Tutorial: modify the hard drive partition table from windows

Hello everyone, today I present a small tutorial in which I am going to explain in a simple and very graphic way how to edit the partition table of a hard disk from the tool that Windows incorporates for this purpose. Tell you that the tutorial I have prepared from my Windows 7 but the tool is the same in Windows XP, Vista, 7 and 8. Before getting into the task I am going to explain some basic things and the precautions to take. Are you ready and ready? So let's start.

What is a hard drive partition?

A disk partition is the generic name for each partition present in a single physical data storage unit. Every partition has its own file system (format); Generally, almost any operating system interprets, uses, and manipulates each partition as a separate physical disk, even though those partitions are on a single physical disk.

In other words, if we divide a hard disk into several partitions, the operating system will treat each one as if it were a separate hard disk. The advantage of this is that we can have our data more organized and, most importantly, separate it from the operating system so that if we need to reinstall it we can do it without losing our valuable information, we can format the partition where the operating system is and reinstall it without altering the partition or partitions where we have stored our valuable data.

Precautions before modifying the partition table of our hard disk

Generally modifying the hard drive partition table is a safe operation and there is no mishap (I have never had any problems), despite this I strongly recommend backing up important data from the hard drive to an external drive. I also warn that the hard drive can suffer irreversible damage if it is not done correctly or there is a problem during the process, a power outage for example. Having said all this I am not responsible for any loss of information or damage to the hard drive, if someone decides to follow the tutorial it is their own responsibility.

Finally I recommend to see the whole tutorial and ask any questions before doing anything.

Process explanation

First of all I want to show you the hard drives that I have on my PC, as you can see in the following screenshot I have two drives, a HDD of 500 GB (465 GB real) and another of 200 GB (186 GB real). They are two independent hard drives with a single partition available on each of them.

The first step to modify the partition table is to click on the start button and write the word "partitions" as can be seen in the following image. Then we click on "create and format hard drive partitions"

We see the following window showing our hard drives and the partitions on each of them. In my case I have drive D: (Disk 0) with a single partition which is completely empty and drive C: (Disk 1) with a 465.66 GB partition with 90% of available space and another partition that says "reserved for the system". This second partition of the C: drive contains the Windows boot sector and is not accessible to the user, so in the previous image only two hard drives appeared to me, this partition should not be formatted or deleted because Windows would not boot and you should reinstall it or repair the startup.

In my case I am going to create a second partition on the 186 GB D: drive, for this we must first reduce the size of the existing partition to make room to create a second partition. To do this we right click on the existing partition and select "reduce volume".

The following window appears showing the available space to reduce and we indicate the amount of space in MB that we want to reduce, in my case I am going to free approximately 120 GB of space so that I have a partition of 66GB and another of 120 GB approximately. For this I do a quick mental calculation of 1GB = 1000 MB with which I must reduce 120, 000 MB to free up approximately 120 GB (20 GB x 1000 MB = 120, 2000 MB), it is a quick calculation and it is not exact, to make it more exact use 1 GB = 1024 MB and the calculator:). We click on "Reduce".

We wait for the operation to finish and we see that 117.19 GB of space has been freed (hence the inaccuracy, it is not 120 GB) and the existing partition has finally been left at 69.12 GB.

To create a new partition we right-click on the empty space (not assigned) and then we right-click on "New simple volume".

We will see the next assistant, we click on "Next".

We see the following window showing the available space on the disk (Maximum disk space in MB) and we must indicate the space to use in the new partition where it says "Simple volume size in MB". In my case I select all the available volume because I want to create a single partition, if we want to create more than one we must distribute the space as we want and repeat the process of creating "New simple volume". We click Next ”.

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It seems the following window to assign a letter to the new unit, we can leave it as it is or change the letter by displaying the options by clicking on the triangle next to the letter, in this case the "J". We click on “Next”

We see the following window where we must select the option to format the new partition and the file system to use, I recommend NTFS. We can also give a name to the new partition, in my case "DATA". Finally we make sure that the option "Give quick format" is checked and we click "Next".

A process summary window appears, we click "Next" and wait for the operation to finish.

The Disk Management window appears again and it already shows us the new partition.

We go to "Computer" and we see that now we have 3 hard drives, including the new partition "DATA"

Here ends the operation of creating a new partition on our hard drive, however I will also show you how we can delete a partition from the hard drive, obviously we will lose all the data that is in the partition so we must remove the important information we have.

We return to the "Disk Management" tool, we right-click on the partition to be deleted (DATA in this case) and select "Delete volume".

It will ask us for confirmation, warning us that we are going to lose all the data that is in the partition to be deleted, we click "Yes".

Below is the unallocated hard drive space.

We right click on the partition to extend, in this case D: and click on "Extend volume".

The wizard appears, we click "Next".

We see the following window showing the available space "Maximum available space" and we must select the amount of space to use "Select the amount of MB space". We select all the available space and click "Next"

Again a summary window, click "Next".

We wait for the operation to finish and we already have our hard disk with a single partition with all the space.

Here ends today's tutorial, I know it is very basic but I have done it thinking about users who do not have knowledge about the subject and wanted to make it as simple as possible. Probably in the future make a more complete one with more advanced tools like GParted that allow you to create and modify partitions for other operating systems like GNU / Linux. I remind you once again to ask any questions before doing anything.