Increasing partition size

I want to increase a partition size without destroying any other partitions that I have, is this possible? I have my main HDD partitioned in the ratio 35 GB to 265 GB. I'd like to increase the partition which my OS is on to, say, 50 GB, therefore descreasing my other partition to 250 GB. The size of the HD is 300 GB, so I've no unpartitioned space to work with. As far as I know I can't do this with Windows' own partitioning tools without deleting one partition to free up space. Is it possible to do with Partition Magic or any other tools? The main thing is to not lose any data that's on either partition (but, if I had to, I could delete my 265 GB partition and just resize the other, but I don't want to do that just yet).

Thanks.

IvySlayer

I don't think you can increase partitions without reformatting.

Fysh

It can be done, but not with Windows built-in tools.

My suggestion would be to use GParted - download the ISO image, burn it to a CD, then boot up from that CD.

You'll need to shrink your data partition first to free up some unused space. Once that's done, you can extend your OS partition.

Things to note:

• TAKE BACKUPS OF ANYTHING VITAL BEFORE MAKING ANY CHANGES. Seems obvious, but still.
• Committing these changes will probably take a while, so be prepared to wait.
• If you're using Vista/Win7, you may need to boot from your installation disk and use the "Repair My Computer" option to restore normal operations. (See here for more info).

x in the city

-JammyDodger- wrote: »

I want to increase a partition size without destroying any other partitions that I have, is this possible? I have my main HDD partitioned in the ratio 35 GB to 265 GB. I'd like to increase the partition which my OS is on to, say, 50 GB, therefore descreasing my other partition to 250 GB. The size of the HD is 300 GB, so I've no unpartitioned space to work with. As far as I know I can't do this with Windows' own partitioning tools without deleting one partition to free up space. Is it possible to do with Partition Magic or any other tools? The main thing is to not lose any data that's on either partition (but, if I had to, I could delete my 265 GB partition and just resize the other, but I don't want to do that just yet).

Thanks.

acronis is your friend

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/diskdirector/

Capt'n Midnight

First check and defragment your drive.

The resize operation will move the larger partition by 15GB up the drive so it will have to move all the data, this will take ages and there is a lot more risk of loosing data than just shrinking a partition without moving it

milo2

-JammyDodger- wrote: »

I want to increase a partition size without destroying any other partitions that I have, is this possible? I have my main HDD partitioned in the ratio 35 GB to 265 GB. I'd like to increase the partition which my OS is on to, say, 50 GB, therefore descreasing my other partition to 250 GB. The size of the HD is 300 GB, so I've no unpartitioned space to work with. As far as I know I can't do this with Windows' own partitioning tools without deleting one partition to free up space. Is it possible to do with Partition Magic or any other tools? The main thing is to not lose any data that's on either partition (but, if I had to, I could delete my 265 GB partition and just resize the other, but I don't want to do that just yet).

Thanks.

Partition Magic is the best option, use the resize option...

Fysh

milo2 wrote: »

Partition Magic is the best option, use the resize option...

Symantec are no longer selling Partition Magic, as of December last year. If we're going down the paid software route, paying for discontinued software probably isn't the best option unless there's absolutely no alternative.

JonathanAnon

Fysh wrote: »

Things to note:[*]TAKE BACKUPS OF ANYTHING VITAL BEFORE MAKING ANY CHANGES.

I think Fysh has mentioned the most important thing here. If it was an important system that I was trying this operation on, I would definitely take an image of the original disk to a spare disk, and then carry out the task on the copy to be sure that it works successfully. I use Disk Director also, it's very good.

You must need to install a lot of applications on to the C: partition, do you? Are you sure that there are not files on that partition that you could get rid of. tbh, I dont think any of my clients would need more than 35GBs for the system partition. Why dont you search for large files on the C: drive and see exactly what is using up all your space?

PogMoThoin

Its not called Partion Tragic for nothing

I use gparted myself, even though I have an Acronis licence, gparted just works better

Capt'n Midnight

JonathanAnon wrote: »

Why dont you search for large files on the C: drive and see exactly what is using up all your space?

move the swap / hibernation files and temp folder

run scandisk in case file fragments taking space

spacemonger or sequoia view to see what is really taking up space

JonathanAnon

Thanks everybody for all of the replies. I haven't decided what to do just yet, so I'll research your suggestions a bit more.

JonathanAnon wrote: »

You must need to install a lot of applications on to the C: partition, do you? Are you sure that there are not files on that partition that you could get rid of. tbh, I dont think any of my clients would need more than 35GBs for the system partition. Why dont you search for large files on the C: drive and see exactly what is using up all your space?

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

spacemonger or sequoia view to see what is really taking up space

I just installed spacemonger and my temp folder at C:/Windows is taking up 10.8 GB, which is crazy. 5.4 gigs of that is taken up by Chrome. I don't even have Chrome installed, just Chrome frame. Can I safely clear/move this folder? The folder doesn't clear when I run disk cleanup. I found 2 gigs of temp files from Grabit too, so that cleared up a lot of space.

Cheers for the help guys, if I can clear/move that temp folder safely I won't need to resize the partition.

I've uninstalled Chrome frame and a few other unwanted programs, deleted all files that could be safely deleted, ran CCleaner and tidied a few things up. All of that saved me almost 12 GB, which solves my problem.

Cheers again for all of the responses, guys.

Capt'n Midnight

reboot to be sure no programs are using the temp folder , then you can empty it when you restart

get ccleaner if you aren't sure