Need To Shrink A Vista Volume [solved]

[yordan 10]

My C: disk is currently taking my own physical disk.This is not optimal, because I love having a small system disk and a big data disk ; in case of a huge system crash, this would allow me to recover from my last ghost image.Now vista allows me to shrink the c: volume.Unfortunately, vista allowed me to shrink only by 40 gigs. Then it allows me 0, due to cache and snapshots activated.How can I manage shrinking my C: disk down to 50 gigs ? This would mean remove 200 gigs ?Please tell me. Yordan

[sparkx 0]

So do you want to shrink the partition in other words? I know that Linux has something called "GParted" which does just that for free, I am not sure if it works for windows yet but I believe it is quite reliable (however I haven't needed to use it). An option of windows is Partition Magic which costs some money and isn't as reliable as "GParted" (from the reviews I have read)...

After doing a quick Google search with "Partition Editor", I found "Beeblebrox Partition Editor" which is apparently a free windows supporting partition editor. I have no clue how reliable it is.

I had used "partition logic" to arrange some partitions in the past. It is a simple boot editor so it really doesn't matter if you have windows or Linux installed. Personally I like it, and probably should be your first try if you have windows, but I don't think it is as functional as the other editors (as in fewer features and doesn't support as many partitions).

(Note: Only Use This Editors at your own risk. Be aware that an error in the editor could leave your entire partition messed up.)

Hope I answered your question,
Sparkx

Links:
Partition Logic
Beeblebrox
GParted
PartitionMagic 8.0 (Not Free)

[xboxrulz1405241485 0]

My C: disk is currently taking my own physical disk.This is not optimal, because I love having a small system disk and a big data disk ; in case of a huge system crash, this would allow me to recover from my last ghost image.
Now vista allows me to shrink the c: volume.
Unfortunately, vista allowed me to shrink only by 40 gigs. Then it allows me 0, due to cache and snapshots activated.
How can I manage shrinking my C: disk down to 50 gigs ? This would mean remove 200 gigs ?
Please tell me.
Yordan

I think buying another hard drive might be better since you can even account for what if the system disc dies, then you'll lose data anyways. Plus, large capacity hard drives don't cost that much anymore be it internal or external.

xboxrulz

[yordan 10]

I think buying another hard drive might be better since you can even account for what if the system disc dies, then you'll lose data anyways. Plus, large capacity hard drives don't cost that much anymore be it internal or external.

 

xboxrulz

This is a brand new system, I cannot open the box during the 1-year guarantee. That's why I would like to do only software things.

Gparted livecd seems able to do the job.

The livecd boots on my system, and it sees the partitions on my disk and accepts to shrink the NTFS partion.

I will give it a try tomorrow, after having copied my personal files on an USB disk.

----------------------------Edit

Everything worked perfectly, gparted livecd was successful doing the job.

Now I have exactly what I wanted : a 80 gig partition for the Windows vista O.S., a 200 gig NTFS partition for my data, and a 10 gig FAT32 partition for the msdos rescue tools.

 

By the way, it works exactly the same way as partition magic, and it's free.

If you are interested you can have it from here : http://gparted.sourceforge.net/download.php

Docs and screenshots are here : http://gparted.org/display-doc.php?name=help-manual〈=C

Edited January 12, 2009 by yordan
reported the successful shrink methodology (see edit history)