▷ How to convert a hard disk in our computer into a dynamic disk

Dynamic hard drives are an interesting option to give a new way of managing files to our hard drives. We can even extend a partition on several disks simultaneously. Although we will also have some other disadvantages or limitations when we have configured a hard disk as dynamic. We will see all this immediately in the following sections, and it will be your decision to exploit this possibility or leave them as basic.

What is a dynamic hard drive

To convert a basic hard disk into a dynamic one, we will not need any special hard disk model, since this configuration only affects the logical structure of the disk and not the physical one. That is, a dynamic hard drive and a basic one, from the physical point of view, will be exactly the same, whether they are SSD or HDD.

To create a dynamic hard drive, the first thing to keep in mind is that we will need to have a user with administrator permissions or that he belongs to the Backup Operators group.

Dynamic hard drives have been implemented in Windows since the 2000 version of the operating system, so it is far from a recent invention.

Advantages of creating a dynamic hard drive

The main advantage of a dynamic hard drive compared to a basic one, is that the partitions will be, so to speak, floating, this means that if we have two hard drives connected to our equipment, we will be able to extend a partition beyond a single hard drive, so that in the eyes of the file explorer two discs are seen as one.

Another advantage of dynamic hard drives is that up to 128 partitions can be created on them, compared to the only 4 partitions that a basic hard drive supports. This as we can see, is a substantial advantage in the case of disks with large storage capacities in which we want to have several partitions to have our files perfectly located.

Another advantage that a dynamic hard disk gives us is the ability to create mirror drives, which will allow us to obtain an exactly equal copy of the information on a hard disk. Thanks to this, we will have hard drives with better fault tolerance against possible physical errors that may occur.

Disadvantages of a dynamic hard drive

For certain operating systems such as Windows 2000, Windows XP or Windows server 2003, we should not convert a basic hard drive to dynamic if two of these operating systems coexist on it, since we could lose the option to start one of the systems.

Nor is a dynamic hard drive compatible with a laptop or USB storage drives that use a USB or FireWire interface. This can be verified immediately by going to the disk administrator and checked if the option to convert to dynamic hard disk is activated in the menu. Then we will see this.

How to make a basic disk dynamic

Given the main notions of a dynamic hard disk, we are going to carry out this procedure on our computer. We are going to do the procedure using the graphical method in order to make it more visual and intuitive, but we could also do it with Diskpart in command mode.

First, we will have to go to the start button and right click on it. We will see a menu with a gray background in which we will have to choose the " disk management " option.

In our case, the scenario we have is as follows: two 50 and 100 GB hard drives destined for documents and a hard drive with our operating system installed, in addition to the corresponding recovery partitions.

We will select the hard disk that we want to convert into its header and we will only have to click on the option " Convert to dynamic disk ". At this moment a window will open to choose the disks that we want to be converted into dynamic hard disks.

When we convert a hard drive from basic to dynamic, we will NOT lose data in the process.

When we click to confirm the changes, a window will appear that warns us that, if we continue with the conversion, only the operating system that is on the first active partition can be started. This is especially important if we have multiple operating systems installed on different volumes. It is not worrying either because at Windows startup, the system will detect if there is another Windows operating system, and it will give us the possibility to start it.

We advise that the hard disk where the system is installed is not converted to a dynamic hard disk, unless we want to make a mirror.

The discs will now turn green, indicating that they are dynamic. But we have not yet joined the two in a single partition, let's see how to do this.

Join hard drive to a dynamic one

To do this, we will need that the hard disk that we want to join to another dynamic one is in the “Not assigned” state, which will be represented in black.

So, the first thing we will have to do is right click on the volume that we want to unite and choose the option " Delete volume... ". This way it will remain as not assigned.

Note that this procedure removed all the data that would have been stored on the drive.

Now we are going to go to the dynamic hard disk that we already have created and we are going to press on the green area with the right button to choose " Extend volume... ".

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A wizard will appear in which the available space of the other hard disk will automatically appear in the unallocated format. Click on the disk in the “ available ” box and click on “ add ”. Then click on " next " to finish the wizard.

Now we can see how the state of the hard drives is represented as purple and have the same name on the label. If we also go to the file explorer, we can see how now, instead of seeing these two hard drives independently, we see it as one, with a total space of 150 GB resulting from the union of both.

Create a partition on dynamic hard disk

Whether two volumes are joined or not, partitioning will be exactly the same. To create a new partition we will only have to right click on the volume and choose “ reduce volume ”.

A wizard will appear in which we will have to choose the space that we are going to reduce in MB. After this, we will only have to click on “ reduce ”. Now a space will have been created as " not assigned ".

But do not create a new partition here yet, we are going to leave it to create a reflection of our partition that has the operating system and so you see how it is done and what implications this has.

Create Windows partition mirror

Reflected is a partition in which all the existing data of the partition that we have reflected will be stored. The only requirement that we must meet is that there is an unallocated space (black) and that it is at least the same capacity as the partition that we want to reflect.

What we will have to do is right click on the volume or partition that we want to reflect, in our case the system one and choose the option " Add reflection... ".

A window will appear where we will be shown the volumes that we can choose to create the reflection. We will only have to click on " Add reflection ". One very important thing that we will have to take into account is that, when adding the mirror, the system hard drive will also become dynamic.

Automatically create a partition of identical storage space in red indicating that it is a reflection.

The downside of creating a mirror on a dynamic hard drive is that if we want to convert the system hard drive back to basic, with the Windows Disk Manager we will lose all the information in the process.

Another interesting detail is that this mirror partition will not appear in the file explorer, but rather as a backup. Also, when we start the system again, a boot menu will appear where, of course, we will have to choose the real operating system, not the reflected one.