Basic Disk to Dynamic Disk

[illicit]

Hi all!

I have just recently added 2 new 500GB HDD's and set them up in a raid 0 configuration. I had created a system image of my old hard drive and restored the image onto the new ones. I had 2 partitions on my old HDD one for system and the other for all media etc. I have now deleted the partition on my old drive that contained the system stuff and want to extend my media partition with the remaining space, but when I try to do this it seems to want to convert the disk from basic to dynamic and I don't want that. Is there any way to extend the partition using the, now unused, space without it converting to dynamic? By the way I'm using windows 7 professional 64-bit.

Regards.

[AruisDante]

From the horse's mouth

If what you're trying to do is combine multiple HDD's into one big volume, it can't be done (from within windows at least) without converting to dynamic disk.

[PommieB]

The problems enlarging the partition with the OS on it, windows doesn't like that with non dynamic disk drives, third- party software will do it easily.

[AruisDante]

Originally Posted by PommieB

The problems enlarging the partition with the OS on it, windows doesn't like that with non dynamic disk drives, third- party software will do it easily.

That's not really true at all. I've done it many times. Again, if he's trying to span two hard drives without having pre-configured it as RAID, it will require you to switch it to dynamic disk. Says so right in that KB article I posted.

[PommieB]

Didn't read it and you could be right, I don't use windows to do that type of thing, I use Acronis disk director, so I haven't really done that with win7, I only know I had problems with Vista all the time.

[AruisDante]

Yeah, Win 7's disk partition management tool is greatly improved.

[PommieB]

I always thought only Ultimate supported Dynamic disks or the enterprise editions, has that changed with win7, or is that still the case.

[species8472]

You can convert a basic disk to a dynamic disk as long as that disk is not your OS volume. IIRC you cannot run windows from a dynamic volume but you can convert a basic volume that doesn't contain the os to dynamic.

[AruisDante]

Originally Posted by species8472

You can convert a basic disk to a dynamic disk as long as that disk is not your OS volume. IIRC you cannot run windows from a dynamic volume but you can convert a basic volume that doesn't contain the os to dynamic.

Correct. Basically, a Dynamic volume doesn't actually exist until the OS boots. Meaning that there wouldn't be a volume from the OS to boot off of if it were to be installed on it.

[PommieB]

Never had much to do with Dynamic disk partitions since about 2002, I knew there was some restriction to do with the OS, just couldn't put my finger on it, never liked them under win NT and win 2000 more trouble than what they were worth, sadly didn't have much choice at the time, it's where I made my main income, there and with Unix.

[illicit]

Originally Posted by AruisDante

From the horse's mouth

If what you're trying to do is combine multiple HDD's into one big volume, it can't be done (from within windows at least) without converting to dynamic disk.

I'm not trying to combine multiple HDD's, this is a seperate hard drive all together. It has nothing on it except for media files and other stuff.

I read that having a dynamic disk wasn't the best thing, something to do with being unreliable or something which is why I'm asking about this.

All I'm basically wanting to do is have my 1 hard drive as 1 basic partition, not a dynamic one; or maybe it doesn't matter? I'm not sure, can anyone shed some light on if there are any disadvantages to having a dynamic disk. I don't plan to ever boot from this hard drive.

[AruisDante]

Is it currently split into two partitions? Or is it, in the partition manager, registering as one partition and then "un allocated space"?

[illicit]

Originally Posted by AruisDante

Is it currently split into two partitions? Or is it, in the partition manager, registering as one partition and then "un allocated space"?

Yeah,unallocated space and a working partition. It used to be my primary hard drive and had an OS on it, but I've recently changed and so I deleted the partition that had the OS on it. When I got to extend the current partition it says it must change it to dynamic.

[PommieB]

Could be there's a hidden boot file on there, does it allow you to delete the partition on the drive first, if not use third party software to clean up the drive, then create a basic partition the full size of the drive.

[illicit]

Originally Posted by PommieB

Could be there's a hidden boot file on there, does it allow you to delete the partition on the drive first, if not use third party software to clean up the drive, then create a basic partition the full size of the drive.

Yeah it did allow me to delete that partition, which is what I did, and then when I attempted to extend that partition that had data on it, it wanted to convert to dynamic.
So do you think I should just back up the data that's on the drive now, delete the partition and create a simple volume from there? What happens if it then tells me that it must be a dynamic disk also? Is there actually any downside to having a dynamic disk rather than a basic, other than not being able to boot from it?

[PommieB]

This Problem turns up now and again, you need to start fresh and set it up correctly, have you tried re-initializing the drive, this doesn't harm the data in anyway but forces the operating system to re-check the partition you are trying to extend and reset it.

You need to go into disk management and right click on the partitions/drives number. It sounds like it's the OS partition you are trying to extend, I do all my extending and shrinking with third party software, Microsoft as always been hit or miss at it.

I'm not up to date with the way windows does this type of thing, I would suggest you do a bit of research on the do's and don'ts if you persist with windows way of doing things.

As I said before Delete all partitions and start fresh you can do that easily from within windows, if not then you may need to use third party software to clean the drive, what type of bios are you using, just curious?