Windows 7: How to lump the 100MB system reserved partition as part of C Drive?

Hi there
Not quite true - but almost.

The only time you can avoid creating this partition is if you allocate the WHOLE HDD / SSD to "C" before installing Windows -- if you have any other partitions then Windows will always create the 100 MB partition.

After you've created your Windows system you can then use something like Partition Wizard (Free) to re-size the "C" partition if you've installed on to a large HDD.

It's not necessary to avoid creating the windows system partition - but I can understand why some people might want to do it -- then they just have to backup the "C" image instead of the system partition too.

On restore also when you restore the system Partition it must be the ACTIVE partition or your system won't boot. Set the "C" partition to PRIMARY.

I can see people just preferring to have a single partition so they don't have to worry about any of this on backup / restore of their images.

Remember also with things like GPT disks etc other considerations will apply in future.

Cheers
jimbo

Deleting the System Reserved partition is straightforward - just delete it and merge the unallocated space to C: using your favourite partitioning tool..........but only after you have copied over the bootmanger to C: using these very simple steps:

Bootmgr - Move to C:\ with EasyBCD

I "pre partiton" a HD with multiple partitions before installing the OS.
I've never had Windows create the 100MB System Reserved partition, when multiple partitions already exist.

Golden, that's right, I only figured that out a little while ago. I use Windows 7 Manager to move the boot manager over to C.

Actually, just re-name the RAR file as an ISO file. Or the reverse. I've done this a million times, they are practically identical, and ISO is an uncompressed RAR file, or, a compressed one, if the ISO image has been compressed to make a Gigabyte of space fit onto a CD image.

that way you can just burn whatever RAR you have after changing the RAR to ISO.

Hi - any feedback on the magic number for the best partition size for both C and D on a 120GB SSD?

That 's not my experience.
In fact my experience is the exact opposite (i.e. just like DavidW7ncus's).

If my drive is empty (i.e. not partitioned and formatted) I always get the 100 MB partition.
My VMs all have that 100 MB partition (since pre-partitioning VHDs is a pain, I just let Windows install to the entire VHD as it sees fit).

I always pre-partition and format my physical HDDs, before installing any operating systems.
I never get that 100 MB partition on any HDDs I've pre-partitioned and formatted.

Hi guys...also, need some advice on something else.
Please refer to this link.
App slow to display itself onto full screen.

I would not use 3rd party tools or line commands to move the boot files because these do not complete the job.

Since before Win7 was released the procedure developed here is to Mark Partition C Active (converting first to Primary if it's Logical so it will accept the Active flag) and then run Startup Repair - Run up to 3 Separate Times.

Anything less will not complete the job. The OS may boot from C but it will lose the Repair console link on F8 Advanced Boot Options which is not a Best Practice and sloppy work.

This is not quite correct:

1. Your predefined C partition must also be active. Simple primary alone will not do.
2. Windows will not install the 100MB partition on C. It will install the bootmgr on C - thus the 100MB partition is no more needed and will not be generated.

But if you have an installation with the 100MB partition, you can just move the bootmgr to C ( Bootmgr - Move to C:\ with EasyBCD ). Then the 100MB partition becomes irrelevant and you can do with it what you want.