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How-To Geek Forums » Windows Vista

Extend C: into unallocated space BEFORE it

(23 posts)
  • Started 2 months ago by aaston86
  • Latest reply from ScottW
  • Topic Viewed 583 times


aaston86
Posts: 9

Somehow my drive has ended up with three partitions: an unnamed 86 MB partition labeled "Healthy (EISA Configuration)", an unnamed 10 GB partition labeled "Unallocated", and finally a 222.8 GB NTFS partition named "OS (C:)" and labeled "Healthy (System, Boot, Page File, Active, Crash Dump, Primary Partition). I have done some research online and learned that the EISA partition is important and should be kept, and Disk Management won't let me delete it anyway. I don't really care about that as it is only 86 MB, though I would be interested in knowing exactly what it is for. What I do care about is the 10 Gigs of unallocated space. How do I merge it into my C: drive? Disk Manager says it won't extend into space before a partition, but this is what I want to do. Is it possible to recover this space WITHOUT messing up my OS or any of the data in C:?

Again, I don't want to make a bunch of partitions, or run multiple Operating Systems, or anything like that. I want to run as few partitions as possible with one OS and one drive letter. I simply want to turn "EISA|Unallocated|OS (C:)" into "EISA|OS (C:)". How do I do it?

Posted 2 months ago #
 
Lighthouse
Lighthouse
Posts: 5298

Hi aaston. What computer, make/model do you have?

Posted 2 months ago #
 
aaston86
Posts: 9

I have a Dell XPS M1530.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
whs
whs
Posts: 4985

The EISA partition usually contains some utilities that you can call from the BIOS. So that one I would not touch. The 10GB partition may be your recovery partition - but then it would usually be D:\. If possible, open it from COMPUTER and see what's in it. If it contains only 1 Folder called Recovery or Dell or something like that, then it is your recovery partiton.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
Lighthouse
Lighthouse
Posts: 5298

I am presuming this is new. Correct?

Posted 2 months ago #
 
aaston86
Posts: 9

The computer is pretty new (1 month). I cannot open the 10 GB partition in COMPUTER - it is unallocated space and cannot be seen from anywhere other than Disk Management. It may once have been drive D:, but I think I managed to delete that right after buying the computer without having a clue what I was doing.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
Lighthouse
Lighthouse
Posts: 5298

Oh dear. You have messed up your restore partition. The only way out is to Reinstall Vista (I'm sorry). Do you have an installation disk?

Posted 2 months ago #
 
whs
whs
Posts: 4985

This is what you would usually find in the Dell 10GB recovery. The important one is the "Dell" - that one contains your Vista slipstream file called Factory.wim

Posted 2 months ago #
 
aaston86
Posts: 9

What is a restore partition? Do I need it? My computer seems to be running fine without it.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
Lighthouse
Lighthouse
Posts: 5298

Did Dell supply you with a Vista installation disk?

Posted 2 months ago #
 
aaston86
Posts: 9

Yes, I have a disk, but I don't want to reinstall everything unless it is absolutely vital - as I said everything is working fine.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
whs
whs
Posts: 4985

Good for you. But one of these days you will need to reinstall - believe me. We all have done it. You can, of course, prepare yourself for this day with the proper backup strategies.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
Lighthouse
Lighthouse
Posts: 5298

Can you post a screenshot of your Disk Management please?

Posted 2 months ago #
 
aaston86
Posts: 9

I'm pretty new to this forum thing - how do I post a screenshot?

Posted 2 months ago #
 
whs
whs
Posts: 4985

You can go to Photobucket , upload your screenshot and post the link or the picture.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
aaston86
Posts: 9

Here is the screenshot.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
Lighthouse
Lighthouse
Posts: 5298

The only way I know of, to delete that partition, is to Re-install the OS
But wait, and see what others may say.

Posted 2 months ago #
 
jd2066
Posts: 2807

See http://www.howtogeek.com/howto.....partition/
Note: This can make Vista not boot though this is easily fixed with the Vista install disc like the article shows.

Posted 1 month ago #
 
aaston86
Posts: 9

The article jd2066 mentions says that after resizing the partition on your drive with GParted, Windows Boot Manager will ask you what OS to boot from every time you turn the computer on. If I only have one OS (Vista) installed, but it goes into recovered mode, will this still happen?

Posted 1 month ago #
 
jd2066
Posts: 2807

The boot manager asking what OS to load will only appear if you have more then one OS installed. It appears from that example, the machine also had Windows XP on it.
For you if you just have Vista, it should not appear.

Posted 1 month ago #
 

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