Vista Tutorial - Disk Management - Shrink Partition

**Brink** · **Type of Partition** **Description**

How to Shrink and Create a Partition with Disk Management in Vista

Information

It is possible in Vista to repartition your hard disk by using the Shrink feature in Disk Management. You can shrink an existing partition (volume) to create unallocated disk space, from which you can Create a new partition (volume). For more information, see: Windows Help and How-to: Partition and Understanding Disk Partitioning

Type of Partition

Description

Primary Partition

A type of partition created on a hard drive that can host an operating system and functions as though it were a physically separate hard drive. Also called a volume. Only up to four primary partitions, or 3 primary partitions and 1 extended partition can be created on a single hard drive. Primary partitions can be used to install and start an operating system. If you want to create more than three partitions, the fourth partition is created as an extended partition. See: Windows Help and How-to: What are system partitions and boot partitions? and The Storage Team at Microsoft - File Cabinet Blog : Understanding the error message "There is not enough space available on the disk(s) to complete this operation" when you create a volume

Extended Partition

A type of partition on a hard drive that should be used if you want to create more than four Primary partition. Extended partitions can contain multiple logical drives that can be formatted and have drive letters assigned to them. An extended partition is a container that can hold one or more logical drive. Logical drives function like primary partitions except that they cannot be used to start an operating system. This optioin has been removed in Disk Management for Vista. For how, see: The Storage Team at Microsoft - File Cabinet Blog :How to create an extended partition in Windows Vista (Click Yes for Security Information prompt)

WARNING

You will not lose any data on the partition (volume) that you are shrinking. You must be logged on as an administrator to perform these steps.

Tip

The default location for Disk Management is C:\Windows\System32\diskmgmt.msc.

RELATED LINKS:

EXAMPLE: Before and After with a New Partition Volume

STEP ONE:
To Shrink a Partition

1. Open the Control Panel. (Classic View)
A) Click on the Administrative Tools icon.

B) Click on Computer Management.

2. Click on Continue in the UAC prompt.

3. In the left pane, click on Disk Management under Storage. (See screenshot below step 4)

4. Right click on the volume (EX: C:\ ) your want to shrink and click on Shrink Volume.

5. You will now see this for a moment. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: It is verifying that there is enough free space on the disk to create a new partition.

6. Enter the amount of space in MB (1024 MB = 1 GB) to shrink by, from the available free space on this volume, for the new partition and click Shrink. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: The value in the Total Size Before Shrink box indicates the current size of the partition and the value in the Size of Available Shrink Space indicates the maximum size that you can allocate to the new second partition.

WARNING

The size of the available space can be restricted by the amount of space currently allocated to on the hard drive for the virtual memory page file, System Restore max size, and hibernation files. The location of the files on the hard drive plays a big part here because these files are marked as unmovable, and Disk Management is unable to relocate them. As such, if these unmovable files are located in the middle of the total amount of free space on the disk, then only the amount of free space on the other side (to the right) of these files will actually be available for the new partition. This will result in you showing that you have x amount of free space, but not being able to use it for your partition. The only way around this is to use a 3rd party hard drive partition management program, or setup the partition when installing Vista.
If you wish to force the partition to shrink, then see: the How-To Geek: Working Around Windows Vista's "Shrink Volume" Inadequacy Problems

7. After a few minutes, you will see the new unallocated (unformated) partition. (See screenshot below)

STEP TWO:
To Create a Partition

8. Right click on the new Unallocated partition and click on New Simple Volume. (See screenshot below)

9. The New Simple Volume Wizard will now appear. Just click on Next. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: This wizard will make the new unallocated partition usable when finished.

10. Enter the volume size you want for the new partition and click Next. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: Unless you are going to shrink this new partition, you should use the Maximum disk space in MB.

11. Dot Assign the following drive letter. (See screenshot below)
A) Select a drive letter for the new partition.

B) Click on Next.

12. Dot Format this volume using the following settings. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: This may take a while to format the new partition volume.
A) Enter a name for the new partition under Volume label.

B) To save time, check Perform a quick format.

C) Click on Next.

13. Click on Finish when the Succesfully Completed window pops up. (See screenshot below)

14. You will now see the Disk Management console with the new partition volume ready to be used. (See screenshot below)

15. Close Computer Management.

16. Click on Computer in the Start Menu and see your new partition volume. (See screenshot below)

That's it,
Shawn

paras · 12-14-2007

hi, i did this step by step but when i tried formatting my new partition it gives error and says low disk space to complete the task.
i have 11 GB free in my C: .

**Brink** · 12-14-2007

Hi Paras,

Welcome to the forum.

See the Warning under step 6 above. This may be causing this problem for you to. 11 GB is not much for a partition, but you may only be able to do it while reinstalling Vista or by a 3rd party partition management program. (EX: Partition Magic)

Sorry,
Shawn

paras · 12-15-2007

if i reinstall vista, i will be losing all my data in c: which i dont want , is there any way out that i only format that unallocated space using my vista CD

	Quote:	brink
	Hi Paras, Welcome to the forum. See the Warning under step 6 above. This may be causing this problem for you to. 11 GB is not much for a partition, but you may only be able to do it while reinstalling Vista or by a 3rd party partition management program. (EX: Partition Magic) Sorry, Shawn

**Brink** · 12-15-2007

Sorry Paras,

Not without a 3rd party partition management program.

Shawn

**Bare Foot Kid** · 02-22-2008

Hey Brink, I just wanted to say that with the help of this well written and easy to follow Tutorial, I now have a new 200GB Volume M:. I have started adding music to it 10GB so far. I also want to say thank you for all the Tutorials. It is very evident that you did a very good job on them !!! You have made my life much easier.

Thanks, Bare Foot KId

**Brink** · 02-22-2008

Your welcome Bare Foot Kid. If you ever find a problem with any of them or they do not appear clear enough, please drop me a PM so that I can update them.

Shawn

Premkumar Subramanian · 03-19-2008

I have been trying to create a partition on my laptop with the windows feature. When I have tried to shrink the C drive, it gives the following error "An unexpected error has occured. Check the Syetm Event log for more information.Close the disk management console, then restart Disk Management or restart the computer". Even after restarting, the error still appears.I have tried this multiple times.

I have checked with the system event log. It does not have any error. The information which I cld see in the event log is,
"The Virtual Disk service entered the stopped state."

The steps I executed were exactly the same as mentioned in this article. I was successful till step 6. The 'Shrink C:' window was shown. When I clicked on 'Shrink', I received the error which I mentioned earlier.

I tried shrinking the volume after the defragmentation. However the error continues to be there.

Any ideas on how this can be resolved?

**Brink** · 03-19-2008

Hi Premkumar Subramanian,

The error may have been cause by unmovable files that Disk Management cannot help with. For example, the Virtual Memory Page file, Shadow Copies, etc...

You will most likely have to use a 3rd party Disk Partition Management program to create your partition in this case. You can use Acronis Disk Director Suite that includes the Partition Expert for a 15 day trial. It should allow you to create the partition.

Acronis Partition Manager - disk partitioning for Windows (Vista/XP/2000): resize disk partition, copy, move, split and merge partitions

Shawn

Premkumar Subramanian · 03-25-2008

Thanks Brink

.

I just wonder how third party softwares can resolve such issues when the issue is not resolvable by the feature provided by Windows.

Would it help if we report this issue with MS Support ?

Thanks & Regards,
Premkumar Subramanian

	Quote:	Brink
	Hi Premkumar Subramanian, The error may have been cause by unmovable files that Disk Management cannot help with. For example, the Virtual Memory Page file, Shadow Copies, etc... You will most likely have to use a 3rd party Disk Partition Management program to create your partition in this case. You can use Acronis Disk Director Suite that includes the Partition Expert for a 15 day trial. It should allow you to create the partition. Acronis Partition Manager - disk partitioning for Windows (Vista/XP/2000): resize disk partition, copy, move, split and merge partitions Shawn