What's the most safe way of enlarging a partition in Vista?

[dak125]

I need to enlarge my OS partition. It's presently 30 GB and I ran out of room. There is plenty of additional space on the hard drive but my main concern is screwing up the OS.

I know Vista has the option to enlarge a partition directly from Local Drive Management but unfortunately that option is greyed out. There may also be a way of doing it through command prompt but I'm concerned about screwing something up.

Are third party apps the way to go? Partition Magic perhaps? Does anyone have any experience with expanding a partition successfully?

Thanks in advance!

 

[dak125]

Would GParted work with Vista? Can anyone recommend this app?

 

[masteryoda34]

I've used GParted before with Vista. It worked fine for me.

 

[dak125]

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
I've used GParted before with Vista. It worked fine for me.

To expand partitions? I'm just concerned that I'm going to be expanding the OS partition and Windows will implode.

 

[Thraxen]

I've not tried it myself, but from what I've read you need to have unallocated space available to extend an existing paritition in Vista. So if you have any empty partition you should delete it first and then see if you can extend the partition into the unallocated space. If it's not empty, Vista should have the option to shrink it. So shrink the partition with the excess space and then extend the OS partition.

 

[dak125]

Originally posted by: Thraxen
I've not tried it myself, but from what I've read you need to have unallocated space available to extend an existing paritition in Vista. So if you have any empty partition you should delete it first and then see if you can extend the partition into the unallocated space. If it's not empty, Vista should have the option to shrink it. So shrink the partition with the excess space and then extend the OS partition.

I have two partitions; C: and F:. The C drive is ~30 GB and the F Drive is ~370 GB. I would need to shrink the F Drive, unallocated the new space, and then expand the C Drive using the unallocated space?

I was thinking all I would have to do is expand the C Drive since I have copious amounts of free space on the F Drive.

 

[Thraxen]

From what I've read it has to be unallocated space, so try shrinking F first. Once you shrink it the extra space should already show up as "unallocated". Then I think you should be able to expand the OS partition into that space.

 

[dak125]

Originally posted by: Thraxen
From what I've read it has to be unallocated space, so try shrinking F first. Once you shrink it the extra space should already show up as "unallocated". Then I think you should be able to expand the OS partition into that space.

Hmm, that's really interesting. In theory then, Local Drive Management should suddenly "see" the fact that I can expand my system drive and I wouldn't have to mess with third party apps. Do you have any articles or guides describing this?

Thanks for the responses everyone, keep them coming.

 

[Thraxen]

[edit]This guide seems better: Link

Again, I haven't tried this myself, but I've read about it recently because I have a similar need on my file server at home. I just haven't gotten around to actually doing it yet. It seems fairly straight forward though.

 

[haffey]

I have used Acronis Disk Director many times without a hassle. It was very quick too, just make changes in the program, apply, and restart.

 

[dak125]

Originally posted by: Thraxen
[edit]This guide seems better: Link

Again, I haven't tried this myself, but I've read about it recently because I have a similar need on my file server at home. I just haven't gotten around to actually doing it yet. It seems fairly straight forward though.

Thanks, I'll give it a shot hopefully this weekend.

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: dak125

Originally posted by: Thraxen
From what I've read it has to be unallocated space, so try shrinking F first. Once you shrink it the extra space should already show up as "unallocated". Then I think you should be able to expand the OS partition into that space.

Hmm, that's really interesting. In theory then, Local Drive Management should suddenly "see" the fact that I can expand my system drive and I wouldn't have to mess with third party apps. Do you have any articles or guides describing this?

Thanks for the responses everyone, keep them coming.

This may or may not work. IIRC the space has to be contiguous. When you shrink it shrinks from the end (higher sector #) so the new free space would be on the wrong side of the space already in use.

Give it a try. It will harmlessly fail if it's not possible. If it fails you'll have to use a 3rd party app. I would recommend a good backup if you have to go this route.

 

[Blazer]

as the poster above stated, acronis disk director works, been using it for years and its never failed, install it & create the bootable cd, you could use it anywhere.

 

[random betrayal]

Originally posted by: dak125

Originally posted by: Thraxen
From what I've read it has to be unallocated space, so try shrinking F first. Once you shrink it the extra space should already show up as "unallocated". Then I think you should be able to expand the OS partition into that space.

Hmm, that's really interesting. In theory then, Local Drive Management should suddenly "see" the fact that I can expand my system drive and I wouldn't have to mess with third party apps. Do you have any articles or guides describing this?

Thanks for the responses everyone, keep them coming.

This won't work if your C drive is to the right of your F drive in the management console as outlined in this guide.

I know cause I am in the same situation as yourself and have been looking at options to extend my C drive but am stuck as my configuration will not allow the shrink extend procedure to work.

 

[dak125]

Originally posted by: random betrayal
This won't work if your C drive is to the right of your F drive in the management console as outlined in this guide.

I know cause I am in the same situation as yourself and have been looking at options to extend my C drive but am stuck as my configuration will not allow the shrink extend procedure to work.

Well that's not good. Perhaps a third party app is the only way to go?

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: dak125

Originally posted by: random betrayal
This won't work if your C drive is to the right of your F drive in the management console as outlined in this guide.

I know cause I am in the same situation as yourself and have been looking at options to extend my C drive but am stuck as my configuration will not allow the shrink extend procedure to work.

Well that's not good. Perhaps a third party app is the only way to go?

As I posted. Try the built in utilities first. They are the safest way to go. If they fail it is because you are not in a configuration they support and they will fail harmlessly. At that point go spend money.

 

[RebateMonger]

Or copy the Data partition(s) to your backup drive (you DO keep backups, right?), remove the Data partition(s), expand the System partition, create a new Data partition(s), and copy your data back. You need data backups anyway before playing with partitions. Unless your data has no importance to you.

There are also ways to reduce the amount of data in the Vista System partition. It's likely being filled up by System Restore and Volume Shadow Copy actions, which are good things but have been known to grab a lot of drive space if left on their own.

 

[dak125]

Originally posted by: Smilin

Originally posted by: dak125

Originally posted by: random betrayal
This won't work if your C drive is to the right of your F drive in the management console as outlined in this guide.

I know cause I am in the same situation as yourself and have been looking at options to extend my C drive but am stuck as my configuration will not allow the shrink extend procedure to work.

Well that's not good. Perhaps a third party app is the only way to go?

As I posted. Try the built in utilities first. They are the safest way to go. If they fail it is because you are not in a configuration they support and they will fail harmlessly. At that point go spend money.

I'll give it a shot.

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
Or copy the Data partition(s) to your backup drive (you DO keep backups, right?), remove the Data partition(s), expand the System partition, create a new Data partition(s), and copy your data back. You need data backups anyway before playing with partitions. Unless your data has no importance to you.

There are also ways to reduce the amount of data in the Vista System partition. It's likely being filled up by System Restore and Volume Shadow Copy actions, which are good things but have been known to grab a lot of drive space if left on their own.

I don't have backups of the OS partition. I have backups of the data that I actually need. Half of me wants this NOT to work so I can go ahead and install XP again. If my memory serves me correctly, I disabled System Restore when I initially installed Vista.

Thanks for the responses.

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: dak125
If my memory serves me correctly, I disabled System Restore when I initially installed Vista.

Don't do that. Turn it back on.

 

[dak125]

Originally posted by: Smilin

Originally posted by: dak125
If my memory serves me correctly, I disabled System Restore when I initially installed Vista.

Don't do that. Turn it back on.

Why's that? I'm basing all of this off of memory. This install is probably 1.5 years old.

 

[dak125]

Originally posted by: Thraxen
[edit]This guide seems better: Link

Again, I haven't tried this myself, but I've read about it recently because I have a similar need on my file server at home. I just haven't gotten around to actually doing it yet. It seems fairly straight forward though.

Just an update ...

This guide did NOT work for me. I was able to shrink one partition but I was unable to extend my main system partition. I got Acronis Disk Director and it worked PERFECTLY. Not only was in stupid easy but it even figured out to use the unallocated space that I just shrunk to extend my main partition.

Thanks for all of the responses.

 

[hanspeter]

It is true, the free space must lie contigious next to the partition you want to extend.

Only volumes on dynamic disks bends this rule.