[RussellV]

I am trying to figure out if I have 2 partitions on a drive (C: & D:) and I want to get rid of one of them (d:) with "Computer Management" will I loose everything out of the main partition (C:)?

I actually have 4 partitions on the drive thanks to Dell. I have to following:

No name - Basic FAT Partition 39MB (installed by windows for some reason I think?)
No name - Basic FAT32 Partition 4.63GB (end of drive, unused are?)
C: - NTFS 51.21GB (Main drive with windows)
D: - NTFS 18.6GB (empty)

I don't know about the 2 no name partitions but I would like to get rid of D: and get that space back into C: so it is easier to use and access. However, I don't want to have to reinstall and reload everything on the computer. If I try to remove D: it tells the that all data on the volume will be lost. Is that just on D: or is that on the entire drive?


Thanks in advance for any advice.

Russell

[The Skeptic]

If you delete a logical drive in disk management you will lose the data only on the deleted partition. But what will you gain from doing so? You will create a fresh (extended) space which is unusable unless another logical disk(s) is/are defined. C will keep the present size and you will gain nothing.

As I see it you have two options:

1: Resize the present partitions. Enlarge C on account of D. You need special programs for that. Partition Magic is a well known one. Please note: resizing partitions fails sometimes, with serious results. Backup all your important data before you go for that.

2: My preferred option: Leave the computer as is but move important data from C to D. This will ease the load on C and will make better use of D which is presently empty. Even further, if you move important data to D it will be kept safer then in C in some cases of software failure.

[RussellV]

Thanks for the info Skeptic.

I have moved a few partitions before and it can sure have serious side effects. I don't really want to go that way because I don't trust the Dell components. Sometimes they don't like to be changed that drastically. I think it will be safer to get them a new larger hard drive and use something like Norton Ghost to transfer the info over. Plus if I buy Norton Ghost I can have it do regular backups to the old drive.