HP laptop has used up all four primary partitions

gregrocker said:

If you have favorite apps you want to extract from the HP recovery disks like WOrks, then you can use this method: https://www.sevenforums.com/installat...tml#post488270

gregrocker

I have had a look at the two videos and it seems an incredibly complicated and lengthy procedure.

This is probably a silly question but is it not possible somehow to copy folders from my present C:\SwSetup directory and then paste them somewhere - not too sure where - into my fresh install of Windows 7 (once I get round to attempting it that is) and run the various Windows Installers? Or is that a complete no no?

One program I would definitely like to try and keep is the CyberLink DVD Suite, but unfortunately HP do not seem to offer this as a download for my particular laptop on their support website.

I always back up SWsetup to save time reinstalling drivers. But I don't know if any HP system utilities you may want are in there. The only thing I would want off of the Recov disks myself is Works, which I already have. You may want to use the extraction method to get Cyberlink off of them.

gregrocker said:

You may want to use the extraction method to get Cyberlink off of them.

OK, thanks. I'll probably give that a try. It just struck me as rather excessive having to download the entire Windows Automated Installation Kit to do this when all that is needed (I believe) is imagex and WIM driver.

whs

Yes, but the Tools partition is only 103 MB in size so surely that is an absolute non-starter for creating an extended partition in?

If I deleted the Recovery partition (13.56 GB in size) that would make enough free space to create an extended partition with two logicals to install Linux in. And, if Disk Management/Diskpart permitted it, I could also shrink the adjacent C: partition to make even more space for the extended partition. However, I have had problems in the past using Disk Management to shrink C: partitions. Sometimes, depending on immovable system files on that partition, there is a limit to how much you can shrink.

So far I have created the HP recovery DVDs plus a Macrium Reflect image backup of the entire drive so hopefully one at least of these will work should I need them.

Thanks for the link to Partition Wizard. I had not heard of this program before.

Bare Foot Kid said:

Have a look at these then.


Partition : Recover Space Used by an Older OS

Partition Wizard : Use the Bootable CD

Bare Foot Kid

Cheers. I'll read through those articles.

whs said:

My point was slightly different. I wanted to get you off the 4 primaries so that you could create an extended partition. Whether you did that then with the 103MBs and then shrunk more space off the C partition or whether you started with space off the C partition right away would not have mattered. The problem at hand was that you were stuck with the 4 primaries.

Ah right. Sorry, I misunderstood.

The problem with the Disk Management not being able to shrink beyond the MFT sitting in the middle of the partition can be overcome with Partition Wizard.

Thanks. I'm just about to study the articles on Partition Wizard.