Computer Question (partition tweaking)

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Hey Guys

Got a bizarre PC question i thought i might post here.

I got a 250gb hard drive partioned into (5) 50gb drives (progs, music, pics, vids, etc...)

I have the music one almost full and have no videos i care to keep around

I would like to merge the vid and the music partitions to make one 100gb drive.

Can this easily be done without loosing any data or needing fancy software?

Thanks
 
As far as i know dude you can't do that dude. You'll just need a bigger drive homey. Let me know if you want a nice firewire external we are a dealer for Lacie:)

Thanks Dave

Drive is PLENTY big, i just have to figure out how to organize it better! :)
 
One thing i just thought of. Do you know someone with a big external drive?

Run all your crap off to that and then re-format your drive with new partions the way you want it and toss your junk back on.


Not a chance i am going to go through all of that trouble! :D

Never works as planned! :D
 
I ran into a similar problem with my computer. My friends that know more about computers than me told me I couldn't re-partition the thing once everything was loaded into it.

Bearing in mind that I know next to nothing about computers, I just moved all of my stuff onto the other drive and put shortcuts to them on my desktop (C drive).

Maybe that will work for you as well, or someone could help you with it. Good luck.
 
Kevin,

This is an area where I may actually contribute. Keep in mind that anytime you mees with data, there is a chance something may get lost. I highly recommend you back up anything you want to keep to DVD or external hard drive before you do anything else.

Thank being said:

I am asuming you are running windows xp or 2000.

Is this 250GB disk the second physical disk in the computer? (i.e. do you have a C: drive, and a second physical disk containing, say, D:, E:, F:, G:, H:, or is it all on one physical disk?). If you dont know, open the case and count the hard drives.

Windows uses what is called physical and logical partitions. Windows will limit the amount of physical partitions to 4. A logical partition is just a container that you can create logical space within and assign drive letters to. So I am guessing you are running a single physical partition as your C: drive and the rest are contained in a 'logical drive'. If you right click on My Computer and select Manage, then go to Disk Management it will show you the layout of your drives.

Can you take a screenshot of the disk layout and post?

If you can temporarily copy all of your files to another physical drive (either another physical drive within your computer or and external hard drive or DVD), then you can use computer management to reassign space within the logical partition, or combine, or delete, etc.) This is a little tricky, so again, back everything up.

You should not need to touch the C: drive, which I assume contains your windows files.

Please post the above screenshot, and I can advise further.



Eric
 
I am asuming you are running windows xp or 2000.

Yes, XP Pro with service pack 2

Is this 250GB disk the second physical disk in the computer? (i.e. do you have a C: drive, and a second physical disk containing, say, D:, E:, F:, G:, H:, or is it all on one physical disk?). If you dont know, open the case and count the hard drives.

It is one physical disks partitioned into 5

Windows uses what is called physical and logical partitions. Windows will limit the amount of physical partitions to 4. A logical partition is just a container that you can create logical space within and assign drive letters to. So I am guessing you are running a single physical partition as your C: drive and the rest are contained in a 'logical drive'. If you right click on My Computer and select Manage, then go to Disk Management it will show you the layout of your drives.Can you take a screenshot of the disk layout and post?

Gotcha! Sounds like i have one physical and 4 logicals A screen shot is attached at the bottom of this

If you can temporarily copy all of your files to another physical drive (either another physical drive within your computer or and external hard drive or DVD), then you can use computer management to reassign space within the logical partition, or combine, or delete, etc.) This is a little tricky, so again, back everything up.

Thanks. As you can see in the pic the "I" drive is the one thats 100% clear and i want to merge with the "L" drive to make a 100gb music drive.

You should not need to touch the C: drive, which I assume contains your windows files.

My s*** installed onto the H drive which is fine, but has made some installtions a bitch! Its all good though

Please post the above screenshot, and I can advise further.

Here ya go my friend! I appreciate all the help with this

system.jpg
 
OK, it looks like you have one hard drive in your computer, divided up into one physical partition and one logical partition (with 4 defined logical volumes / drive letters).

I still recommed backing everything up (all 5 "drives"), but if careful, you can just get away with backing up your logical drive (I:, L:, J:, K: )

It looks like you have about 43GB of data to back up on the logical drive. Can you get your hands on a USB external hard drive with about 50-60GB of free space? This is your best bet. I have one you can borrow, if you can't get one. I would copy (not move) everything onto it. If that is not an option, you can fit about 20GB of that on the H: drive (create a folder on the H: drive and copy about 20 GB of data into that folder), and burn the rest to DVD. The second option will take awhile. Regardless, without a third party utility (such as partition magic, etc) you will need a place to put those files while you modify the drive.

Once everything on the logical partition is backed up, you can use disk manager to adjust volume sizes. You may have to delete the logical partition, but I believe that if you delete the I: drive, you can then expand the L: drive to fill up the newly available space. If you cannot adjust the logical volumes individually, just delete the logical partition,and recreate them as you like. When you're done, just copy everything back.

Be careful if you delete anything, and make sure you are only messing with the logical volumes, not the primary physical partition, which is your H: drive. You should not have to touch your H: drive.

Here is why you want to copy vs. move. If somethig happens during the copy, you can just start the copy over and overwrite everyting. If you moved the files and something went wrong, you'll have a partial directory structure on the target and a partial on the source. If you start over, it will see the same folder on the target as the source, and ask to overwrite. If you say yes, it will overwrite the target folder with the source folder, even though they contain different files. IOW, you'll lose files.

When you are done copying, select all files on the source (CTRL-A), and right click, select properties. Do the same on the target. Make sure the # of files and # of folders are exactly the same, with the total size being very close. The total size may differ a little depending on how the drive compresses the files.

I am saying all this from memory, and unfortunately I dont have a computer with a similar setup handy to verify the steps.

Perhaps someone can chime in on the ability to resize logical space?

Whatever you do, just make sure you are only operating on the logical partition and not on the whole drive or the physical partition (H)

Good luck, and let me know if you need anything. I'll be doing my PHH today, but I'll check in periodically ;)
 
Ok trying to understand this thread makes my head hurt :confused: I think I will get back to truck stuff now. :flipoff2:
 
All fixed!

Thanks guys!
 
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