cluedo
March 8th, 2006, 09:21 AM
Hello everyone
I have a harddrive with three partitions and in XP they are assigned as G:, J: and M:
G: and J: are on a EXTENDED PARTITON.
We leave M: alone in this case
XP is installed on J:
G: is a legacy partition which has followed generations of drives at my place by cloning software similar to Ghost. But now it has become a pain. It is too small for anything useful.
What I'd like is to delete this partiton and let J: take te freed space.
I know this is possible (in theory) with programs such as PQMagic, Acronis DD Suite, and some shareware/freeware programs.
I've had success earlier with shrinking G: and letting J: take this space.
BUT when repeating this two years later everything got messed up, one g: was fine but j: was wrecked, i had fortunately a backup but i did not manage to restore xp to its normal state again.
I have enough free space to take a backup of G: and J: The problem however is that since XP is installed on J: the following things can happen, I'm not sure however:
1. boot.ini contains reference to partiton and disk for the windows install. It would be reasonable to assume that this mapping will be ruined when deleting G: and it is hard to modify boot.ini without getting into XP.
2. AND even worse, the letters will change. J: might become G: and then the whole system will wreck itself because the registry points to absolute path (J:\Windows) countless times.
3. If G: is deleted but XP boots nicely into windows there's still a risk of the letter-assignments getting ruined when resizing the J: partiton.
A possible solution i've considered is using something like purchasing Acronis TrueImage and make an image of the xp partiton. delete both G: and J: make a new partiton and restore the image back on this new partiton. Although this is the most safe way considering the risks involved in resizing i do not know what wil happen with drive letter assignments and what letter windows will assign to its system partiton.
I have attached a structure of the drive. Kindly disregard the drive-letter labels.
Could anyone provide assistance to the capabilities of Acronis programs in this regard.
I have a harddrive with three partitions and in XP they are assigned as G:, J: and M:
G: and J: are on a EXTENDED PARTITON.
We leave M: alone in this case
XP is installed on J:
G: is a legacy partition which has followed generations of drives at my place by cloning software similar to Ghost. But now it has become a pain. It is too small for anything useful.
What I'd like is to delete this partiton and let J: take te freed space.
I know this is possible (in theory) with programs such as PQMagic, Acronis DD Suite, and some shareware/freeware programs.
I've had success earlier with shrinking G: and letting J: take this space.
BUT when repeating this two years later everything got messed up, one g: was fine but j: was wrecked, i had fortunately a backup but i did not manage to restore xp to its normal state again.
I have enough free space to take a backup of G: and J: The problem however is that since XP is installed on J: the following things can happen, I'm not sure however:
1. boot.ini contains reference to partiton and disk for the windows install. It would be reasonable to assume that this mapping will be ruined when deleting G: and it is hard to modify boot.ini without getting into XP.
2. AND even worse, the letters will change. J: might become G: and then the whole system will wreck itself because the registry points to absolute path (J:\Windows) countless times.
3. If G: is deleted but XP boots nicely into windows there's still a risk of the letter-assignments getting ruined when resizing the J: partiton.
A possible solution i've considered is using something like purchasing Acronis TrueImage and make an image of the xp partiton. delete both G: and J: make a new partiton and restore the image back on this new partiton. Although this is the most safe way considering the risks involved in resizing i do not know what wil happen with drive letter assignments and what letter windows will assign to its system partiton.
I have attached a structure of the drive. Kindly disregard the drive-letter labels.
Could anyone provide assistance to the capabilities of Acronis programs in this regard.