WinXP partitions

[zm2002]

Good Day,

Just one question ...

One Hard Drive of 120Gb unpartitioned space (out of the box), and a boot from Windows XP Pro CD. It asks how much unpartitioned space I want to use for XP, and only gives me a maximum of 114Gb. Then, it tells that I have 114Gb partitioned for NTFS and 8Mb unpartitioned. When I try to use the 8Mb, it tells that the partition is for "partition information only" ???

Can anyone explain it to me?

Thanks 🙂
ZM

 

[AndyHui]

The 8MB is reserved for converting your Basic Disk to a Dynamic Disk.

A Dynamic Disk is useful in certain situations, but the general recommendation is to leave your partitions set to Basic Disk, unless you are absolutely sure you need the features of dynamic disks.

 

[zm2002]

Good Day,

Can you add further details?

Can I use that 8Mb as a partition and add it to the others (with partition magic for example)?

What is the diferences between Basic and Dynamic disks?

Thanks 🙂
ZM

 

[WinkOsmosis]

Can't stand to lose 8mb??

Seriously.. why do you want it all to be one partition? Splitting my 80gb drive has saved me alot of movies and mp3s when reinstalling Windows. I don't see any reason to have one big partition.

 

[zm2002]

Hello,

I made the question because those 8Mb are MINE!!! And I just want to know where the hell are they 😀

Ofcourse I'll make a partition on my system ... about 20Gb & 100Gb (for a start) with partition magic 8.

But what is the diferences between Basic and Dynamic disks? Disk Management utility tells me I have a NTFS Basic Partition ...


Thanks

 

[cleverhandle]

Check out any W2K/XP server documentation for full info on Dynamic Disks - among other things, they let you add disks to a volume without repartitioning and use software RAID. Will you use this? Who knows? But even if you probably won't, 8MB on 120GB is less than a hundredth of a percent of your disk space. If "wasting" that much space for storage flexibility really concerns you, you need more serious help than we can provide.

 

[RVN]

Originally posted by: zm2002
Hello,

I made the question because those 8Mb are MINE!!! And I just want to know where the hell are they 😀

Ofcourse I'll make a partition on my system ... about 20Gb & 100Gb (for a start) with partition magic 8.

But what is the diferences between Basic and Dynamic disks? Disk Management utility tells me I have a NTFS Basic Partition ...


Thanks

Recommend partitioning from the XP disc when you install (fdisk) and leave PM8 out of the equation ...it's cleaner!

 

[sechs]

Don't use dynamic disks unless you know exactly what you are doing. This a completely different creature from the standard partitioned disks with which you may be familiar. It's far easier to lose data and almost no disk utilities at your disposal will work on them.

Now, I'm thinking, if your 120GB (likely decimal GB) drive has a 114GB (binary GB) partition and 8GB (binary GB) of unused space, where did the extra come from? If I'm right, you can only have a single partition of about 112GB (binary GB).

And, one more thing. There is no fdisk in Windows XP. I hope that you kissed it goodbye....

 

[GrumpyMan]

On another note with Drive Image 2002 that I use for backups it cannot restore images from dynamic disks. So if you plan on using a program like this for backups I would use basic disks only.

 

[zm2002]

Good Day,

First of all, a little correction to my original post ... 120Gb total disk, it gave me 114Gb partitioned and 8Gb unpartitioned.

Now, I've installed Partition Magic 8.0 and made a 90Gb Logical Partition, so I have the following info in PM8:

Partition Type Size MB Status Pri/Log
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Local Disk C -> NTFS -> 24466Mb -> Active -> Primary
(*) -> Extended -> 90004Mb -> None -> Primary
Local Disk F -> NTFS -> 90004Mb -> None -> Logical

Looking at this, I count 24466 + 90004 = 114470 Mb, and I still miss my 8Gb space ...

[1] Before I made the 90Gb partition, I saw a 114Gb NTFS partition and a 8Gb unallocated partition ... now, I see no 8Gb unallocated one ... where is it? Anyone has a clue?

[2] What is the reason for that (*) partition on PM8?

[3] If I format drive C to reinstall my operation system, I still maintain all data from drive F with this configuration, don't I? (just to confirm if I'm corrrect)

[4] What are the main diferences between Primary and Logical? When creating the partition, PM8 gave me the option of both, but recomended the Logical one ...


Thanks Allot
ZM