HD Partitioning Problem

I'm using Partition Magic 7.0 to increase the size of my HD's primary partition (C) from 8 Gb to 15 Gb--but PM 7 refuses to do it... (I'm running under W2K).

PM gave me a warning about increasing the size bigger than 8 Gb (or 1000 cylinders).

There's a second partition on this drive, with 6 more volumes (D-I) allocated within it. I had to move those first. Now there's free space at the end of the primary partition, but it still won't make the primary partition any bigger...

I got a couple of PM error codes (1073731435 & 322123851),
but I can't decipher them, even from the Symantec PM error-code web site.

Thanks for any good feedback concerning this problem.

 

Have you shrunk the extended partition containing volumes D thro I as well as the volumes themselves?

 

Not really helpful info here, but have you backed up any important data on all these volumes? With this many partitions/volumes on one drive, things have a tendency to go awry when you start to play with resizing partitions, or doing any type of partition work can be dangerous even with only one or two partitions.... but a total of 7 partitons/volumes (if I counted correctly) just seems ripe for disaster IMHO.
Good luck.... and back up anything important or irreplaceable before it's too late.

Oh, yeah, Welcome to Major Geeks! :major

 

If you delete any partitions before the last partition , you could have real problems.
If you have backed up the other partitions, I suggest that you use partition magic to delete the partions from the last one first. Then when you have only two partitions, you make the remaining second partition an extended partition to bring it into C:.- Read up on the Partition Magic to check this out, first, as I have to go off-line, but I will come back tommorrow.
Partition Magic version you have is an older version, so this might be why you have difficulties.
I use HyperOs , which uses Patition Magic , but a later version , now, and that is how I would do it.

 

No partitions have been deleted yet; files will be backed up (with CyberLink PowerBackup) before any further attempts to re-partition...

Perhaps this profile of my 80-Gig HD will be of some help in dealing with
this problem:

Drive C: 7.86 Gig
[7 Gig unallocated here]
Drive D: 19.5 Gig
Drive E: 509 Mgb
Drive F: 1.16 Gig
Drive G: 1.16 Gig
Drive H: .99 Gig
Drive I: .99 Gig
[37 Gig unallocated here]

 

I would still get rid of the other partitions, once you have saved what you need, and follow my previous instructions.

But for more ways, and ideas,forget the jargen about Linux, and other operating systems, and read through this from an early majorgeeks thread

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=73353

 

Win2k with Service Pack 4 should allow up to 137 GB. However, unpatched, you'll be limited to either 4 Gig or 8 Gig, depending on how your BIOS/Hardrive combo divvies up the 1024 cylinders. Since your BIOS does have an impact, you could download a new BIOS for your motherboard (if it's available). However, before trying to expand the boot partition beyond 8 Gig, get Service Pack 4 installed first, otherwise you risk losing the entire drive.

 

Prometheos, and Sabrenx make a very good point - I assumed you had all service packs, as W2K is very good on updates , still.
I should have asked you.

 

Are you sure you are reading the PM information correctly?
You didn't answer the question on my post#2.

Can you post a screenshot similar to the one below which is for a W2K machine with PM running?

 

Have not shrunk extended partitions/volumes...have read carefully through the PM documentation...will try to post a screen shot very soon.

A friend who's an electronics engineer is taking a crack at this problem a week from
today....

Thanks.

 

Yes, I have SP 4 installed, Thanks.

 

Here's a screen shot (attached) of Partition Magic 7 on my PC (running
W2K)...

 

Since hard drives of 80Gb and 160 Gb are plainly displayed I can't see any BIOS limitation being involved. LBA must be enabled in BIOS.

I don't have PM7, only 4 and 8.

The documentation for 8 is :crap since the Symantec takeover, but the PM4 manual states

"Partition Magic displays a warning if you attempt to create, move or resize a bootable partition outside the boot code boundary. If you continue the operation you may not be able to boot or see the partition. In either case you can resolve the problem by moving the partition back within the boot code boundary."

This implies that PM would complete the resize, but might mess up your C drive.

Your boot code boundary is 8G, by the way.

You could use the free space to the right of the extended partition to create a copy (clone) of C as a safety precaution, and delete it once you have a successful resize.

You could also try converting C to NTFS before resize. Win 2k may be happier with this.

PM may also be happier to resize if you temporarily unset C as active.
It may also let you create a new partition in the free space to the right of C and then merge the two.

 

I used partition magic 8 with which I was able to find the missing partition. Its free for use now. Thanks for your help guys