Converted my HDD to dynamic; how do I change it back?


  1. kbronski
    Posts : 297
    Windows 7 Pro x64
       New #1

    Converted my HDD to dynamic; how do I change it back?


    So, I'll give this as plainly as I can.


    I had some partitions, as follows.

    ||SYSTEM RESERVED||WINDOWS 7||SHARED DATA||WINDOWS 8||

    Next, I shrank the Windows 8 volume and made a new volume. My plan was going to be to clone the Windows 8 volume to the new volume, so I could add more storage space to my shared data partition. The problem is this: creating the extra volume converted my whole HDD to dynamic. That said, my Windows 8 boot was lost immediately. So, I just deleted the Windows 8 partition and the new one and merged all that extra space to my data partition. Now, will this mess with my Windows 7 boot at all? I'm scared to restart my computer.


    All of my partitions (including my Windows 7 one) are just simple volumes now.
    I'm feel stupid.
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

  3. windude99
    Posts : 1,533
    Windows 7 Professional x64 Service Pack 1
       New #2

    kbronski said:
    So, I'll give this as plainly as I can.


    I had some partitions, as follows.

    ||SYSTEM RESERVED||WINDOWS 7||SHARED DATA||WINDOWS 8||

    Next, I shrank the Windows 8 volume and made a new volume. My plan was going to be to clone the Windows 8 volume to the new volume, so I could add more storage space to my shared data partition. The problem is this: creating the extra volume converted my whole HDD to dynamic. That said, my Windows 8 boot was lost immediately. So, I just deleted the Windows 8 partition and the new one and merged all that extra space to my data partition. Now, will this mess with my Windows 7 boot at all? I'm scared to restart my computer.

    I'm feel stupid.
    Insert your Windows 7 installation cd and boot off of it. Next, click on repair your computer and then click on startup repair. It should fix the issues. If not, insert your Windows 8 installation cd/usb and run startup repair off of that.
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

  4. kbronski
    Posts : 297
    Windows 7 Pro x64
    Thread Starter
       New #3

    Blargh. Okay. Or I can just reformat :3 OR DO A SYSTEM RESTORE?

    If I reformat, will I be able to use my Windows 7 key on the bottom of my laptop again? This would my second time reformatting.
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

  6. ignatzatsonic
    Posts : 12,012
    Windows 7 Home Premium SP1, 64-bit
       New #4

    Post a screen shot of Windows Disk Management so we can see what is going on.

    Generally---if you have a valid product key, you can reinstall as much as you have to--if you have not changed motherboards.
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

  7. kbronski
    Posts : 297
    Windows 7 Pro x64
    Thread Starter
       New #5

    Actually, the issue is more updated over here: Drive Cloning -- One Partition To Another - Windows 8 Forums
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

  8. karlsnooks
    Posts : 10,200
    MS Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 64-bit
       New #6

    kbronski,
    Yes. You will be able to use your Product Key again.
    SIW, under Software | Licenses will shou you both your product id and your product key. They are different animals.

    Link to SIW in my signature.
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

  10. gregrocker
    Posts : 50,642
       New #7

    You must have ignored the warning message that you were converting to Dynamic disk which is meant for spanning large partitions across HD's.

    To convert it back to Basic non-destructively use free Partition Wizard bootable CD, however this feature is only free in version 4.2 and prior. You can download the file here and burn to CD using Windows Image Burner or ImgBurn: pw422.zip ISO - Windows Live

    Boot the CD, click on Disk # to highlight it, then from Disk tab select Convert to Basic Disk.

    In order to do this you'll first need to delete the partition which caused the conversion.

    Then post back a screenshot of your maximized Disk Mgmt drive map so we can advise you the best way to convert a partition to Logical so that as many Logical sub-partitions can be added as needed. Often this is done with C if you have the 100mb System Reserved partition booting Win7..
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

  11. kbronski
    Posts : 297
    Windows 7 Pro x64
    Thread Starter
       New #8

    I'm just gonna start over from scratch after next week (next week is finals and then it's back home for summer).
    That way I can give my HDD a few good wipes anyway. Thanks for the help, though. I'll bookmark these for the future.
      My Computer
    Quote Quote

 

  Related Discussions
well scenario is I got my new dell 15r laptop with windows 7 basic loaded yesterday.. so backed it up and wanted to put my old PC's windows 7 ultimate version on it. I installed it, while installation it allowed to have only 4 partitions. it already had 2 partitions 1) Recovery - 15gb 2)...
(Win7 Ultimate x32, SP1) I have an old 40GB drive split into 3 partitions (none are boot). After a recent crash the drive had a mechanical failure- the actuator was sticking or something- but after a few taps it started again and seems to be ok. No loss of data and fully accessible but windows...
I am building a new computer with 1TB of HDD. At first when I started to install an OS, a system volume was created automatically of 100MB size. Then I created another 200GB partition as C to install win7 and 2 other partitions of 250GB. I wasn't allowed to create another one partition. After I...
Disk converted to dynamic?
in General Discussion

So I realized my system reserved partition had ended up on the wrong drive. I deleted the volume with the partition and tried to combine it with the rest of the disk by extending but it turned into a dynamic volume. http://img819.imageshack.us/img819/7296/75072986.png Is this going to affect...
I have a 500GB IDE (seconday master) (all my OS and other drives are on SATA) to dynamic. (it wouldn't being recognized by W7, and in a hurry I converted it to Dynamic).
Our Sites
Site Links
About Us
Windows 7 Forums is an independent web site and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Microsoft Corporation. "Windows 7" and related materials are trademarks of Microsoft Corp.

 © Designer Media Ltd
All times are GMT -5. The time now is 05:09.
Find Us