Partitioning problem

[sane83]

I have 160 gb HD in which C drive i have installed XP. There are 6 partittions in total.

C:drive - 10gb
d: drive - 30gb
e: drive - 35 gb
f: drive - 20gb
G: drive - 10gb
h: drive - 47gb

Iam going to install WINDOWS 7 (fresh install) .. since my C drive is only 10gb , i thought of deleting my G drive partition and combining it with C.
Now my problem is , what will happen if i delete C and G partition.what would be the drive letter then. (i want drive letter as C.)

 

[zigzag3143]

I have 160 gb HD in which C drive i have installed XP. There are 6 partittions in total.

C:drive - 10gb
d: drive - 30gb
e: drive - 35 gb
f: drive - 20gb
G: drive - 10gb
h: drive - 47gb

Iam going to install WINDOWS 7 (fresh install) .. since my C drive is only 10gb , i thought of deleting my G drive partition and combining it with C.
Now my problem is , what will happen if i delete C and G partition.what would be the drive letter then. (i want drive letter as C.)

To do what you want you are going to need a thrid party management tool like parigon disk suite. You want to delete c & G and move the free space so they can de combined. when you get ready to do it let us know


Ken

 

[Arc]

I have 160 gb HD in which C drive i have installed XP. There are 6 partittions in total.

C:drive - 10gb
d: drive - 30gb
e: drive - 35 gb
f: drive - 20gb
G: drive - 10gb
h: drive - 47gb

Iam going to install WINDOWS 7 (fresh install) .. since my C drive is only 10gb , i thought of deleting my G drive partition and combining it with C.
Now my problem is , what will happen if i delete C and G partition.what would be the drive letter then. (i want drive letter as C.)

To do what you want you are going to need a thrid party management tool like parigon disk suite. You want to delete c & G and move the free space so they can de combined. when you get ready to do it let us know


Ken

Hi ken, I have an alternative suggestion for him. If he has the XP CD, he may delete C and G using XP Cd, and create a partition in that empty space (20 Gb) . The drive letter will be C. The same thing also may be done using Free Download Partition Wizard bootable CD, and after that it is just to install 7 there.

But I am not sure whether it is possible using 7 dvd. In my case, it failed to combine primary and extended logical partitions. Dont know whether it is the practice there , or my bad luck. Though the PW bootable Cd is is just good to manage your partitions.

 

[gregrocker]

Please post back a screenshot of your full Disk Management drive map, using Snipping Tool in Start Menu, attach file using Paper Clip in Reply Box.

We can best give you the steps if we see the actual setup.

 

[sane83]

Thanks everyone.
@Arc i have XP CD..so if i delete the partition in that way my drive letter would be C (20gb).that would be fine.

Here is the Screenshot of Disk mngmnt.

 

[Arc]

Thanks everyone.
@Arc i have XP CD..so if i delete the partition in that way my drive letter would be C (20gb).that would be fine.

Here is the Screenshot of Disk mngmnt.

Your screenshot is exactly what I have imagined , C is primary and the others are logical.

You insert the XP cd and boot from it. Delete the partitions C and G to get aprox. 10 GB free space, create a new partition in the empty space. As you have deleted C, the drive letter of the new partition will be C automatically . Now you are to exit the XP cd ( some setup error may be shown, but it need not to pay attention to them, as you are to install another OS there) .

No install windows 7 as per the tutorial http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1649-clean-install-windows-7-a.html , and dont miss step 7 and step 8 . Otherwise there is a chance of some xp items remain there ( as you partitioned using xp cd)

But it would be better if you do the deleting and creating partition task using Partition wizard bootable cd ( link is in my previous post).

 

[sane83]

thanksss ..iam gonna do it now...will let you know after that..

 

[haxcid]

Just as a note. Windows 7 is flexible with drive letters. Windows 7 will always be the C drive when you are booted into it. MS started this in Vista. I have a dual boot set up. In vista Vista is C:\ and Win7 is D:\
In Windows 7 Win7 is C:\ and Vista is D:\ Then I have a storage drive which is E in both systems.

 

[gregrocker]

Test what happens when you boot the Partition Wizard CD to attempt to delete the G: sub-partition of the extended partition. You can cue up these operations with PW without having to apply them yet, to see how they pan out.

If just the G: partition will delete, then see if you can rightclick>Resize the extended partition by sliding the left border to the right to take up the unallocated space left by deleted G:. This should put the unallocated space to the left of G: next to C: so you can merge it with deleted C:

Next, see if you can delete the C: partition and if it will add it's deleted Unallocated space to the space left by G:

If this works to your satisfaction and you have the unallocated space to make one large C: partition as you wanted, then go ahead and Apply the steps after checking it all over several times. If you have any questions, post back here for more help.

 

[SIW2]

Uh oh.


You can't do that with the XP cd - at least not without deleting the extended partition and getting into a serious data recovery situation.

Better use a 3rd party tool.

Paragon Pro/Server is by far the best - it's not free , though. ( They do a free edition - not all that many functions on the free edition - enough for what you want , so you could use that ).

Free Partition Manager Express - Leading partitioning software ...

The free edition with most functions is Partition Wizard - also capable of doing this job.

Free Download Partition Wizard

 

[Arc]

Uh oh.


You can't do that with the XP cd - at least not without deleting the extended partition and getting into a serious data recovery situation.

Hello SIW2 sir,
It's a humble presentation to you From Arc.
I am a great fan of you. I honor your supreme knowledge and respect your extremely high efficiency. I always follow your posts and tutorials; I learned a lot from those, and still doing so. I also remember that when I was a newbie, I exited Installation & Setup - Windows 7 Forums forum at your one word. Returned there after a long gap.

But sir, at the present issue, what I am saying is possible. Let me prove it. It is my disk management window. In disk 0, win 7 is installed in the primary partitions, and in disk 1, in the primary partitions, there are linux and swap for linux. I am planning to delete first three partitions (two primary and one logical extended) using XP cd.

So I booted from XP cd, and it is the disk info as per the XP cd (I detouched the disk 0 earlier, hence G,H,I and J is shown as C,D,E and F)

Deleted C, I and J (I an J are primary, as linux were there, the format is said unknown there) and got the total free space as unpartitioned, as per the image below

Now created a new partition there in the free space, formatted the partition using XP cd, exited from installation, attached disk 0 again and took the disk management screenshot which is this


So I if can , why anyone else cannot?
Sir, please dont take it otherwise. I just tried to justified myself. ( and in this process I lost my nice beloved Ubuntu linux installation.)
Hope you will accept my words. Waiting for your opinion in this regard.

 

[DarkStar GT]

That Disk 1 is confusing me - from the colours, it looks like there are primary partitions and logical volumes inside an Extended partition.

Perhaps Disk Management is showing them as primary as it cannot recognise what they really are. What file system did they have on them?

 

[Arc]

Actually Disk 1 was 58 GB primary. It was a XP installation. Later I deleted XP and installed Ubuntu there, but not as dual boot (Thanks to Robert and Gladson! They helped me so much then). When I installed Ubuntu there, I used only 8 GB for Ubuntu, and formtted the rest 50 GB as logical. I did that using PW, coz at that time I came to know about PW from Gregrocker, and I was to experiment that tool

 

[SIW2]

Hi Arc,

Good to hear from you.

Is it possible to join the Unallocated to the Free space using the XP cd ?




They are not adjacent.

Can you do that without deleting the Extended partition itself?

I may be wrong as I am not that familiar with the partitioning capabilities of the XP cd.

If so, it will be a pleasant surprise.

 

[gregrocker]

More likely you'll have to move the data off of the extended partition, delete it, extend the C: partition to the size you want, then create whatever other data partitions you want.

If you want to use the opportunity to clean the HD, use Partition Wizard to Wipe (apply zeroes) to the entire HD, then create new partitions as you desire. Data partitions may be logical; OS partition(s) should be primary.

 

[Arc]

My experience regarding partitioning of hds using xp cd says that it is possible (at least I did it various times in my machine, before Dec 2009). What I noticed that when you delete a partition (previously created with xp) , it creates free unallocated space; whatever the character of the partition may be, primary or extended. then if two partitions are deleted, you have the unallocated space in aggregate . Now it is just to create a new partition there.

EDIT : I cannot do the same thing using Win 7 DVD. It creates two unallocated spaces for two types of partitions (again saying, it is my experience, not claiming it to be universal.).

 

[SIW2]

Did you notice if that is the same if the volumes you deleted are not next to each other ?

Are you then able to create one partition from the two separated areas of free/unallocated space?

To do that , the XP partitioner would have to non -destructively move all the data in the first and second logical drives 10gb ( to the right as seen in Disk Management view)

 

[Arc]

Did you notice if that is the same if the volumes you deleted are not next to each other ?

Are you then able to create one partition from the two separated areas of free/unallocated space?

To do that , the XP partitioner would have to non -destructively move all the data in the first and second logical drives 10gb ( to the right as seen in Disk Management view)

Sorry, I didnot want to delete anymore data, So I experimented that by creating another logical volume through shrinking one logical partition; and tried to merge it with the primary partition.

I tried all possible processes to do so (other than using Acronis, which I almost dont touch nowadays, coz it does everything automatically, and I dont get any chance to learn the actual situation); but failed every time. Neither xp cd nor 7 dvd nor PW (and GParted) could manage the merger. When both the primary partition and the newly created logical volume both are deleted, the free spaces are shown separately .

So it stands that I was wrong.

 

[gregrocker]

You would first need to convert the logical to Primary (or vice versa) using Partition Wizard>Modify before deleting. This makes the Unnallocated Space (if Primary) or Free Space (with logical) the same to merge.

Then if there is a remaining partition in the way, you righclick>Resize that partition and drag it as a whole over to the right or left so that the empty spaces merge.

I am working from memory here so SIW2 (my teacher) may correct me.

 

[Arc]

You would first need to convert the logical to Primary (or vice versa) using Partition Wizard>Modify before deleting. This makes the Unnallocated Space (if Primary) or Free Space (with logical) the same to merge.

Then if there is a remaining partition in the way, you righclick>Resize that partition and drag it as a whole over to the right or left so that the empty spaces merge.

Sorry, Still they were displayed separately, may be it is due to I created that logical volume out of another logical partition.

Greg, I want to know something from you. I want to install XP in my disk 1 (screenshot in n earlier post) by getting a 10 gb partition out of G, but in such a manner that the xp partition would not be visible in Win 7, and obviously not as dual boot. As I do experiments with my computer now and then, If 7 corrupts I can be in my work thus.