partition they tell me that there is an error
and i should use a 'Repair Tool' to fix the problem. Shrinking feature of

vista says that "The attemped operation is invalid.Either the parameters
specified are invalid or the operation cannot be completed on the selected

object. Refer to Disk Management help for assistance on the correct use of
the attemted operation". I would apperitiate if you could help me.

Cheers

 

[cp in arlington]

Would i be able to completely delete the d partition and then extend the c
partition into the empty space?

 

[Rick Rogers]

Only if "D:" is immediately after "C:" as shown in disk manager
(diskmgmt.msc). Otherwise, you'll need a third party partitioning utility to
manipulate the volumes and space so that it is.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

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