Partition Expert on Server 2003 - Please respond

[bwoodruff]

Hey,

I have the newest version of Partition Expert running on my server 2003 box.
I have one 120GB hard drive.
These are the partitions I had:
C: 30GB - Websites
D: 30GB - File server
E: 50GB - OS/Swap

I told Partition Expert (in Wizard mode) to turn them into this:
C: 20GB
D: 60GB
E: 30GB

When I clicked commit changes, it rebooted, and now I just have a black screen. I figured it was still working, and it just didn't display anything while it was resizing. It's been 14 hours. Still just a black screen. Am I just being impatient, or should I really be concerned?

Also, I'm getting a Western Digital Raptor 37GB SATA 10,000RPM drive in the near future. I want to put 2 partitions (one for the OS, and one for the swap file) on it. So I would have to move the E: partition from above to the new drive. What is the best way to do this, then delete the old partition?



My system specs (currently):

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition
Microsoft Exchange 2003 Enterprise Edition
Western Digital 120GB 7200RPM IDE HDD
1 x 512 DDR Pc2700 RAM
1 x 256 DDR Pc2700 RAM
AMD Athlon XP 2800 @ 2.1GHz
Asus motherboard with nVidia chipset (I don't remember the exact model)
ATI Radeon 7000 video card
2 x D-link 10/100 NICs (Realtek chipsets?)
1 x 52x48x52 CD burner
and a 400Watt power supply


This machine is my primary domain controller and file server, so I can't really wait much longer than tonight.

Thank you,
Ben Woodruff, Technician
Hurricane Technologies
53 Genesee St.
Avon, NY 14414

[Acronis Support]

Hello Ben,

Thank you for using Acronis software (http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/).

We are really sorry for the inconveniences.

Could you please let me know what was there after rebooting and before the black screen you see now? Acronis Partition Expert should resize your partitions right before the Windows login message (just like Check disk utility does when it is scheduled to carry our the checking of the system partition). There shouldn't be any black screen.

Please let me know if there is any disk activity or if it just sits there on the black screen.

Thank you.

[bwoodruff]

{QUOTE-> Hello Ben,

Thank you for using Acronis software (http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/).

We are really sorry for the inconveniences.

Could you please let me know what was there after rebooting and before the black screen you see now? Acronis Partition Expert should resize your partitions right before the Windows login message (just like Check disk utility does when it is scheduled to carry our the checking of the system partition). There shouldn't be any black screen.

Please let me know if there is any disk activity or if it just sits there on the black screen.

Thank you. <-QUOTE}

Just the POST. =(

POST, then black screen.
I have my HDD LED messed up so it's always on, so I don't know if there is disk activity or not.

Should I do a hard reboot?

[Acronis Support]

Do you mean that there occured only power-on self test and nothing else?

If this is the case please reboot your computer. The system should start to boot up in the normal way and then Acronis Partition Expert should resize your partitions just before the Windows login screen.

Thank you.

[bwoodruff]

Tried re-booting. Same thing. It goes through the POST, then stops.

[Acronis Support]

Dear Ben,

Please do the following:

- Download Acronis Report utility from http://www.acronis.com/files/support/AcronisReport.exe;
- Run Acronis Report utility and select the "Create bootable floppy" option;
- Insert a blank floppy disk in the floppy drive and proceed with creating the bootable diskette;
- Boot the computer under consideration from this diskette and wait for report creation process to complete;
- Send the report.txt file from the floppy disk to support@acronis.com and let me know the subject of your message.

This would provide us with detailed information on the hard disk partition structure.

Thank you.

[bwoodruff]

unfortunatly neither machines have floppy drives.

Good news though: I booted from the Windows CD, and it looks like it did make all the partition changes I wanted! And it didn't distroy any data! But I can't boot Windows. So I think I'll just have to reinstall S2k3, but I think that'll be OK. I should do it once in a while anyway. I have backups of most of my important data.

Thank you!

[Acronis Support]

Dear Ben,

Could you please issue a disk checking procedure on all your partitions in order to make sure that everything is OK?

Thank you.

[Acronis Support]

Please also try to boot your computer into Windows Recovery Console and issue the following command:
fixmbr

This should help you to boot into Windows.

Thank you.

[bwoodruff]

{QUOTE-> Please also try to boot your computer into Windows Recovery Console and issue the following command:
fixmbr

This should help you to boot into Windows.

Thank you. <-QUOTE}

Nah, I thought of that. No go.
But I got Windows reinstalled and working again. All I have left to do is reinstall Exchange and put the backup of that back on.

{QUOTE-> Dear Ben,

Could you please issue a disk checking procedure on all your partitions in order to make sure that everything is OK?

Thank you. <-QUOTE}


Did that. Everything's ok. =)


Thanks again. Love your software... when it works. ;)