Advanced Disk Management in Vista

[Marik]

Over the past months I have seen how people spend a fortune on Disk Management tools like Acronis DiskDirector, Partition Magic etc. but most people often forget that Windows Vista Has an advanced disk and partition management utility built in.

Here is how to use it.

How to Delete and Extend a Partition with Disk Management in Vista

STEP ONE:

To Delete a Partition :

1. Open the Control Panel. (Classic View)

• A. Click on the Administrative Tools icon.

• B. Click on Computer Management.

2. Click the Continue button in the UAC prompt.

3. In the left pane, click on Disk Management under Storage. (See screenshot below)

4. Right click on the volume (EX: E:\ ) your want to delete and click Delete Volume.

NOTE: If your hard disk is currently set up as a single partition, then you cannot delete it. You also cannot delete the system partition, boot partition, or any partition that contains the virtual memory paging file, because Vista needs this information to start correctly. You will have to use the Vista installation disk to delete it.

5. Click Yes to the confirmation prompt. (See screenshot below)

NOTE: This will leave the partition as unallocated (blank) with no drive letter.

STEP TWO:

To Extend a Partition :

6. Right click on the partition (EX: C:\ ) you want to Extend into the now unallocated partition and click Extend Volume. (See screenshot below)

7. Click on Next for the Welcome to the Extend Volume Wizard window.

8. Select the amount of space in MB you want to use from the unallocated partition to use to Extend this partition. (See screenshot below)

NOTE: If you want to make one partition again, then select all of the available space for that one disk. If there were other drives with free unallocated space, they would be shown under the Available selection.

WARNING: It is advised that you do not extend a volume on one disk with free space from another disk. If one of the drives has a hardware failure, then all the data on that partition (volume) will be deleted.

• A. Click Next.

9. Click Finish in the Completing Extend window. (See screenshot below)

10. You will now see the Disk Management console with the new Extended partition volume ready to be used. (See screenshot below)

11. Close Computer Management.

12. Click on Computer in the Start Menu and see your new Extened partition volume. (See screenshot below)

NOTE: In this example, we will have one large partition from the same hard disk now.

[dock98]

windows xp pro also has a built in in the same place with the same options

[gest]

as a customer of acronis, i am interested in the xp capabilities...

so far, i only see the delete options

can i call myself a customer? ;)

[dock98]

as a customer of acronis, i am interested in the xp capabilities...

so far, i only see the delete options

can i call myself a customer? ;)

click on disk management and then right click on the disk you want to partition.it will not let you partition a boot disk.

[gest]

not there...

get me a screen shot?

[gest]

nevermind, once the disks are set in xp, they cannot be resized by windows...