Can I even merge these two non-adjacent partitions?

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Carla_20

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Jun 9, 2017
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510
Hi all,

I'm a complete newbie to this kind of thing, but I've done a lot of reading and researching and it appears that I am unable to merge disk E: with disk C: (which is getting pretty full). When I first bought the computer, I had many more games and apps installed and never got warnings about drive C: being full. I really only use this computer for gaming and online shopping, so when I started having problems with a game, and uninstall/reinstall didn't fix it, I read in an online forum that it was probably a registry key problem and to run a registry cleaner. I did that and it's like it uncoupled the drives, because i immediately started getting messages about my drive being full.

I tried moving my games to disk E and some were fine, others not, and it created another user account, so I have user Carla and user Carla.Carla-PC. What's up with that? I'd just like to be able to load stuff like it did before, where Windows automatically used the empty space. Thanks for any help.
Drives_zpsipgv2zc5.png


 
Solution
Colif
Better to leave them as 2 drives, you can have the game on E as well, and still leave steam on C drive. Look at option 2 here: https://www.lifehacker.com.au/2015/07/how-to-move-a-pc-game-to-another-hard-drive-without-re-downloading-it/

I would save up for a 250gb ssd at the very least and replace that 120 as its really too small for windows these days. Then you can easily have a game or two on ssd and not run out of space as easily. I have 170gb free on my ssd but then i put almost everything on my hdd.

I would guess cause 120gb ssd are cheaper. I have seen worse, at least its not 64gb, SSD below 250 are just not worth it anymore. unless its optane but thats another story.
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kanewolf

kanewolf

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May 29, 2013
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No, you can't merge. It looks to me like C: and E: are on different physical disks.

You need to check for excessive restore point usage.

Here is an article on cleaning up SSD space -- http://www.pcgamer.com/how-to-save-even-more-space-on-your-ssd/
 
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Colif

Colif

Win 11 Master
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Jun 12, 2015
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Is this a laptop? Can you show us a screen shot of disk management with the far right column hidden and showing how much free space you have on all the drives?

You can't merge partitions on 2 separate HDD, I am curious how they could have been linked before. Have you ever reinstalled windows or was the registry thing all you did?

I am curious if this was a cache drive originally, some laptops have a small ssd and a 1tb hdd in them, and Windows is installed on the 1tb drive and uses the ssd as a cache drive to speed up the system. Windows doesn't see the ssd, an Intel program is used to link them
 
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C

Carla_20

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Jun 9, 2017
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510
Drives_zpsbuyrfyee.png


No, it's a desktop. Never reinstalled Windows, and I a don't have any restore points set up. I did, stupidly, try to extend the volume of Drive E. Which wiped out my Itunes and my backup. Insert angry at myself face here. I will try to get a screenshot showing what space is available on all drives. Mind you, I have deleted most of my games and have yet to fully add back my music to iTunes. I will read the articles you have suggested. Thanks!
 
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Colif

Colif

Win 11 Master
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Jun 12, 2015
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Were the games on C or on E? If they were steam games, you could have had the client on C and all the game library folder on E, cleaning registry shouldn't have caused that though. There is a program called Steam mover that can create links in the steam folders to other locations so that might explain links - http://www.traynier.com/software/steammover but the steam client allows you to do it now without needing to use that

120gb isn't very big, if you had games on it it was only a matter of time before you ran out of space.
 
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C

Carla_20

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Jun 9, 2017
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510


 
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C

Carla_20

Prominent
Jun 9, 2017
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510
I just did typical installation, which was always to the C drive. I believe the iTunes app was on C, but the music files were on E. I only have one Steam game and it's on C. Can I make these dynamic drives and make them one Drive? Most of the games will install on E, but still want to download some amount of data on C. I just don't understand why they would build the computer this way.
 
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Colif

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
Jun 12, 2015
65,251
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Better to leave them as 2 drives, you can have the game on E as well, and still leave steam on C drive. Look at option 2 here: https://www.lifehacker.com.au/2015/07/how-to-move-a-pc-game-to-another-hard-drive-without-re-downloading-it/

I would save up for a 250gb ssd at the very least and replace that 120 as its really too small for windows these days. Then you can easily have a game or two on ssd and not run out of space as easily. I have 170gb free on my ssd but then i put almost everything on my hdd.

I would guess cause 120gb ssd are cheaper. I have seen worse, at least its not 64gb, SSD below 250 are just not worth it anymore. unless its optane but thats another story.
 
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Solution
C

Carla_20

Prominent
Jun 9, 2017
5
0
510
Thank everyone! I got a lot of good info that I am sure it will help me. The machine is 6 years old, so probably a dinosaur in computer terms, I've just never had a problem with it before. It appears that Drive E has remained largely unused for all this time, which is frustrating since I paid a pretty penny back then for all that extra space. I love Windows 7 and most of my games are old, so I don't want to change my OS because many of them wouldn't be compatible, so it seems buying a bigger SSD is the answer. Thanks again.
 
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