Small GAP's in between partitions
I use Disk Director already years, but sometimes I find very small unpartitioned gaps (I hope) in between partitions, after resize/add partitions?
I wonder why? Is this normal or can it cause data loss??
The size is always very small of these unpartitioned gap(s), about 32KB, and they are never visible via partition programs, even the partition manager of Windows.
You only can see them with tools like Spinrite. In the attached pdf file you can see an example, above the overview in Disk Director and below the overview of Spinrite of the same disk. In Spinrite the gap is selected.
This example, that I have attached in the native message, is the result of a full disk image via True Image 8 of a 40GB HDD.
That is restored on a new 80GB HDD. Because of more space, I was enlarging the 3 partitions to take in the unpartitioned space.
But on my current pc, I also have got the same gap after resizing via Disk Director(DD) 11 boot cd.
On this HDD I have 3 partitions created in the past via the good old one Partition Magic8(PM), with some limitations because 500GB is actually to big for PM8.
After the release of DD11, I was reducing the C: partition and enlarging (all created unpartitioned space) the partition next to C:
However, before resizing with Disk Director 11, I did a check with Spinrite. Like always, there was not such a small gap.
I never have got such a small unpartitioned gaps with Partition Magic in the past!?
After resizing with DD11, I did again a check with Spinrite, and again I have a small gap, just like on the example?!
suspicious, but maybe it is something innocent and risk-free?! I do not get any error tag.
Maybe they hide this small gaps in the overview of DD (and other, also imaging programs) because you can't do something with it?
And that's not the only case, recently on an new pc of a friend.
The usual check with Spinrite, nothing suspicious.
After updating and creating my own image, I was deleting the recovery partition via DD11 boot-cd, moving the Windows partition to the begin of the disk, enlarging the partition a bit, and then enlarging the data partition next to the Win partition with the remaining free unpartitioned space.
Then again the Spinrite check, and surprise, again the same very small unpartitioned gap in between the sys and data partition?!
Thx
I have done some additional test.
In the attached pdf file you can read a summery of this test.
This is MY conclusion:
Although these very small unpartitioned gaps are invisible/hidden in DD, if they
appear, I suppose they do not cause any error; to make them visible you need a low level tool like eg Spinrite.
As you can see in the pdf file, if they appear they always stay gently in between two partitions, they
never occur in the middle of a partition.
I wish to chime in.
I also observed gaps between 2 partitions on my WD 2TB Green after I aligned the partitions to the Windows Vista/7 scheme using the WD Align tool made by Acronis. In Acronis Disk Director 10 build 2288 there is a small gap between the first and second partitions.
I put this to the fact that the partitions are "aligned". No such gaps can be seen from Disk Director on another Seagate Barracuda LP 2TB drive, which persumably is still using the Windows XP scheme ("unaligned").
I wonder what Acronis Disk Director 11 Advanced Workstation will display on my two hard drives.