Wrong partition is "active"

S

Simon

My (bootable) C drive is partitioned into C, E and F. I also have a D
drive for data. Although my computer works fine, I notice in Disk
Management that my C drive is marked "system" and my D drive "active".
The toggle active partition command is greyed out.

There are some issues on my D drive because it causes imaging software
to crash, but the problem is resolved when the D drive is
disconnected. Also, there seems to be some unused, unallcoated space
at the end of the D drive, because in Disk Management, there is an
area missing at the end of the drive. I previously had "Unallocated
Space" of about 8Mb, but converted it into a partition and merged it
with my D drive.

Should my D drive partition be marked as "active" and if not, how do I
change it?

What is causing the apparent unallocated space at the end of the D
drive and how do I resolve it? (There is no unallocated space on my C
drive and my other computers do not have this problem.)
 
T

Timothy Daniels

Simon said:
My (bootable) C drive is partitioned into C, E and F.
I also have a D drive for data. Although my computer
works fine, I notice in Disk Management that my C
drive is marked "system" and my D drive "active".
The toggle active partition command is greyed out.

Windows will only mark primary partitions "active",
and if there is only one primary partition, the MBR
will *assume* that it is "active" Since you have only
one primary partition on your 2nd HD, Disk Manage-
ment shouldn't give you the capability to mark the sole
partition "active". Are you sure the sole D partition is
marked "active", or do you mean to say that it's named
"boot"?

Microsoft's terminology calls the partition whose
boot files loaded the system the "system" partition.
Microsoft calls the partition containing the OS that is
running the "boot" partition. Yes, it's conceptually
backwards, but that's Microsoft. When the "system"
and the "boot" partition are the same partition, the
partition is called "system", i.e. the location of the
boot files.

And BTW, again - you have no "D: drive". What
you have is a 2nd HD which has a Local Disk (i.e. a
partition) called "D:" The concept of "C drive" and
"D drive" went out when HDs could contain more than
one partition.

*TimDaniels*
 
S

Simon

Sorry if it all sounds confusing. I have spent a few hours on this
since my first message. I *definitely* have two "primary active
partitions" on different physical discs.

1) C drive which is a 250Gb drive where my operating system resides
(partitioned into C, E and F).
2) D drive which is a 200Gb drive.

However, the D drive has some kind of error in it. Initially, it shows
as a189Gb partition and unallocated space of 8Mb. Using Acronis Disk
Director, I am able to create a partition called G which is 8Mb and
has a smaller cluster size than partition D. I can change the cluster
size to be the same as D. I cannot merge D and G, because when I try
to do so, although I get no error message, D remains 189Gb and
although G disappears, the "unallocated space" of 8Mb returns!

Partition D isn't primary active but when I create partition G, G
becomes primary active and the option to change that is greyed out.

It looks like the 8Mb refuses to move or be merged. I'm going to try a
low level format next.
 
T

Timothy Daniels

Simon said:
Sorry if it all sounds confusing. I have spent a few hours on this
since my first message. I *definitely* have two "primary active
partitions" on different physical discs.

1) C drive which is a 250Gb drive where my operating
system resides (partitioned into C, E and F).
2) D drive which is a 200Gb drive.

There is nothing wrong with that. The "active" flag just
tells the HD's MBR which partitions's boot sector to use.
The BIOS selects the HD whose MBR is get control,
and that HD's MBR passes control to the boot sector of
the "active" partition.

However, the D drive has some kind of error in it. Initially,
it shows as a189Gb partition and unallocated space of 8Mb.
Using Acronis Disk Director, I am able to create a partition
called G which is 8Mb and has a smaller cluster size than
partition D. I can change the cluster size to be the same as D.
I cannot merge D and G, because when I try to do so,
although I get no error message, D remains 189Gb and
although G disappears, the "unallocated space" of 8Mb
returns!

Partition D isn't primary active but when I create partition G,
G becomes primary active and the option to change that is
greyed out.

It looks like the 8Mb refuses to move or be merged. I'm going
to try a low level format next.

Do the two partitions that you're trying to merge have
differing formats? And why are you using a 3-rd party
utility to create the 2nd partition when MS provides
Disk Management? You only need 3rd-party stuff if you're
sliding a partition up or down, or if you changing a
partition's size non-destructively, or if you're merging
partitions.

*TimDaniels*
 
G

Guest

A couple of pointers here:

1. The question of booting from C: or D: -as actual physical disks- is NOT
down-to the active partition, or even Windows, but to the BIOS boot-order
settings. If you press Del during startup (or F2 on some Dells/Acers) you
should be able to check this. It's usually under 'Advanced Options' or the
like.

2. I would guess from the drive letters that you have one disk with a
primary partition (C) and two logical partitions (E/F). - and a second disk
with just one primary partition (D). In this case only C or D will be the
Active partitions on each physical disk, you cannot boot from a logical
partition, therefore E and F cannot be Active. That is why Windows refuses
to change the setting- there is no other partition to make active.

Hope this makes things a little clearer.
 
T

Timothy Daniels

Ian said:
2. I would guess from the drive letters that you have
one disk with a primary partition (C) and two logical
partitions (E/F). - and a second disk with just one
primary partition (D). In this case only C or D will be
the Active partitions on each physical disk, you cannot
boot from a logical partition, therefore E and F cannot
be Active. That is why Windows refuses to change the
setting- there is no other partition to make active.


You're sharp. I missed the implication that E & F are
probably logical partitions, i.e. Logical Drives in an
Extended partition. And you're right if you meant that
that logical partitions cannot contain a boot sector,
and thus cannot contain usable boot files. But logical
partitions CAN contain a bootable Windows OS.
As long as there is a Primary partition that is marked
"active" on the HD controling the booting and that
Primary partition contains the boot files (i.e. ntldr,
boot.ini, and ntdetect.com), entries in that boot.ini can
point to an OS in a logical partition, even a logical
partition on another HD, and the ntldr will load it, and
the OS will run successfully.

*TimDaniels*
 

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