Solved Moving 100MB 'System Reserved' partition to regain unallocated space

[chrisp9au]

I'm running Windows 7 Home 64bit on a Compaq Presario CQ61 laptop.
I have a 120GB SSD drive (C) with only Windows operating system and program files.
I have a 320GB HDD drive (D) in place of my DVD drive which holds all my documents.

Following a foolish adventure with Linux which forced me to re-install Windows,
I find my 320GB drive partitions are no longer optimal.

When setting up Linux I reduced the size of my documents partition to provide for Linux partitions.
When re-installing Windows, the installation setup a 100mb System Reserved partition immediately after my documents partition. This leaves a 42GB unallocated portion of my HDD.

I understand that I cannot delete the 100mb System Reserved partition as that is required for boot files etc.
However, I would like to move the System Reserved partition to the end of the HDD so that I can resize my documents partition using the 42GB of unallocated space.

Partition Wizard does not allow me to touch the System Reserved partition, how do I move it?

Thank you,

Chris

 

[Kaktussoft]

"system reserved" is not on the win7 physical drive!! Since you have one 1 OS... It is very good thing to move it to same disk as WIN7. even better merge the boot filles and boot menu to the C-drive . Wanna know how?

 

[Kaktussoft]

In http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/783-elevated-command-prompt.html do:

bcdedit/enum all

and post output

 

[chrisp9au]

Thank you, what would you advise?

I couldn't remember the 'pipe' command to direct output to a file,
so attached are screenshots of the output from the bcdedit function.

Cheers

Chris

 

[lehnerus2000]

Pre-Partition

I always pre-partition my HDDs (using Gparted) so that wretched 100 MB partition is never created.

If you have everything backed up, I'd just reformat the entire HDD and create the new partitions that you want (using a program that you can boot from a CD/USB, like Gparted on a Linux Live CD).

I'd then reinstall everything in the desired locations/partitions.

I'm not sure what program is best for SSDs though.

Just out of curiosity:

• What Linux distro did you try?
• What problem(s) did you experience?

 

[gregrocker]

This is why you should always disable or unplug all other HD's and peripherals during install. SysReserved will otherwise write itself to the first HD.

To move the System boot files to C so you can delete the System Reserved partition first Mark SysReserved as Inactive,

next Mark C Partition Active,

reboot into BIOS setup to disable DISK0 or physically unplug it (whichever is easiest),

then boot into Win7 installer to run Startup Repair - Run 3 Separate Times until C starts on its own and is marked System Active.

Now you can re-enable Disk0 and delete System Reserved in Disk Mgmt to extend Documents.

 

[chrisp9au]

Thanks gregrocker, all fixed!

Your help is much appreciated.

Chris

 

[gregrocker]

Good work, Chris. You can mark the thread Solved at top.