Unallocated spaces at the beginning & end of the BOOT disk

DavidE · 23 Mar 2015

I was playing around and noticed something interesting !
In my screen prints previously posted there is no unallocated space on my "OS" SSD, as displayed by Partition Wizard, EaseUS, and Windows Disk Management:
Unallocated spaces at the beginning & end of the BOOT disk
Unallocated spaces at the beginning & end of the BOOT disk

I was in Windows Disk Management and right clicked on Disk 0, then clicked Properties.
The Volumes tab shows 4 MB of unallocated.
This is the only place where I have seen unallocated space.
My Disk 1 similarly shows 3 MB unallocated, that no other tool shows.

I've been using this triple boot SSD and Data HD for quite a while now with no problems ...
I don't think the small unallocated space matters.
It might take a forensic disk specialist to explain why different tools see things differently ...

Unallocated spaces at the beginning & end of the BOOT disk-windmdisksunalloc.png

119baystate · 24 Mar 2015

OK, this is now what I have. Read more afterward--

119baystate · 24 Mar 2015

What you see above is that I merged the "SHADOW" with the UNALLOCATED space at the beginning & likewise with the new partitition with the UALLOCATED at the end. My screenshot on post #43 I got rid of all of the UNALLOCATED spaces by:
1) moving the SHADOW to the FRONT;
2) move the C partition in front of the UNALLOCATED space that was between the SHADOW & C from the previous step.
3) created the 2nd partition which engulfed the UNALLOCATED spaces.

However, when I attempted that procedure this time is when I got a boot failure & the rescue disk wanted to perform a REPAIR boot. I am going to attempt this again. It is VERY WIERD that I get different results.

BTW: thanks for the effort. I never thought I could brew up this much of a FIRESTORM unless I lit a match in TAHOE at the end of SEPTEMBER. For those of you that don't know the humidity in the SEIRRA NEVADA often is in the single digits that time of year.

119baystate · 24 Mar 2015

I got it back without any UNALLOCATED spaces. I had to do the process incrementally. What do I mean:
1) move the SHADOW to the front of the drive;
2) REBOOT;
3) MERGE the C partition with the UNALLOCATED space between C & the SHADOW;
4) REBOOT;
5) CREATE the 2nd partition;
6) REBOOT;
7) FRESH install. (still have to do this)

WHAT THE HELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Attached is my SCREENSHOT!

119baystate · 24 Mar 2015

I do not understand what the problem is, but whatever info you need from me to sort this out let me know.

BTW: There is NO WAY this is NORMAL as SIW2 puts it.

Layback Bear · 24 Mar 2015

Very good point DavidE.
I have noticed that in Properties/Volume but never in the pictures. Mine is 2mb.
I really don't know why it's there. I always thought it had something to do with where the ssd was picked up for alignment.
I never thought much about it until this thread. 2 mb one way or the other was never a concern of mine but now I'm curious.

TVeblen · 24 Mar 2015

Yep, me too. 1MB on SSD, 3MB on both 1TB spinners.

I don't know the why, but I will guess it has to do with alignment. Finding the largest chunk of even sized blocks out of a raw disk with a slightly variable number of total blocks due to manufacturing imperfections, errata, and disk condition.

Could be that experienced programmers realized that leaving small spaces on either end of a disk was safer and cleaner than dealing with problems caused by imperfect disks.
Similar to what they do in setting the default speed of processors or RAM. The end user can tweak more performance out if the want, but the manufacturer just wants to be sure the product will work correctly every time out of the box.

AddRAM · 24 Mar 2015

I don`t kow, the shot in post #64 let`s good to me, now post shots using EaseUS and DM and we should be done :)

Other then the fact that you like to use Logical partitions, I see no reason for em, but hey that`s just me

AddRAM · 24 Mar 2015

Layback Bear said:

Very good point DavidE.
I have noticed that in Properties/Volume but never in the pictures. Mine is 2mb.
I really don't know why it's there. I always thought it had something to do with where the ssd was picked up for alignment.
I never thought much about it until this thread. 2 mb one way or the other was never a concern of mine but now I'm curious.

Alignment is exactly why it`s there Jack, we just don`t want to see it, and you shouldn`t.

DavidE · 24 Mar 2015

AddRAM said:

Layback Bear said:

Very good point DavidE.
I have noticed that in Properties/Volume but never in the pictures. Mine is 2mb.
I really don't know why it's there. I always thought it had something to do with where the ssd was picked up for alignment.
I never thought much about it until this thread. 2 mb one way or the other was never a concern of mine but now I'm curious.

Alignment is exactly why it`s there Jack, we just don`t want to see it, and you shouldn`t.

I don't think it's a question of we don't don't want to see it and we shouldn't ... it happens ...
Isn't the question why do we see this "sometimes" depending on the tool and option we are looking at ... ?
The OP is concerned with this ...

To throw more into the mix, here is a post for Acronis Disk Director:
Small unallocated space automatically created | Wilders Security Forums