Help with Partitioning
<div class="IPBDescription">New dual-boot system!</div>Hey all. I've been setting up a WinXP/Vista dual-boot system today. Here's what is going on:
I have a 140gig hard drive (10,000RPM) that I am partitioning into 3 sections:
The first section is for WinXP (which I made 8gigs);
the next section is for Vista (which I made 30gigs); and
the final section will be for games and such (currently unallocated space).
I also have 2 other 300gig hard drives for programs and music (7,200RPM).
I have everything set up great! The dual-boot works awesomely. The problem is that I am getting nervous about running out of space in my WinXP partition. There's only a gig left... I feel I mistakenly made it too small. Is there anyway I can extend it into the unallocated space? The Vista Disk Manager will let me expand the Vista partition, but I believe this is only because it is right before the unallocated space.
<a href="http://files.chickenfactory.net/images/partition.jpg" target="_blank">http://files.chickenfactory.net/images/partition.jpg</a>
I have a 140gig hard drive (10,000RPM) that I am partitioning into 3 sections:
The first section is for WinXP (which I made 8gigs);
the next section is for Vista (which I made 30gigs); and
the final section will be for games and such (currently unallocated space).
I also have 2 other 300gig hard drives for programs and music (7,200RPM).
I have everything set up great! The dual-boot works awesomely. The problem is that I am getting nervous about running out of space in my WinXP partition. There's only a gig left... I feel I mistakenly made it too small. Is there anyway I can extend it into the unallocated space? The Vista Disk Manager will let me expand the Vista partition, but I believe this is only because it is right before the unallocated space.
<a href="http://files.chickenfactory.net/images/partition.jpg" target="_blank">http://files.chickenfactory.net/images/partition.jpg</a>
Comments
It'll allow you to move the Vista partition, making room in the partition table to resize the XP partition, which it will also do. It will take a while though.
It's pretty intuitive, you shouldn't have a problem using it, even if you aren't familiar with Linux.
@Caboose:
I've burned the ISO and was able to load up the GParted program on boot. To be honest, I'm kind of nervous to use it. Is this really that reliable? I really don't want to have to re-install everything again. Can I do a backup of the entire Vista partition (including registry, <b>EVERYTHING</b>) so I can format, make new partitions, and reinstate Vista <b>IF</b> something goes wrong with the GParted partition moving?
EDIT: I believe Nero 8 will allow me to make a backup.
@SkulkBait:
Because WinXP is already installed on the first 8gig partition.
Again, thank you. I appreciate the help a lot.
There are games that only run on XP?
On topic: I fully trust GParted. I've done a lot of complex partition operation and it always worked perfectly. However, backups are always a must unless you don't really care about what's installed on the partitions. If you don't want to use it, then maybe you could merge the first 8GB with the Vista partition and reinstall XP on the unallocated space. That way you'll only have 1 OS to reinstall.
On topic: I fully trust GParted. I've done a lot of complex partition operation and it always worked perfectly. However, backups are always a must unless you don't really care about what's installed on the partitions. If you don't want to use it, then maybe you could merge the first 8GB with the Vista partition and reinstall XP on the unallocated space. That way you'll only have 1 OS to reinstall.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Thank you.
<b>EDIT:</b> Woo! It seems that it worked! Thank you for showing me GParted! There was one little problem when I tried to boot. A boot file was missing somehow, but the Vista DVD repaired it and it seems to work just fine! Thanks again!
I want to keep WinXP for a few reasons:
1) Some programs simply aren't compatible with Vista yet.
2) I want to experiment with the performance of games in both operating systems.
3) Now if one OS goes down, I can go into the other one and fix some files easily.
4) Dual-boots are cool! (and I wanted to try it!)
I dunno how much it costs these days but there is a demo...that may or may not be time based rather than usage based. But now you're sorted thats all fairly redundant.
My main reason for posting is to say that Windows XP will use as much space as you give it, or at least thats my experience, I originally had a 2gig Windows partition from when I had Win2K installed, when I upgraded to WinXP which took up about a gig it started to bloat out and filled the 2gig after about a month so I had to constantly delete temp files, unused installer files and other tosh that XP creates. In the end I expanded the partition to 6 gig and it now bloats out to to fill that up as well.
Basically XP is bloatware, just keep an eye on how much disk space it's taking up and delete all the crap it creates for no apparent reason.
Partition Magic, for example. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />
Every symantec product I've used has worked perfectly fine under vista whether it's listed under system requirements or not.
Basically what we are trying to say is there is NO reason to have both XP and Vista besides "Just because I want to".
Because WinXP is already installed on the first 8gig partition.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
So? Keep it there. Theres no need for the OS to be installed on the other partition, just whatever you want to put there.
Meh, I want to keep it more organized.
I've had a few program compatibility issues with Vista so I want to keep XP available. I don't see why this hurts.