How to change active partition without removing data from partition?


  1. Posts : 3
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
       #1

    How to change active partition without removing data from partition?


    Hi Folks, I have contrived to get two active partitions on my PC! After a 2 week old hard drive (D: & F -) died I replaced (now F & G) it with an old drive that had previously been configured with XP and as a boot drive. I don’t think it is acting as boot as drive C: has an active partition and boot and largely the computer runs fine with the exception of G not being search / index able? And there being a phantom path in the backup which I can’t reset. So the question!
    How do I remove the active setting on G: (it holds all the variable windows data) and will it lose all the data?
    Im at that point where a little knowledge is dangerous and have seen some genius replies so thought I would ask and see if you could help me out.

    See attached screen shot

    NB The old drive partitions were formatted before being repopulated
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails How to change active partition without removing data from partition?-active-part.jpg  
    Last edited by MarkRocketman; 05 Jul 2012 at 17:01. Reason: Add screen shot
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 2,072
    Windows 7 x64 Professional SP1
       #2

    Hello and welcome to the forums MarkRocketman!

    You can easily change the active/inactive flag on a partition easily by following these steps:-

    Removing the Active Flag from a Partition
    (on a drive that's not currenly being used as a boot drive)

    First, open an elevated command prompt in Windows:-

    1. Click Start Orb
    2. In search box, type cmd
    3. Right-click on cmd.exe, and choose 'Run as Administrator'

    In the elevated command prompt type in the following commands:-

    Diskpart
    LIST DISK
    SELECT DISK n (where n is the number of the HDD in question)
    LIST PARTITION
    SELECT PARTITION n (where n is the number of the Partition that holds G)
    INACTIVE


    Hope that helps!

    EDIT:- As a supplementary addition here's how change it back to active:-

    LIST PARTITION
    SELECT PARTITION n (where n is the number of the Partition you want to activate)
    ACTIVE
    Exit (to exit Diskpart)

     
      My Computer


  3. Posts : 3
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
    Thread Starter
       #3

    Ha you found both my post's. I realised that this one was marked solved so I really appreciate how hard you help. Mark
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 2,072
    Windows 7 x64 Professional SP1
       #4

    No worries mate, that's what we're here for!
      My Computer


 

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