14GB 100% free Healthy (Primary Parition) after Windows 7 install

sebs said:

It is MBR.

I posted on Reddit and someone says it would be very complicated to do: https://www.reddit.com/r/pchelp/comm...se_partitions/

What do you think?

He is exaggerating, I have deleted the recovery partition all the time before without consequences. You can delete it with a partition program and then annex the 15 GB to your C drive, the app will automatically update the boot files to reflect the new parameters. But I can't stress enough, back it up first! That way you are insured nothing will go wrong.

As for why the 15 GB partition is there at all, the seller could've forgotten to reformat it, you might've selected the option to keep a recovery partition alongside your OS partition during installation, though they are typically a few hundred MB. If you assign that mystery partition a drive letter, you might be able to explore it. There are also plenty of specialized programs that can browse partitions including broken/deleted ones.
Btw, when I got my Vista box in 2008, it came with a 250 GB HDD with a 10 GB recovery partition at the front and the 240 GB C drive to the right of it. I deleted it without incident.

jumanji said:

@sebs

You are saying that it is a new SSD. When you received did you check it to confirm that it is a new one? We have come across users who bought SSD on ebay and found that it was a used one and not new. In one instance it was actually formatted in Linux for Linux.

Usually, you will need to format an SSD after purchase in order to ensure it's compatible with your operating system or if you are moving the SSD from one device to another.

How to Initialize Your SSD for Windows(R) | Crucial IN

Hey, thanks for the reply.
I bought it from Amazon from what appears to be an official Kingston Amazon shop. This is the one I bought and where I bought it from exactly: Amazon.com: Kingston 240GB A400 SATA 3 2.5" Internal SSD SA400S37/240G - HDD Replacement for Increase Performance : Electronics

I didn't check anything before installing Windows 7. It didn't cross my mind that there could be anything on it with me assuming it was really new.

I didn't know it was supposed to be formatted first. I thought the Windows installation took care of everything.

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dg1261 said:

First, just to be clear, 15 GB is not a lot of space. Don't be prejudiced by the Disk Management display, which is not to proportional scale.
Aha, there's the key piece of information.

@dg1261

Thanks so much for such a detailed explanation! :)

Yea, I'm not really worried about "loosing" the 15 GB. It's more the feeling of not being in control of my computer, wanting to know and understand everything, and feeling "cheated" kinda thing. I think most people active in this forum can probably relate

I checked the old HDD as you suggested and sure enough, there it is, exact same partition in same location and same size. So must be the hidden recovery partition for a full factory restore image as you mentioned. So I guess mystery solved :)

Now, whether to delete it or not is the question. Like I mentioned, I'm not so concerned about the space as I am in just "feeling proud" of having accomplished it. But then I don't know that it's worth the hassle, and the risk of loosing all the time I already spent on setting it up. Also would it have any impact on performance? I know with HDD and fragmentation it was more an issue. Would there be any such thing to keep in mind with moving partitions around on an SSD? Of course I'd rather have a more performant and "stable" system than have the bit of extra space.

And I'm more interested in dual booting also. So if it's as you say would be a good thing then. I could even buy a second SSD since I have two slots on my laptop. Only if it makes things better in some way. As far as the Windows install and dual booting, does it make a difference if the other partition with Linux is on the same physical disk or a separate physical disk?

If dual booting was to be a problem, I was even considering buying the second SSD, but instead of dual booting, just swapping the physical disks in and out each time I was to use the different OSes. But that would be more annoying of course.





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SIW2 said:

I supected it might be that which is why I made post #2
Already suggested one easy method for doing that in post #2
diskgenius will usually indicate the partition type for example

Hey, thanks for this!

If you see my previous post you'll see that the mystery has been solved
So I guess no need for this anymore.

But just for the record, does Diskgenius do the same/similar things as GParted?

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BlueBonnett said:

He is exaggerating, I have deleted the recovery partition all the time before without consequences. You can delete it with a partition program and then annex the 15 GB to your C drive, the app will automatically update the boot files to reflect the new parameters. But I can't stress enough, back it up first! That way you are insured nothing will go wrong.

If there's any risk, then I think it probably won't be worth the hassle.
Also if it has any impact on performance or stability, then I'd much rather leave that partition alone as it is.

But just to know, to back it up I would need to buy a second SSD and make a clone? Or how else could I back it up?

sebs said:

If there's any risk, then I think it probably won't be worth the hassle.
Also if it has any impact on performance or stability, then I'd much rather leave that partition alone as it is.

But just to know, to back it up I would need to buy a second SSD and make a clone? Or how else could I back it up?

Here's the thing, there's always a risk. You could lose power while resizing the partition. I have done all sorts of partition dancing many many times without issues, but wanna know what ****ed me up one time? A chkdsk. Yeah, you heard that right. I did a chkdsk and that somehow destroyed the filesystem. I didn't make a backup because it made no sense to have a precaution against a harmless chkdsk operation which a billion people do regularly. That harmless operation rendered the disk unrecoverable.

You can never be too careful. I'm telling you it's perfectly safe to delete that partition and annex it but after the incident I just described, nothing is guaranteed.

To back it up, you would need another medium, yes. IMO it's worth it. I use a big USB stick, fits my entire 256GB C drive from my SSD. Computing is the only field where you can literally go back in time to reverse mistakes, so use it.

sebs said:

Now, whether to delete it or not is the question. [...] But then I don't know that it's worth the hassle, and the risk of loosing all the time I already spent on setting it up.

Then you'll want to backup that new OS partition ASAP. With a backup image, you can easily restore a partition in a matter of minutes if you mess things up, and won't have to start over from scratch.

Get an external USB drive to hold the backup image, and choose a backup imaging program. (I like the paid Terabyte Image or the free Macrium Reflect older versions, but there are others such as Aomei BackUpper, Easus ToDo, Acronis TrueImage, and more, that should do just as well, and all have their proponents in this forum.) Make a backup image now, and another later, after you've done more tinkering on the OS. To restore, you'll need to be able to boot from "rescue media" (a bootable CD or USB flash drive), so make sure you make that media for your choice of program, and test it to make sure you know how to boot from it. Don't wait until you need it to find out whether you know how to use it.

If there's any risk [to deleting the restore partition], then I think it probably won't be worth the hassle.
Also if it has any impact on performance or stability, then I'd much rather leave that partition alone as it is.

There will be no impact on performance or stability. As designed, the factory restore partition is just dormant space, having no impact until/unless it's awakened and called into play.

As for risk ... well, there's always some risk, but it's generally very safe. In this case the risk would be a tad higher than normal because you're also sliding the OS partition over to the left to recoup the (soon-to-be unallocated) 15GB space. You can't simply tack that space onto the end of the OS partition because it's on the wrong side. So, you have to slide the entire OS partition, byte by byte, until the unallocated space is on the right, then you can extend the back end of the OS partition to encompass that space. Note this byte-by-byte slide can take a significant amount of time.

And I'm more interested in dual booting also. So if it's as you say would be a good thing then. I could even buy a second SSD since I have two slots on my laptop. Only if it makes things better in some way. As far as the Windows install and dual booting, does it make a difference if the other partition with Linux is on the same physical disk or a separate physical disk?

No difference in performance, but two disks would be easier to setup.

To use a single disk, you would need to repartition the Windows disk to not only delete the restore partition but add three partitions for linux (grub, the OS, and swap). It would be much easier to put those on a separate disk and leave the Windows disk as is.

Further details, I think, are better left for a linux forum.

If dual booting was to be a problem, I was even considering buying the second SSD, but instead of dual booting, just swapping the physical disks in and out each time I was to use the different OSes. But that would be more annoying of course.

No need for that. That second disk is still going to need grub, even if it's only booting a single OS (linux). I believe it's relatively easy to merely add a second entry to grub and point it at the alternate physical disk without the need for physical swapping.


So your immediate objective should be to set up and familiarize yourself with a backup imaging regimen. For your purposes, choose imaging, not cloning. (I have an in-depth discussion in my video, if it's of any help to you.)

In due time, when you're ready to try linux, buy yourself a second SSD and start asking questions in a linux forum. After all, you'll undoubtedly want advice on which linux distro to try, as well, and a linux forum would be best suited for that.

Thanks again for such a detailed explanation!

I saw your video too.

If I hadn't already installed all the programs I installed, making a backup would have been easier and made more sense. By now there's 57 GB being used, and probably about half of that are programs other than the OS. Making a backup of the OS would make sense, but of all these programs, not so much. I'll think about it.

I'm just going to leave that partition there. Not worth the trouble. Especially if all the information will have to be copied to the left. I was wondering about that, if everything would be copied or if the space just became empty and new data would be stored there, while keeping everything already there in it's current place.

As far as Linux, I'm actually writing this from Linux on another laptop
Been using Linux for few years now. That's why the last Windows version I used was W7.
I already know exactly what distro I want and everything. Just Windows is slowing me down and giving me a hard time.
Basically Linux is my daily driver. The Windows install will only be to use music production software which I bough literally over a decade ago with an audio card that is even older and has drivers for up to W7 only. About a thousand bucks worth of software and hardware that only work on W7

Nowadays, the popular Linux distros make it very easy to install them. It's Windows that gives problems with sharing the hard drive. That's why it's recommended always to install Windows first and then Linux, to allow Windows to handle the booting, otherwise it won't play nicely. That's why I installed that Windows first and planned to install Linux after.

Normally to install Linux as dual boot with Windows, you put in the USB with the Linux to install, you select to install alongside Windows, and the Linux installer takes care of everything. No need to create any partitions or format anything manually. That's why I'm so confused now.

To use a single disk, you would need to repartition the Windows disk to not only delete the restore partition but add three partitions for linux (grub, the OS, and swap). It would be much easier to put those on a separate disk and leave the Windows disk as is.

I wouldn't know how to do all this for example. I thought I would just put in the USB with Linux and let it take care of things, but do you think then that if I did it that way there would be a problem with the Windows install? Could it be that this is why I had been told about the System and Boot being on the same partition would be a problem to do a dual boot with Linux?

sebs said:

I thought I would just put in the USB with Linux and let it take care of things, but do you think then that if I did it that way there would be a problem with the Windows install? Could it be that this is why I had been told about the System and Boot being on the same partition would be a problem to do a dual boot with Linux?

I'm a Windows guy. I know just enough linux to get by, but am certainly not one who should be giving advice to anyone else.

Knowing what I know about Windows, I don't see any reason why split System/Boot partitions should pose any more of a problem for dual-booting. It seems to me it should be the opposite, but perhaps there actually is some limitation in linux that doesn't like split Windows partitions.

That StackExchange thread to which you linked suggests there may be some preconceived notions about what they're calling "the boot partition", so that could be where the argument is getting sidetracked. If they're assuming grub is to go into the Windows System partition, their argument makes some sense. But that seems to be assumed and never stated. In contrast, my scenario would have grub go into a linux partition, from which it would chain to the Windows System partition ... in which case split or not split wouldn't matter.

(FTR, I'll mention that when I multi-booted Windows and linux many years ago, I always used a real boot manager, and that partition was always where the computer started booting from. I never relied on the boot managers in either Windows or linux to do double-duty and try to handle booting both. But that's totally unrelated to the scheme you're trying to configure, and I'm sharing that just to point out that "the boot partition" can mean different things depending on who you're talking to.)

I'll do a bit of research and ask on some Linux forums, and I'll share back here what I find

Thanks for all the help and tips so far :)

Especially if all the information will have to be copied to the left.

It won't, the partition tables get updated, whatever mandatory system files get moved to the left won't be many. It's a quick operation. The only time anything gets moved is if you relocate any part of your OS partition with data on it. That data will of course be shifted. But that isn't what you're doing, you're just annexing an empty partition, nothing will be moved.