Vista Partition Resize

[mschraier]

I have just swithced to a Vista laptop (sold my XP...STUPID!!), Anyhow, it has about 39 GB of space left. I want to steal about 10 or 12 to lead 9.10. Whether I used the built in app, g-parted ort EASUS, i cannot shrink it. Any ideas

[DaddyGeek]

Re: Vista Partition Resize

The reason why Windows won’t let you shrink the volume could be because there are immovable system files at the very end of the volume. To absolutely ensure that you can shrink the volume, you should disable as many of the system files as you can, at least temporarily.

Here’s the list of steps:

1. Run the Disk Cleanup Wizard, making sure to remove the hibernation file and all restore points.
2. Disable System Restore
3. Disable the pagefile ( Open up System in Control Panel, then Advanced System Settings \ Advanced \ Performance \ Advanced \ Change \ No Paging File.
4. In the same Advanced Settings, go to Startup and Recovery \ Settings and then change the Write debugging information drop-down to “None” to disable the kernel memory dump.
5. Disable Hibernation mode in your power options \ advanced power options screen.
6. Reboot the machine, and then delete your c:\pagefile.sys file.

Also look and see if a mft file is sitting at the end of the volume, if that is the case then I do not know a way around that.

[Snowhog]

Re: Vista Partition Resize

To shrink a Vista volume, you need to use the utility that is part of Vista. See How to dual boot Vista and XP (with Vista installed first) -- the step-by-step guide with screenshots

[mschraier]

Re: Vista Partition Resize

the utility within vista did not allow me to resize. this was so much easier in XP. my other is a pen drive, but did not want to have an expense at this time

[Snowhog]

Re: Vista Partition Resize

the utility within vista did not allow me to resize.

Before you can resize, you have to compress. Vista, as installed, "reserves" the entire HD space it is installed to. Even though looking at the drives space usage, it shows you have x amount of unused space, that 'unused space' is set aside by Vista. I know this, as I had Vista on my laptop, and had to follow the instructions in the Vista utility to first, compress the volume before resizing would work. Also, if you have set up Recovery setpoints, you need to turn that off and possibly, delete any such Recovery setpoints that you may have created - they take up a lot of space.

[mschraier]

Re: Vista Partition Resize

The compression utility is found where? Also, how do I delete the restore points if there are any? I got the 2nd hand from my wife, sinc eshe got a new one. I know how to turn it off, but not to where i can find them for deleiton.

[Snowhog]

Re: Vista Partition Resize

Use Vista's Help and search on compress and/or resize. It's there. Sorry I can't be more specific, but I dumped Vista over a year ago.

See:

How To Resize A Partition In Windows Vista & Windows 7, using Disk Management.
System Restore: frequently asked questions

[mschraier]

Re: Vista Partition Resize

well....all is going to be good. I used disk cleanup then a chkdsk. that chkdsk took 3 hours and found several corruptions that needed to be repaired. Finally I defragged. In total I went from 39GB free to 105GB. Then I tired to use the VIsta utility and it failed. However, I used my EASUS disk management softwware and voila, I now have a 20GB section to install on. As time goes on I may increase that. But for now, that will be fine. I guess you can call this thread closed. thanks for your help

[Guest]

Re: Vista Partition Resize

There is no need to use external applications. The only reason you got the error message is because you are using a laptop and most of the times vista doesn't shutdown but hibernates. That leaves the filesystem locked.
If you, instead of allowing Windows Vista to hibernate tell it to completely shutdown then Kubuntu/ubuntu will automatically recommend/allow you to create a partition. It will resize and install without any glitch.

JP