Can I shrink the system reserved partition?

DonnyTechMaster · Feb 6, 2014

Hi, I recently got a new 1TB HDD and cloned my previous HDD (160GB) to it with EaseUS Todo Backup.

After doing this, I went into disk management and noticed that my system reserved partition was 199MB when I know that it is supposed to be 100MB. Can I do anything about this?

Also, it is showing my new C: drive as being over 133GB. Is this normal, or should I shrink it as well?

USAFRet · Feb 6, 2014

Do not screw with the System Reserved partition. 100 or 200 MB is 0.1% of that drive. Leave it alone.

For your C drive and 133GB...what does Disk Management show for the rest of the space on the 1TB?

DonnyTechMaster · Feb 6, 2014

USAFRet :

Here is a picture of what it all looks like: https://www.dropbox.com/s/isx8adj6h60ods8/Capture.JPG

It all looks pretty messed up, not sure what it should look like.

mbarnes86 · Feb 6, 2014

Hi

Do not worry about a reserved partition of 199MB thats MB not GB

why do you want to shrink the 133 GB partition !! most people would want to expand it

1000GB = 1TB

It seems your program duplicated the old 160GB hard disk without expanding the partitions to fill the hard disk

If the main Windows C:\ partition is working
(eg you can boot up and run all your usual programs) but there is a lot of un-used space at the end of the disk then you need a Partition Manager to expand the C: partition and possibly create a D: partition

do you want 2 x 500GB or 1 x TB partition or something in between

If you have used a modern bootable Partition Manager disk and know how to use it then use that program

I use Gparted live linux CD or USB memory stick
There are many others to choose from
(download ISO and use ImgBurn to burn to a CD)
The interface of the Partition Manager in gparted looks like Partition Magic
(purchased by Symantec in 2002 and shut down)

Note you need to check if the Partitions are aligned for 4K sectors as old small disks had 512 byte sectors while new & large hard disks have 4096 byte sectors

Most Hard drive manufacturers make available a program to test & correct problem

looking at you picture of Disk Management I am not sure what happened to get a small system reserved partition AFTER the C: partition (148GiB)
It should be before the C: partition for Vista and latter Windows
It might be safer to create a D: drive after the reserved Partition and leave C: alone

regards

Mike Barnes

DonnyTechMaster · Feb 6, 2014

I'd like to just have everything on one 1TB partition. Is it not possible to expand the C: drive in disk management using the leftover un-allocated space? I'm not really sure how to use the bootable CD's you mentioned as I'm not very experienced in storage.

USAFRet · Feb 6, 2014

However you do it, it is highly advisable to have a backup of any critical data saved elsewhere before messing with partitions.

Either combine the current C and the unallocated 782GB space, or
Create a new drive letter in that 782GB space.

The previously mentioned GParted will help fix things up.

And what you have ended up with here is why I rarely recommend cloning from one drive to another, especially different size drives.

mbarnes86 · Feb 6, 2014

Hi

I would re install the old 160 GB hard disk and see how that was laid out
If the reserved partition was before the main C: partition I would consider re cloning the 160GB disk onto the 1TB hard disk again.

You can not expand the C: partition without moving the reserved partition to the end of the disk which will likely stop Windows boot manager working.
Boot problem may be curable by booting from the Windows DVD

I am assuming you have Vista or later not XP

regards
Mike Barnes

DonnyTechMaster · Feb 6, 2014

USAFRet :

Yeah I understand it's a bit of a hassle, but there was just no other way I could think of to get all my files onto the new HDD without re-installing windows. Anyway, it turns out that EaseUS also makes a partition manager that I can extend the C: drive in so I think I'm done here. Thanks for all of your help!

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