Re-sizing need Help
Hi,
So i just bought a Crucial MX300 SSD today 275GB and i plugged it in and wanted to clone my current 148GB Hard Disk after the cloning i think it resized my SSD and now the SSD is 149GB and the HD is the same 148GB
In Disk Management it says
149.05 GB NTFS
Healthy (system,Boot,Page Flie,Active,Crash Dump,Primary Partition)
And the Other half says
107.12GB
Healty (Recovery Partition)
How do i get my wasted space back???
Greg:
You probably don't want to remove the recovery partition since it may be needed in the future if something goes wrong with your PC. But the partition doesn't need to be this large. You can use DD12 to resize both partitions, making the recovery partition smaller and the Windows partition larger.
Look at the display in the main Disk Director window and determine how much used space exists on the recovery partition. Click on the recovery partition and choose "Resize Volume" from the list of actions and tools (or right-click on the graphic of the recovery partition and do the same).
The window that opens shows a graphic image of the partition at the top. Drag the left side of the graphic to the right to make the partition smaller, leaving unallocated space to the left of the recovery partition. Leave at least 1 GB of remaining free space in the partition; in other words, the volume size should be at least 1 GB larger than the used space in the recovery partition. Click on OK.
To complete this operation you need to click on the "Commit" flag at the top of the window. Once this step has been completed you should now see a large amount of unallocated space between the two partitions. Now click on the Windows partition and choose "Resize Volume". Drag the right side of the Windows partition graphic all the way to the right so that the Volume Size is as large as possible. Click on OK.
Again you will need to click on the "Commit" flag to complete the resize. You may or may not be prompted to reboot the PC.
Mr Wharton,
Thank you for your quick reply. Although after downloading DD12 the trial version will not allow me to complete these actions. Am i to understand that I am required to buy a program from acronis to fix what the other program caused? What a bait and switch tactic that is. Is there any other way to resolve this issue that would not cost me another $50 for a program that I will only use one time?
Gregory:
From reading your first post I concluded, perhaps incorrectly, that you had a copy of DD 12. Of course there are always other ways of accomplishing what you want to do. You can certainly find free partitioning software to download, or you can use the tools built into Windows.
If you would like me to help you, can you post a screenshot from Windows Disk Management Console that shows your partition layout? These operations can be completed entirely from Windows, but the process is not as simple as using partitioning software like DD12.
Mr Wharton,
Sorry for the confusion on the DD12. Attached is the screen shot of the configuration. Thank you for all your help thus far.
Gregory:
Two questions before proceeding:
1. Is your SSD set up as an MBR disk or a GPT disk? (In Disk Management console, right-click on "Disk 3", choose "Properties", select "Volumes" tab which will either say GPT or MBR under "Partition Style").
2. Can you assign a temporary drive letter to the Recovery Partition on Disk 3? (Right-click on the graphic image of the partition. Does the menu include a choice for "Change drive letter and paths..."? If so, assign it a drive letter, say letter "B" for example, so that the contents of the partition will show up in Windows File Explorer).
Cannot assign a letter to the recovery partition on Disk 3. I have attached a screen shot to answer your 1st question.
OK, you have an MBR disk.
Are you comfortable using the command prompt? If so, here is how to assign a drive letter to the Recovery partition:
Open an Admin Command Prompt (right-click on the Windows 10 icon at the lower-left of the taskbar and select "Command Prompt (Admin)").
Type each of the following commands, followed by the Enter key:
Diskpart
Select Disk 3
List Partition
Select Partition 2
Assign Letter=B
Exit
Exit
Does the Recovery partition show up now in File Explorer? You may have to set File Explorer to show both Hidden and Protected Operating System files in order to see the contents of the Recovery Partition. If you can see the contents, copy everything in this partition to temporary storage on another one of your disks or on a flash drive.
It's late; can we continue this tomorrow?
Mr Wharton.
Command prompts worked great the letter B has been assigned. i will copy over the files to a flash drive and wait for further instruction when you have time. Once again thank you for all your assistance thus far.
Gregory:
You're making good progress. I will assume that you have copied the contents of the Recovery partition to external storage. The next steps have the objective of making the Windows partition on the SSD as large as possible, leaving 450 MB for the Recovery partition. Since you're now familiar with using Diskpart, let's stick with it for these steps. The steps are a little convoluted but this is due to the limitations of Windows built-in partitioning tools. Graphical tools like DD12 make this easier.
1. Start an Admin command prompt
2. Enter the following Diskpart commands:
Diskpart
Select Disk 3
Select partition 2
Delete partition
Select partition 1
Extend
Shrink minimum=450
Active
Create partition primary ID=0x27
Format quick fs=ntfs label="Recovery Tools"
Assign letter=B
Exit
Exit
At this point you should have the desired partition sizes on the SSD and you should now copy the files that were on the recovery partition back to drive B:. Again, be sure that you have Windows File Explorer set to display both Hidden and Protected Operating System files. After confirming that the files have been copied, you should remove the drive letter from the Recovery partition:
Diskpart
Select disk 3
Select partition 2
remove letter=B
Exit
Exit
Now your Disk Management view should show that Disk 1 and Disk 3 look the same except that Disk 3 has a larger partition size for the Windows partition.
Getting your system to boot from the SSD is another problem, since you unknowingly violated the first rule of cloning, which is to NEVER boot a PC that has two identical installations of Windows on two different attached disks. To prepare for undoing this error you should have a method of booting your PC from a recovery disk. If you haven't done this already, then before you go any further you should create a recovery CD. From the Windows 10 start/search box, type "Backup and Restore" and select "Backup and Restore (Windows 7)" from the search results, then click on "Create a System Repair Disk". Make a CD and test it to be sure that you can boot the PC from the repair disk successfully.
Let me know if you get to this point and we'll go from there.