how to transfer Harddrive space from C to D

[Guest]

Hi, I just bought my new and first ev er Toshiba laptop (model in signature)
equipped with Windows Vista Home Premium OS. It has a 200 gig Harddrive
space. When I turned it on, I checked the space available on my harddrive. It
was partitioned or maybe it wasn't but there was a C drive and a D
drive(local disk) The C: Drive contained the majority of my Harddrive space
availability: 178gig, and the D: Drive contained 6 gigs. Can somebody please
tell me step by step how to reallocate the C Drive volume to the D Drive, so
I can have more harddrive space on my partitioned drive as opposed to my C
Drive so in case of a system crash, the files that are on the D Drive won't
be affected by it and only the C Drive where Windows Vista Operating System
is installed.

I want to have 120 gigs on my D: Drive and the remaining on my C Drive just
to be able to run Windows Vista smoothly. To be exact there is 155 gigs of
173 on my C: Drive. and 5.65 of 5.71 on my D: Drive.

I have not tampered with any reduction of the System Shadow Storage Backup
yet until I repartitioned it to have my D Drive containt the majority of the
harddrive space. Can you also tell me if the System Shadow Storage is only
for the C Drive where Vista is installed? If so, like I do in my PC by
creating a D Drive partition the files in the D Drive won't be affected by
any mishaps. So by doing this I can eliminate the whole process of the shadow
storage cuz I won't need to backup my D as it will be unharmed by system
crashes etc.

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

Quaresma

Check with Toshiba before you decide do this. That D: drive is probably a
recovery partition for Vista and should not be used or changed. It may be
the only way that you have to reinstall Vista.

 

[Mike]

Quaresma

Check with Toshiba before you decide do this. That D: drive is probably a
recovery partition for Vista and should not be used or changed. It may be
the only way that you have to reinstall Vista.

While this is probably true, it's interesting that he can see it in
Vista. Recovery partitions are supposed to be hidden from the OS.

Mike

 

[Paul Randall]

The D: drive probably has recovery information. You might need it to build
a set of recovery CDs or DVDs, or to restore your computer to something
close to its 'out of the box' state. Some vendors make this a hidden
partition, and some don't. Messing with this important partition may screw
things up. Check with Toshiba. I'd even call again another day and get a
second opinion.

If you really want separate partitions for your system and data, maybe you
can shrink the C: drive partition and create a third partition in the
freed-up space. You can have up to four primary partitions (or three
primary and one extended partition into which you can create any number of
logical partitions). Of course, if you ever restore your system from the D:
drive, the partitioning may revert to 'out of the box', or maybe it will
refuse to restore since you changed the partition arrangement. Check with
Toshiba, or try it so you will know for sure. Sometimes its nice to have a
spare hard drive for you laptop so you can try stuff like this.

-Paul Randall

 

[Guest]

Very informative, thanks guys. But just to clear this up. I think the C drive
is the recovery information Drive as I noticed after posting the first post
where I indicated that I have 155 gigs left, it depleted to 153 gigs, losing
2 gigs in an hour span. So right then I decided to turn off the System
Restore Point and I recovered my harddrive to 160 gigs. In the D Drive there
is no files or folders but it has space taken up. I already created the
recovery disc as well.

But can someone answer this though.*** If I made a 3rd partition to make it
like a BACKUP Drive incase of a system crash to put all my music/movies on
thsi 3rd partition. Will it be unaffected? And only the C Drive where Vista
is installed is affected. Just like on a PC/Desktop, if you know what I mean?
Cuz on my desktop computer, I have C Drive with less space and D Drive with
the majority of space to contain my music and movies. And when I have to
reformat the D Drive is left untouched cuz all I need to do is reformat the
C: drive to get windows operating smoothly again.

Will this be the same case with my laptop if I create the 3rd partition to
do this exact actions that I do on my desktop?

 

[Paul Randall]

I think D drive is your recovery partition (typically 5 to 10 Gigabytes).
Sometimes the partition is hidden and sometimes it isn't. If you are set up
to view hidden and system files and folders, you should see stuff in that
partition (your D drive). Typically, when you run your recovery disks,
everything will be lost from your C drive, so you would be wise to make that
third partition for data you wish to retain, which should be unaffected by
the recovery. I say should because I have never tried recovery on your
machine.

-Paul Randall

 

[Guest]

Mr. Paul Randall, thats what I needed to hear. Thanks so much, Appreciate
your help and kindness, bless.

 

[Guest]

Oh one more thing if you can comment on. I disabled my System Restore Point
and it recovered me 7 gigs back. I disabled it because I assume that there is
no need for it as I have created the Recovery Disc already. But yea I suppose
it's useful for the time I have a lot of data on the C Drive and I want to
save it at that Restore Point. But seeing as my other question was regarding
the third partition where my data won't be affected by using the System
Recovery then I suppose the System Restore Point function is pretty much
useless in that case correct?. Since I am going to put all my files that I
want to be on the third partition.

 

[Paul Randall]

Suppose one of the windows updates or the installation of some driver
screwed up your computer in a way that you could not manually fix? Would
you rather do a few clicks to do a system restore or completely reinstall
your OS, all updates and all of the other software you had previously
installed? That is not to say that restore points can't get messed up and
be unusable. I know of no way to periodically validate system restore
points. Think of that 7 gigs as an insurance policy with a company that
doesn't always pay off. It is just one more thing that can be helpful in a
pinch. I've heard that shadow files are also associated with system restore
and can be quite handy, but I haven't played with that.

-Paul Randall

 

[Guest]

I have another issue. Last night I followed the steps from Windows Help and
Support and from many other websites about partitioning my harddrive.

What I wanted to do was to partition my C Drive and make another Drive so
that when I do a system recovery, the files I have on that Drive doesn't get
affected as you said, since it is partitioned. I followed the steps and
"shrinked" the volume of my C Drive which gave me 62 gigs to allocate
elsewhere. In the Storage/Disk Management list it shows that 62 gigs as
unallocated and then I had to further follow the steps by right clicking that
unallocated box and go through with the New Simple Volume Wizard. I followed
the steps but it gave me a warning and then an error message about Dynamic
Disc and how it can't work. (Some current boot of the installed Operating
System) My C Drive then became 111 and then 62 gigs was not shown in the Disk
Management list nor in My Computer. How do I make that partition active? I
know there is a option in the pop up list when you right click, but it is not
available to click.

?How do I partition correctly so I can start backing up my files onto that
secondary partition so when I reformat or do the recovery system the files I
have will not be touched seeing as it is not on the Drive where Windows is
installed. Just like when you do partitioning in XP or 98.?

 

[Paul Randall]

I have not set up any dynamic discs on my systems and don't know enough to
be able to help you. Search for dynamic disc in help & support. Maybe you
can find out how or why your system thinks your drive has turned into a
dynamic disc.

-Paul Randall