Partition for C: too small

Hi, I am having a problem with my attempt to increase the size of the partition of my C: drive. This is a Machine that I am just setting up, so no drama if things go wrong.
I have installed XP - Pro 40 Gig HD "“ 2 partitions C: and F:. C drive I want to keep for OS only and F: I have programs and so on.
When I first created the partition for C: I thought 2.5 Gig would be enough for just the OS but I only have 188MB left of free space and Windows keeps reminding me that I am low on disk space, so I installed Partition Magic 8 to resize C :
C: NTFS Active Primary "“ F: NTFS Primary
PM takes me through the Resize routine all is OK I am trying to give C drive one more Gig 3.5 Gig taking the necessary space from F it gives it all OK asking for a
Re- boot but after re- booting the size is still the same no change.
I have done this now 4 times with no result same thing every time I did use PM to create the 2.5 Gig for C.
Where am I going wrong here.
Regards hawk22

 

Hi hawk,

Can't answer your particular question on why PM doesn't wiork - I used it once and had no problems with it.

I do have an opinion on the size of the OS partition you're trying to create - it's way to small.

FWIW, a thread I started on this:
http://www.windowsbbs.com/showthread.php?t=40176&highlight=ideal

Regards - Charles

 

Hi Hawk,

Went into the PM help, this sounds like your symptom even though it references FAT partitions:

What you might want to try is making F smaller freeing up some un-allocated space - then try re sizing C up. Even though you don't get an error messge, I think C is too small for PM to work with.

Regards - Charles

 

Make my system partition 8 GB. Would think you'd need 5GB at least.

 

Hi, thanks for the reply's, I was just doing the same thing reading in the help files and I read that bit about fat 32 but I am in NTFS.
I just had a try doing it by not using the Wizard.
Resize/Move Partition will not allow me to go bigger:
Minimum Size 2,400.3 MB
Maximum Size 2,502.3 MB
and it will not allow me to go above or below that.
Maybe Charsvar idea of making F smaller first might work I will try it.
But first do I have my partitions correct
C: Active Primary
F: Primary
thanks
hawk22

 

"Charsvar idea of making F smaller first "
Definitely.
FAT32 vs. NTFS unimportant.
"do I have my partitions correct" yes, no problem there.

 

have done that reduced F by 6 Gig after rebooting same thing no change.
must be something else that is not working.

 

No Christer I don't sorry.
hawk22

 

Why not remove f: altogether, and replace it after you resize c: ??

 

Hi Hawk22,

You made 6 Gb of free space, I would say that the free space is after the F: partition. You need to make the free space before the F: and after the C: drive so that you can increase the size of the C: partition. You will need to "move" the F: partition to the end of the disk, then the freespace before it can be filled by C:.

Matt

 

I freely admit that I don't know the PM software as I've never even used it. However I have a thought... which everyone here that knows me knows is a dangerous thing.

With only 188meg left on C: can PM do it's thing? Would seem to me that from what I've been reading it just isn't enough space for it to work with. I am also thinking that no matter what is done to the other partition it's still going to fall back to not enough free space on the drive being worked on ( C: ) for it to do it.

Since it was stated, I believe, that it was a new setup and nothing was critical wouldn't it be easier to just start over and use fdisk or whatever to delete and redo the partitions and reinstall?

Like I said I don't know PM at all. Just a thought on what seems to be happening.

Jay

 

Hi and thank you all, jaylach that is what I was going to do next, like I said I had nothing to loose apart from a couple of hours of work. And your theory might have been right, but I remembered that on my other machine I had a old copy of Acronis Partition Manager so I transferred that and installed it and to my surprise it worked fine I now have a C: Partition of 8.1 Gig.
I have un-installed PM, but just for the heck I might install it again and try to change the partition a bit just to see what happens now.
I still have some other enquiries regarding the video drivers, but I will start a new post for that, so please guys stand by I still need you.
Thanks and regards
Hawk22

 

To gain some space on the c: drive you could temporarily reduce the size of your pagefile. How small you can make it depends on the amount of ram you have. How much do you have? Also, are there d and e drives? If so, are they cdrom drives or partitions on the hard drive?

 

Did you hit the "Apply Changes" button in Partition Magic which is, I believe, in the bottom right hand corner? Did the computer reboot itself and then run in DOS??

I think that is the part you forgot.

Dale

 

Hi, and thanks again to you all, and no I did not forget the" Apply Changes" I know it won't work without, I have used PM on my other Machine several times and it always worked ok.
I have tried PM again after changing C: to 8.3 Gig using Acronis Partition Manager to reduce it to just 8 Gig but again it failed. Yet I had no problems with Acronis. I un-installed PM then re-installed it again before my last try.
Even with only 188 MB free on C the PC did not crash, freeze up or misbehave at all, it only warned me of dangerously low free space.
I was amazed at the amount of space SP2 takes up, as much as a complete install of MS Office.
regards
hawk22