Multiple partitions?

[ahstanford]

Hello everyone,

I recently purchased an Asus Desktop PC with Win7 and I've realized that the computer came with two partitions - Drive C and Drive D.

Drive C - 372GB with all of Windows and my data stored on it.
Drive D - 550GB and is nearly empty.

I am wondering what the reasoning for this is, what the benefit is, if I should keep it and how it should be used?

If anyone can shed some light on this for me, I would appreciate it.

Thanks in advance,
Alex

 

[richc46]

That drive is reserved for backup. Probably reserved for system image and restore points.
Keep it one day you will have a problem and you will be glad that you did.

 

[richc46]

Here is a recent thread with the same question.

http://www.sevenforums.com/general-discussion/76446-whats-point-partition.html

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Hello ahstanford, welcome to Seven Forums!



In the start menu right click computer, manage, disk management, post a snip of disk management so we can see it.

http://www.sevenforums.com/general-...ed-method-uploading-posting-screen-shots.html

 

[whs]

Did you ever open D to see what's in it. It is too big for the traditional recovery partition. Also, if you look a Disk Management as BFK suggests, you may even find a 3d partition that is only 100MB.

 

[ahstanford]

Here is a recent thread with the same question.

http://www.sevenforums.com/general-discussion/76446-whats-point-partition.html

Bill's post over there was very helpful, thanks!

Hello ahstanford, welcome to Seven Forums!

In the start menu right click computer, manage, disk management, post a snip of disk management so we can see it.

http://www.sevenforums.com/general-...ed-method-uploading-posting-screen-shots.html

http://www.alexstanford.com/partss.jpg

Did you ever open D to see what's in it. It is too big for the traditional recovery partition. Also, if you look a Disk Management as BFK suggests, you may even find a 3d partition that is only 100MB.

Yeah, the link to the Disk Management screenshot is above, and it does seem to show a smaller third partition of 8GB.

It is showing 931.51GB total HDD size, but I thought it came with 640GB or 750GB. Weird.

 

[richc46]

Glad that I was able to help.

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Hello again ahstanford.



Use D: to store all the data you don't want to lose so if/when you need to reformat and reinstall C: you don't have a potential loss of date; as a wise old indian once told me, NEVER store anything on C: you can't afford to lose; get in the habit now of making regular backups.


BTW, never molest the recovery partition in any way.

 

[ahstanford]

Hello again ahstanford.



Use D: to store all the data you don't want to lose so if/when you need to reformat and reinstall C: you don't have a potential loss of date; as a wise old indian once told me, NEVER store anything on C: you can't afford to lose;

What is that little 8GB partition used for?

get in the habit now of making regular backups.

How do I go about that?

Don't I need a second HDD for the backups?

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Hello again ahstanford.



Use D: to store all the data you don't want to lose so if/when you need to reformat and reinstall C: you don't have a potential loss of date; as a wise old indian once told me, NEVER store anything on C: you can't afford to lose;

What is that little 8GB partition used for?

get in the habit now of making regular backups.

How do I go about that?

Don't I need a second HDD for the backups?

The "little partition" is the recovery partition and will be needed if you ever have to do a "Factory Recovery" of the OS.

The other partition is the place to use as storage; have a look at the tutorial at the link below.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/663-backup-complete-computer-create-image-backup.html?ltr=B

 

[ignatzatsonic]

Placing backups on D is better than not having any backups at all, but it won't help you at all if your drive fails. In that case, you would lose everything on C and D, including your backups.

The preferred backup strategy is to use a second hard drive, either internal or external.

You apparently have a 1 TB drive. I would shrink C to perhaps 60 or 80 GB and let the D partition take the entire remaining space on the drive--somewhere around 850 GB.

I would put all my data on D, none on C.

I would then backup D to a second hard drive.

Alternatively, you could expand C to take the entire drive and delete D. If you did that, you would keep all data on C and then back up just your data folders to a second drive.

Many people on this forum like to put their data on a separate partition, but most computer users in general just use a single C partition. And, unfortunately, most of them don't do any backup at all.

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Placing backups on D is better than not having any backups at all, but it won't help you at all if your drive fails. In that case, you would lose everything on C and D, including your backups.

The preferred backup strategy is to use a second hard drive, either internal or external.

Thanks mate, I meant to add that but got sidetracked.

Here is another useful tutorial.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/615-backup-user-system-files.html

 

[ahstanford]

You apparently have a 1 TB drive. I would shrink C to perhaps 60 or 80 GB and let the D partition take the entire remaining space on the drive--somewhere around 850 GB.

I would put all my data on D, none on C.

I would then backup D to a second hard drive.

How would I go about shrinking the C partition to 60 or 80 GB?

Also, should I leave that 8GB partition sitting there, or?

 

[SIW2]

Leave the 8gb as it is. You will need that to do a restore of win 7 - that will restore to factory condition - exactly as the day you got the pc.

You might want to do that for a complete fresh start , or when you sell the pc for example, or if you haven't made your own backup images.

Your own backup images of the partitions will restore to the exact state at the time you made the image - better, obviously.

I very strongly recommend you use a 3rd party app. instead of Windows Backup for your partition imaging.

There are some good free ones around.

 

[546 Inspiron]

Backing up to a partition is not much of a backup. Keep 95% of your 1TB C drive usable and get an ext drive for backups.

 

[ahstanford]

Leave the 8gb as it is. You will need that to do a restore of win 7 - that will restore to factory condition - exactly as the day you got the pc.

You might want to do that for a complete fresh start, or when you sell the pc for example, or if you haven't made your own backup images.

Your own backup images of the partitions will restore to the exact state at the time you made the image - better, obviously.

Why does a restore require an 8GB partition?

I very strongly recommend you use a 3rd party app. instead of Windows Backup for your partition imaging.

There are some good free ones around.

Such as?

 

[Jonathan_King]

Leave the 8gb as it is. You will need that to do a restore of win 7 - that will restore to factory condition - exactly as the day you got the pc.

You might want to do that for a complete fresh start, or when you sell the pc for example, or if you haven't made your own backup images.

Your own backup images of the partitions will restore to the exact state at the time you made the image - better, obviously.

Why does a restore require an 8GB partition?

I very strongly recommend you use a 3rd party app. instead of Windows Backup for your partition imaging.

There are some good free ones around.

Such as?

SIW is referring to programs such as Macrium Reflect and Acronis TrueImage.

The 8GB partition has the original data on it; that is what you restore from.

 

[ahstanford]

SIW is referring to programs such as Macrium Reflect and Acronis TrueImage.

I'll take a look at those - thank you.

The 8GB partition has the original data on it; that is what you restore from.

It currently shows to be empty, though? It shows 8GB free space in Disk Management.

 

[whs]

Here is a short tutorial and a comprehensive video tutorial about Macrium - in case you want to try that.

 

[ignatzatsonic]

You should be able to shrink C to 60 GB and expand D to about 850 GB by using Windows 7 disk management, without using a third party application. You may have to temporarily delete D to do this, then shrink C, then make a new D.

You would then have partitions of 8 GB, 60 GB, and 850 GB, reading from left to right in Disk Management.

If you buy a second hard drive, it would show up on a separate line within Disk Management.

You could then use Macrium or any other imaging application to make images of C, D, or both and place them on the new drive.

You could also use any of several third party applications to make separate backups of your data partition (D) WITHOUT using an image.

You will hear different ideas about backup strategies, but I have always felt it is good practice to make data backups without imaging. Personal data is typically the most valuable information on a PC and I don't like to have to rely on imaging as a backup because images can fail. If your operating system image of C fails, you haven't lost anything but the time needed to restore it by other means, but if your personal data (D) is backed up only within an image, you may lose it forever if you can't get at the image for whatever reason.

I'm not sure why your 8 GB partition shows as 100% free space. If it is in fact empty, then it is pointless and a candidate for deletion also. Typically, those small partitions contain data usable to restore your PC to factory specifications. You need to further investigate what, if anything, is truly in that partition.

Since the 8 GB partition is to the left of C in Disk Management, you may have to use a third party tool to get rid of it. Alternatively, you could simply ignore it since it is only 8 GB.

Do you have a bona fide Windows installation disc? If not, what system or restoration discs did Acer provide?