Hard Drive partition conversion

[imported_B166ER]

Hey fellas, I got an issue. I have a 750G drive I use now for boot drive and storage. Its split as 100mb Primary (Windows system) 100G Primary (Win764) 46G Extended (nothing) and 552G Primary(downloads, stuff, movies, music, porn, binaries, torrents, EVERYTHING ELSE). I would like to have a partition for old school XP, and one for UbuntuStudio. I have that wonderful extended part in the middle with nothing on it, but I cant install WinXP on it, because its extended. I've heard I can install Ubuntu on it as Ubu will work on a logical partition.
So what I'd like to do is convert that storage partition to an extended part 2 logical drives, Ubuntu and storage, and have my current extended part turned into a primary. I have no other drive available to put my storage stuff on (some 500G's worth!), but I would like to convert that part into an extended part. Is this possible without losing my data? By some part manager perhaps? Maybe by transferring data to an ever growing extended part, while shrinking the primary? Ideas?

 

[mfenn]

Why not just install ubuntu on the Extended partition? 46GB is plenty for it.

PS. This is why overpartitioning is bad.

 

[imported_B166ER]

Why not just install ubuntu on the Extended partition? 46GB is plenty for it.

PS. This is why overpartitioning is bad.

You missed that whole section about WinXP? Read again, my friend..

 

[mfenn]

You missed that whole section about WinXP? Read again, my friend..

Sorry, in your wall o' text it sounded like you had given up on installing XP.

 

[lxskllr]

I don't have any specific advice, but dicking with partitions is always risky. I've never had an issue, but it's always a possibility. I wouldn't do it on any system where I couldn't afford to lose the data.

 

[imported_B166ER]

Sorry, in your wall o' text it sounded like you had given up on installing XP.

My apologies, didn't want my wall 'o text to become the Great wall 'o text. I still would like to have WinXP, I think that would be a given with creating the extended partition and still having three primaries, gotta put something on that third primary! I realize partition messing is risky, but I'd have guessed by now there would be some app that would allow me to do what I need without too much risk, hence why I'm asking.

 

[betasub]

I have no other drive available to put my storage stuff on

Having an additional drive would make things so much easier. Plus it would allow you to have a proper back-up of your storage. Large storage HDD are really cheap now, and spending a little will serve you well in the long run.

 

[Blain]

The older Windows version needs to be installed first.

 

[mfenn]

My apologies, didn't want my wall 'o text to become the Great wall 'o text. I still would like to have WinXP, I think that would be a given with creating the extended partition and still having three primaries, gotta put something on that third primary! I realize partition messing is risky, but I'd have guessed by now there would be some app that would allow me to do what I need without too much risk, hence why I'm asking.

Honestly, I my advice would be to spend $50 and get a 1TB storage drive. That way you can keep a backup of your stuff. Right now, you are one HDD failure (or virus, mistake, etc.) from losing all of your data.

 

[VirtualLarry]

You can install Windows 2000 and Windows XP onto a logical volume in an extended partition, so long as the bootloader is on a primary partition.

I have a triple-boot system with a primary FAT32 partition for Win98se, and then an extended partition, with some logical volumes, also FAT32, for W2K and WXP.