Question about unpartitioned space during XP Home install

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Hi all,

I'm performing a clean install of XP Home and in the setup screen after deleting the existing partitions I have two lots of unpartitioned space, see below:



Can anyone tell me how to merge those two into one because the 980MB one isn't a lot of use for anything on it's own, but it is a fair amount just to waste. Any thoughts?

 

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you need to select the delete selected partition, this will remove the partition and merge the two together into a single 'unpartitioned' area. you will then need to partition the area using the create partition option and using the full value (it will select this by default).

Edit: you may need to select delete for both sections. a bit strange that they are listing as unpartitioned space, and they both appear to be listed as on the same drive but that should sort it id say. if not, try another approach. the joys of a clean install is that you can try it and not worry about losing data.

 

Since that second lot of unpartitioned space is so small, I'd imagine its the remnants of a restore partition or utility partition sometimes put on boxes by system builders.

Weird that it's displayed as 'unpartitioned space' though - I guess its been wiped already

 

It's not a partition though, it's unpartitioned space. I did try this on the off chance it would work, but it doesn't unfortunately. Trying to delete anything does nothing at all. Any more suggestions?

 

If the partitioning tool with XP won't shift it, try this from Maxtor.

Si

 

Actually I have noticed this small extra amaount of unpartitioned space many times and have just ignored it but I would also like to know what it is. I am refering to new operating system installs (XP) on a brand new HDD.

Pete

 

First - *don't* use FDISK from the Win98 days on modern drives - it can't cope correctly with today's large drives.

Second, XP and similar has rather odd rules about disk partitioning, particularly about partition sizes and boundaries. This is why so often there is an unuseable space at the end of a drive.

Harry.

 

Ah, this is the answer we are looking for then. So, you would do as I do and just ignore it Harry?

 

Good shout on that Harry!

I've also seen unpartioned space like this when installing, just never that kind of size - usually it's only in the 10's of megs (if even that), can't remember seeing almost a gig's worth left over!

 

I agree that it is a bit large. My suggestion here would be to wipe the first sector completely. I suspect that when the XP installer comes to recreate the table it will have rather less unused space.

Harry.

 

but i thought these tools were for the same brand hdd, e.g. Maxtor tools for Maxtor drives
WD tools for WD drives
etc
etc

 

Or just download Killdisk from Active@ or a similar disk wiping tool.

 

Mod action - moved thread to hardware and upgrading.

Pete

 

Thanks for all the replies guys.

It's a Seagate drive so I tried using Disk Wizard, but even after partitioning the drive using that the XP setup still showed that same amount of extra space.

I also did try using FDISK but as mentioned I soon remembered that it can't cope with large hard drives and was registering this one as 10GB.

So, in the end I just installed XP forgetting about the 1 Gig I was losing. I guess the bottom line is when there's only 1 or two gig left on your drive it's time to get another one anyway. I was just a bit annoyed that I couldn't figure out why as usually XP only sets aside 8MB. Ah well.