Problem with partitioning

[3bbb7]

Windows 8 64bit

About a week ago I set up a 50GB partition for Steam games. I underestimated how many games I would be installing (and thought I could add more space down the road if needed) and decided to add 100GB.

I shrunk my C drive 100GB and now I have C:, a 50GB Steam partition, and 100GB of unallocated space.

Problem is I can't extend the Steam partition to the unallocated space, but I can with C?
The Extend Volume option is grayed out when I right click, but it works on C.
How can I do this?

 

[trumpet-205]

You can't. Partition are arranged in order. You can't extend partition on the other direction. When you extend partition, you change the endpoint, not the beginning.

Delete your Steam partition and create a new one. This is much faster than using partition software where it moves data bit by bit to the left.

Also shrinking partition is a bad idea if you didn't defrag the drive beforehand.

 

[3bbb7]

You can't. Partition are arranged in order. You can't extend partition on the other direction. When you extend partition, you change the endpoint, not the beginning.

Delete your Steam partition and create a new one. This is much faster than using partition software where it moves data bit by bit to the left.

Also shrinking partition is a bad idea if you didn't defrag the drive beforehand.

ah shoot. I've already downloaded over 30gb.
How long exactly would it take 100gb to move to the left?

 

[FAST6191]

You could probably do it with a proper partitioning tool and not the Windows thing. Gparted is still my main partitioning tool for anything remotely complex, it is on basically every linux livecd that is not completely specialised. That said if you have made it to the point in life where you have learned what a partition is you have also made it to the point in life where you probably want some rescue CDs of various forms. Hiren's boot CD and UBCD aka ultimate boot CD, I hear there are spinoffs of both as well but I have not got around to testing them.

Forest for the trees though -- Steam 2 "F:\"?

 

[3bbb7]

You could probably do it with a proper partitioning tool and not the Windows thing. Gparted is still my main partitioning tool for anything remotely complex, it is on basically every linux livecd that is not completely specialised. That said if you have made it to the point in life where you have learned what a partition is you have also made it to the point in life where you probably want some rescue CDs of various forms. Hiren's boot CD and UBCD aka ultimate boot CD, I hear there are spinoffs of both as well but I have not got around to testing them.

Forest for the trees though -- Steam 2 "F:\"?

What do you mean by "Forest for the trees though -- Steam 2 "F:\"?"?

also I have a few linux live boots on a USB but I'm afraid to partition on it as I often have issues with live boots freezing my system and I have to force shut off.
I dont really want to dual boot just to partition

 

[trumpet-205]

ah shoot. I've already downloaded over 30gb.
How long exactly would it take 100gb to move to the left?

You could copy everything on the Steam partition to C drive or a USB drive. Delete the partition and create a new one. Then copy everything back.

The proper partition tool is going to do what I said before, shift every data bit by bit (which is time consuming).

 

[3bbb7]

You could copy everything on the Steam partition to C drive or a USB drive. Delete the partition and create a new one. Then copy everything back.

The proper partition tool is going to do what I said before, shift every data bit by bit (which is time consuming).

maybe i'll try running a shift overnight or something. What program do you recommend to use when partitioning?

 

[VampireLordAlucard]

Rather than messing with partition software trying to extend backwards, I'd just..

1. Make a new partition over unallocated space.
2. Copy everything from steam (E to new partition manually.
3. Delete steam (E partition.
4. Extend new partition.

This way, you don't have to 'copy everything back' at the end, and you get same effect as using partition tool.

 

[FAST6191]

You should not have to dual boot as it were. Unless you just mean liveCDs tend to freeze your system (might want to look into that by the way).

On the other part I should have been more clear.

Why not make a third drive (it will probably be the F: drive) and call it steam 2 or something?

 

[3bbb7]

Rather than messing with partition software trying to extend backwards, I'd just..

1. Make a new partition over unallocated space.
2. Copy everything from steam (E to new partition manually.
3. Delete steam (E partition.
4. Extend new partition.

This way, you don't have to 'copy everything back' at the end, and you get same effect as using partition tool.

that seems like a good idea. I'm not sure how steam handles copying over though. I tried copying games from C: to E: and it wouldnt detect until I uninstalled the game and manually installed it to E:

You should not have to dual boot as it were. Unless you just mean liveCDs tend to freeze your system (might want to look into that by the way).

On the other part I should have been more clear.


Why not make a third drive (it will probably be the F: drive) and call it steam 2 or something?

I use some USB sticks to liveboot some linux distros like ubuntu or mint and they always freeze up on my laptop after ~10 mins of use. The fan goes crazy too.
At one point I had installed Linux Mint and had no issues but I went back to Windows after having some WLAN issues.
I have no issues using the same USB to liveboot on other systems

 

[VampireLordAlucard]

Might be looking for the game on the other drive letter (E rather than C) still. I don't use Steam tho, so I don't know. If that's the problem, you can change the new drive back to E afterwards. Good test: change the drive letter for E and see if it breaks everything.

 

[Foxi4]

If you want to expand the partition, I strongly suggest EASUS Partition Master - even the free version has that feature, it's capable of expanding the partition from the level of your main OS without having to use a LiveCD and it performs the task admirably. Copying stuff around is not necessary, just be sure to defragment the drive after you're done to maintain performance. Speaking of defragmenting, grab myDefrag or Auslogics Disk Defrag - they're miles better than the Windows tool.

http://www.easeus.com/partition-manager/epm-free.html
http://www.mydefrag.com/Manual-DownloadAndInstall.html
http://www.auslogics.com/en/software/disk-defrag/download/

Rather than messing with partition software trying to extend backwards, I'd just..

1. Make a new partition over unallocated space.
2. Copy everything from steam (E: ) to new partition manually.
3. Delete steam (E: ) partition.
4. Extend new partition.

This way, you don't have to 'copy everything back' at the end, and you get same effect as using partition tool.

Your steps don't really help - he'll end up with his stuff copied over from the 50GB partition to the 100GB one and he'll have 50GB of unallocated space - he'll still have to expand the partition with software either way, so it's same difference (except you waste time and strain the drive while copying).

 

[VampireLordAlucard]

Foxi4 - copying the files will auto defrag everything without having to work around data, and its probably safer than using software to backwards extend. But you're saying the program can backwards extend while leaving the data in place (physically located in the last 50 GB of the HDD)?

 

[Foxi4]

Foxi4 - copying the files will auto defrag everything without having to work around data, and its probably safer than using software to backwards extend. But you're saying the program can backwards extend while leaving the data in place (physically located in the last 50 GB of the HDD)?

Here's how it works in a physical sense:

Excuse the big and ugly picture, but bare with me. The program will squeeze the data into the first partition if necessary, shrink it and unallocate the remainder of the physical space on the disk, then it will move the beginning of the other partition to a new point, altogether it's three operations. He doesn't even have to defragment the drive, it's not a necessary step, the reason why I recommend it is because by doing so, the data will be moved closer to the spindle which improves read speeds, however marginally so, and you want that (Also excuse the Rec... - I misread, I thought he has a recovery partition when in fact it's just system reserved space which gets shuffled around anyways, so disregard that. ). Aaaanyways, this operation in no way causes file fragmentation - the files are where they were, what changes are the boundries of partitions.

 

[VampireLordAlucard]

I thought it had to move the data to the left somewhere in that process, but it can just leave the data and redo the partition part? That's pretty cool. The whole extension would take a short amount of time then I guess?

 

[Foxi4]

I thought it had to move the data to the left somewhere in that process, but it can just leave the data and redo the partition part? That's pretty cool. The whole extension would take a short amount of time then I guess?

Depending on what's in the physical area that's about to be unallocated, it can be anything from "instantanous" to "a couple of minutes". In the event of encountering data that's used by the system (there's a fair chance that it will happen on a System drive) and thus unmovable from the level of the OS, the program has the option to schedule a reboot and perform the operation at boot time which is really neat.

 

[3bbb7]

You could probably do it with a proper partitioning tool and not the Windows thing. Gparted is still my main partitioning tool for anything remotely complex, it is on basically every linux livecd that is not completely specialised. That said if you have made it to the point in life where you have learned what a partition is you have also made it to the point in life where you probably want some rescue CDs of various forms. Hiren's boot CD and UBCD aka ultimate boot CD, I hear there are spinoffs of both as well but I have not got around to testing them.

Forest for the trees though -- Steam 2 "F:\"?

Would it be better using the gparted live boot over any Windows software?
I'm thinking I might actually just dual boot with mint because I am getting tired of Windows anyway. I'll just extend the steam partition to the unallocated space, make a 50gb partition for mint, and reinstall Windows or keep it how I have now