Using my OLD HD for my new external HD

[julio99]

I recently installed a new SSD in my old Acer laptop and removed the old hard drive and re-installed it in an external case. Once I get the few files off of it for the laptop I am going to want to wipe it and re-format it to use as an external Hard drive for Acronis Backups. Can I do the wipe properly in Computer Management or disk management to go from 2 partitions, the C:/drive which is 115 GB and a D:/drive which is 25 GB's. I want to just make it one drive or partition/Primary to use as a backup external drive. Can I do it inside windows and if so how? If not I have used Easeus Home Partition before so i am familiar with it. I just need the proper steps to do it right and not lose any of the disk space in the process. I just looked in Computer management to be sure and it does have a 8.79 Recovery Partition from Acer. I have a feeling that it will need more than Windows Disk management before it let's me delete that partition. When I delete one of these partitions, is the space still recoverable or is it gone too? I guess it's called unallocated?

 

[ignatzatsonic]

Can I do the wipe properly in Computer Management or disk management to go from 2 partitions, the C:/drive which is 115 GB and a D:/drive which is 25 GB's. I want to just make it one drive or partition/Primary to use as a backup external drive. Can I do it inside windows and if so how?

Sure; you can do it through Windows Disk Management after you have everything you need from it.

Type disk management into the Start button search box.

Open Disk Management and right click the partitions to be deleted. Be sure you've got the correct disk and partition selected. Choose "delete volume" and it's goodbye to the partition.

You'll be left with a bunch of "unallocated space", which you can then turn into a partition and format.

You could do much the same thing with other tools, but Windows Disk Management would work fine.

 

[julio99]

Besides the C there is another partition or what windows calls it volumes, so I delete these 2 volumes are both partitions going to come together as unallocated space or will I have to do that? Plus I will have to delete the Recovery partition with Diskpart Override. What I want is for all 3 of those to be brought together as one. You follow me there. Delete both volumes and then delete recovery partition and then?

 

[ignatzatsonic]

Besides the C there is another partition or what windows calls it volumes, so I delete these 2 volumes are both partitions going to come together as unallocated space or will I have to do that? Plus I will have to delete the Recovery partition with Diskpart Override. What I want is for all 3 of those to be brought together as one. You follow me there. Delete both volumes and then delete recovery partition and then?

You say C. That should be a partition on the new SSD, not on the old HDD.

Is that correct?

Have you confirmed for an absolute fact that your PC will boot and operate properly with the old drive disconnected?

Don't delete anything if you are not sure you are dealing with the HDD. You don't want to touch the SSD at all.

Assuming you've got the right disc chosen, delete all partitions one at a time. After you delete the first one, you should see some "unallocated space" pop up in Disk Management. After you delete the second partition, you should see even more unallocated space. If you delete ALL partitions, the drive should be all unallocated space, which you can then format as a single partition. It's done through a menu in Disk Management as I recall.

If you can't get them all deleted, say so and we'll think of something else.

Yeah, I'd forgotten about diskpart override. That may come into play, but see how far you can get with Disk Management.

 

[julio99]

All done ! Deleted the 2 partitions, combined the free space from the 25gb partition to the bigger one which I had created as a new volume. Deleted the Recovery with Diskpart override and added that space too so I ended up with all 3 partitions into one. When I was doing it in Disk management I was getting this prompt about creating a Dynamic disk instead of Basic and I wasn't sure if that is where I wanted to go so I downloaded Easeus Home Partition which I totally understand when it comes to merging and resizing, creating and all that good stuff so I finished the job with that. Installed my Acronis software and used it for a full disk backup to be followed with Incrementals. All is good and thank you for your input!