Author Topic: (Solved) Managing partitions of the internal HD (Read 55637 times)

Lady · « **on:** September 05, 2015, 05:06:03 am »

Hi y'all,

I partitioned the internal HD on my laptop and out of curiosity checked the partitions on my desktop. I noticed that the E: partition is divided into two. See screenshot. No idea how that came about as this was done for me in my pc shop when I bought the custom-made desktop.

Now I (think I) know how to get the two together using the Minitool Partition Wizard, but isn't it wise to get all the music files off of these two partitions before I embark on another Partition Adventure?

Or doesn't it make any difference and I can let this be?

Julian · « **Reply #1 on:** September 05, 2015, 10:48:21 am »

Shoot I'm color blind to green and red but does the color legend match to Any form of raid and I would say yes always back up if you mess with partitions

Shane · « **Reply #2 on:** September 12, 2015, 08:31:11 pm »

That is odd that 2 E: partitions would show up. I also noticed that the other drivers are all basic MBR, as they should be, but the drive with D: and E: is dynamic.
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa363785%28v=vs.85%29.aspx

I dont think it should have been set to dynamic.

Shane

Lady · « **Reply #3 on:** September 13, 2015, 11:58:48 am »

Thank you, Shane, for pointing that out. Had no idea. That article though is WAY too difficult for me. I'll ask the head of the tech dept. of my pc shop why they did that and if he can help out to fix it. In the meantime I'll read some more on the subject and see if I can do it myself.

Can't I earn karma points by doing my darndest best to try to understand all this IT stuff and fix my pc problems?

Julian · « **Reply #4 on:** September 13, 2015, 03:49:57 pm »

Sorry lady I always hate color legends in bright colors or colors near the same tone.

Lady · « **Reply #5 on:** September 13, 2015, 05:57:38 pm »

I would love to tell you, Julian, about the colors of the legends but I didn't understand your post. What is it you need to know?

Lady · « **Reply #6 on:** September 13, 2015, 06:00:47 pm »

Hey, I just noticed I'm not a newbie anymore but a Jr. Member!!! I'm higher up the ladder. That's similar to earning karma points.

But I fooled you, guys. I'm just asking a LOT of questions. Hahaha.

Julian · « **Reply #7 on:** September 13, 2015, 06:02:12 pm »

Lol congrats!

Quote from: Lady on September 13, 2015, 06:00:47 pm

Hey, I just noticed I'm not a newbie anymore but a Jr. Member!!! I'm higher up the ladder. That's similar to earning karma points.

But I fooled you, guys. I'm just asking a LOT of questions. Hahaha.

Lady · « **Reply #8 on:** September 13, 2015, 06:38:25 pm »

Julian, did you see my post before my last?

I just got an idea. I'm attaching two screenshots from the Windows Disk Management, which is in black and white mostly. It's in Dutch, so you have to be a little creative, haha. "Schijf" means Disk.

The only colors I see are on Disk 0, which is an olive-green, meaning basic volume (?, translating).
And Disk 1 and 6 and 7 are dark-blue, meaning primary partition.

Is that helpful?

Julian · « **Reply #9 on:** September 14, 2015, 01:03:01 am »

Aaah that's a spanned dynamic disk meaning it looks like that may be a mirrored volume. Hmmmm but the same drive letter is confusing I've had that happen before when the mirror broke when I had a raid 1 setup but after I rebuilt the array it made it one drive letter again.

Lady · « **Reply #10 on:** September 14, 2015, 09:54:30 pm »

Alright Julian, that post of yours is just all Chinese to me.....

I read some about dynamic and basic disks but couldn't find what is actually the problem or risk of having dynamic disks. Can you tell me?

I have a bit of a problem with asking my friend, the head of the tech dept of my pc shop, to fix this because sometimes I get doubts about his expertise. I showed HIM a few tricks or solved something he couldn't. Minor stuff, of course, but still... I'm gonna test him with this new knowledge I have about the disks.

Just to say I'd rather do this myself. With you guys.

I found this piece of info. Do you think I could work with that? Because there are special programs for it but I read people having problems with them.

From: http://incisiveradar.com/how-to-convert-dynamic-disk-to-basic-disk/

Converting Dynamic disks to Basic Disks in Windows:

Before converting the dynamic disks into basic disks in Windows, I would recommend you to create a recovery media of your operating system and move the other important files into an external hard drive. Once you are ready, you can use the following steps to convert dynamic disks to basic disks.

Step 1: Open the Run dialog box by using the hot key combination Windows Logo Key + R

Step 2: In the Run dialog box type in diskmgmt.msc and hit enter.

Step 3: Now in the Disk Management window look for the dynamic disk you want to convert into a basic disk.

Step 4: Right click on each volume of the corresponding dynamic disk and click Delete Volume for each volume on the disk.

Step 5: When you have completed deleting all the volumes, right click on those disks and select Convert to Basic Disk.

Since my E: only contains music files I assume I don't run a real risk of getting into problems systemwise. Is that correct? It would be similar to making a new partition, wouldn't it? Just back up the files (which I already have, twice, on my 2 external HDDs), delete the volume, convert them to basic disks, paste the two E: disks together with Minitool and put the files back.

Piece of cake or what?

Lady · « **Reply #11 on:** September 17, 2015, 01:35:37 am »

Julian, can you give me the green light to what I suggested? It's rather a scary thing to do, you know.

Maybe I should use Minitool instead of Windows Disk Management?

Julian · « **Reply #12 on:** September 17, 2015, 12:44:41 pm »

Quote from: Lady on September 17, 2015, 01:35:37 am

Julian, can you give me the green light to what I suggested? It's rather a scary thing to do, you know.

Maybe I should use Minitool instead of Windows Disk Management?

it is a scary thing to do I'm looking at d as well and it looks to be the same partition type as well I don't know why the partitions were setup that way best thing is to back up the hdd before messing with partitions . I just don't want you to delete the music drive and it messing with the d drive as well. I normally have a primary partition and have the folders redirected to another hdd I'll show you in a bit because I'm on my phone at the moment.

Lady · « **Reply #13 on:** September 17, 2015, 03:02:03 pm »

Before you put your energy in explaining your suggestion, let me try to get in touch with the head of the tech dept of my pc shop where I bought the custom-made desktop pc. I asked them to partition the internal HDD into C:, D: and E:. I'll ask him why they did that. I have no idea what your suggestion is like, sounds pretty far-out to me (sorry), but I prefer to get it all back to 3 basic partitions.

I always have all my data of D: and E: backed up at least twice, so nothing to worry there. So if deleting E: means interference with D:, that's okay, because D:'s volume has to be deleted as well for it to be turned into a basic disk too. So my idea was to delete both volumes of D: and E: and change them back into basis disks and add the data again. Wouldn't that work?

Actually, the longer I'm on this Partition Adventure (or Partition Expotition as Winnie the Pooh would have said, hahaha), the more I think it's gonna be a breeze.

What's the worst that could happen? A total crash? C: won't be touched, so......Or am I being overconfident?

And I still don't know what's so bad about having dynamic disks. All I read was that advanced users could do more things with them.

Lady · « **Reply #14 on:** September 17, 2015, 03:21:03 pm »

[Second post]

Hey! I got one karma point!!! My first! Yoohooo!

Errr.....how exactly did I get that?

Boggin · « **Reply #15 on:** September 17, 2015, 03:53:10 pm »

Either Shane or Julian clicked on Applaud which gave you a Karma point for your perseverance or should that be persistence

I'll give you one as well because of the work you have put in

Lady · « **Reply #16 on:** September 18, 2015, 04:55:53 am »

Okay, starting out on my second Partition Expotition!

This is what I am going to do.

In Minitool I will delete the volumes of D: and E:. (All data are backed-up.) Then I will use the option Convert Dynamic Disk to Basic. Then I must get the two parts of E: glued together again somehow. And finally I'll put the data back on.

Does that sound right to you guys?

I guess a system restore point is of no use here?

Interesting question: why doesn't my SSD-drive of 128 Gb show in Minitools with all the other HDs?

Shane · « **Reply #17 on:** September 18, 2015, 10:27:48 am »

I may have clicked it..... karma baby!

Shane

Lady · « **Reply #18 on:** September 19, 2015, 01:35:39 am »

Thanks, Shane!

Only positive karma from now on!

Lady · « **Reply #19 on:** September 20, 2015, 05:14:22 am »

Can somebody approve my Partition Expotition Plan, so I won't get lost in the Hundred Terabyte Wood?

Lady · « **Reply #20 on:** September 20, 2015, 11:42:45 pm »

Guys, I just found out something which might pose more problems with the partitions.

In my desktop pc I have a 128 Gb SSD and a 2 Tb internal HD. The pc shop had made the partitions C:, D: and E:. You know, the dynamic discs. BTW, I spoke to the head of the tech dept. and he admitted there must have been made a mistake during installation. He said: "just change them back to standard discs, it's easy". Okay, the words "just" and "easy" I would not use....

Two things (in my Obama voice which sounds nothing like him):

Recently I changed the volumes of the partitions around. I needed some more space on D: and E: and took that off of C:. I don't remember its volume before I decreased it. Still left quite enough on C: (capacity now 111 Gb, unused 46 Gb). Then somebody told me to not defragment C: as it was the SSD. I use Wise Disk Cleaner and have done the defragmentation of C:, D:, E:, F: and G, the last two being my two external HDs. Yesterday I downloaded O&O Defrag and that did give a warning message to not defrag C: as it was the SSD.

Question 1: did I make a mistake by defragmenting C: with Wise Disk Cleaner?

Question 2: isn't it true that it's impossible to move flash memory to D: and E: on the HD, as that is a different type of memory? So where did that go? And shouldn't I change it back to its original size of 128 Gb and stay clear of this whole SSD?

But......it gets even better (or worse): I don't remember the exact volumes before I changed them. But the weird thing is that I added at least 200 Gb to E: for my music files as E: tended to get filled up. The same with D:. I didn't just add a couple of Gbs to it, also more like 100 Gb. I do remember a large overcapacity of C:. And from 128 (SSD size) tot 111 Gb is only 17 Gb. That would mean that C: wasn't just comprised of the SSD alone but of HD memory too. Is that possible and normal?

Even weirder, but maybe an ignorant observation on my part: if you look at what data Speccy gives under Storage, the Kingston SSD: "speed: not used". To me that doesn't sound good, but maybe this is perfectly fine. Is it?

Speccy mentions the disk letters C: and F: and G: but not D: and E:. Is that normal?

http://speccy.piriform.com/results/ozuNekRLhA5gqgBTV1w61d1

These Speccy things might not be a problem at all. My main concern is the defragmentation and decreasing of volume of C: that I did and its possible impact on the SSD.

Lady · « **Reply #21 on:** September 22, 2015, 12:20:41 am »

My dear guys, I'd like to say this.

Over the last few days I realized that the more I read about IT stuff and the deeper I dig into my PCs, the more questions I have, simply because I only have a very limited knowledge. It's not a good thing, it's becoming too much for me now. I feel I'm getting overwhelmed. There's always something new, you know. Although I find it highly interesting, it takes up too much of my time and energy and now of my well-being.

Forget about my last post. I guess it's all alright, otherwise my desktop would not be functioning, right? LOL

If someone can approve of my plan to fix the partitions, then that will be one major problem less. Please give me some reassurance I can do this. Such an Expotition is serious business, you know.

Shane · « **Reply #22 on:** October 08, 2015, 10:52:26 pm »

Sorry I havent replied, for the last 3 weeks I have been on an insane programming session. I am just now getting back to the forums and have over 100+ threads to look over. So my brain is a little fried right now, but if you still are looking for an answer just hit me up Monday and I will be able to think better lol

Shane

Lady · « **Reply #23 on:** October 13, 2015, 02:23:56 am »

Hi Shane,

I TOTALLY understand about fried brains. I had to distance myself from repairing my PCs for a while just now. Have cooled off again. Hope you have too.

I still would like to change the partitions to standard. I reread my posts and most questions are still valid for me, so if you would like to take the time to answer them, I'd be very pleased.

I got so confused about the volume on C:. I understand better now. When taking volume off of C: I had forgotten about the SSD part there and just happily went along, hahaha. Then when I remembered about the SSD I got scared I did something wrong and got totally confused. Then finally I thought about the Gibibyte thing. And I found this about an SSD of 128 Gb (as I have):

There have been some comments regarding the fact that this phenomenon has to be explained with the discrepancy between advertised space, stated in GigaBytes (e.g. 128x 10^9 Bytes) versus the GibiByte value the operating system shows, which is—most of the time—a power of two, calculating to 119.2 Gibibyte in this example. (...) While I certainly can’t state which exact algorithms need most of that extra space, the calculation stays the same. The manufacturer assembles an SSD that indeed uses a power of two number of flash cells (or a combination of such), though the controller does not make all that space visible to the operating system. The space that’s left is advertised as Gigabytes, netting you 111 Gibibyte in this example. (from: http://superuser.com/questions/747244/why-do-ssds-have-weird-sizes)

He mentions 111 Gibibyte!! That may mean that my PC itself indicated the 111 Gb as the lowest possible size I could play it down to. I don't remember as it's been a while. If this is true then my C: now is only comprised of the SSD. Would this be correct, Shane? Then I have no problem there at all. Pffff. Thank God the PC was smarter than me. This time then. Hahaha.

Please take your time with this. It has no real priority, although I'd like to get the desktop in perfect shape as well. Good news: my laptop is just SHINING from being so healthy!

With a LOT of thanks to Boggin!

Rick · « **Reply #24 on:** October 13, 2015, 08:59:31 am »

CAUTION;

What operating system are you using?

Why not, just back up all the data you have?

do a new clean install of your operating system and programs?

doing what your doing is quite messy, troublesome and can cause system failures that I have experienced!

Minitool from my experience is not safe to join together as your considering... if you have some operating files on them and join them, it will destroy your registry settings too...

is it better to have a clean system?

Regards