Dealing with hidden partitions, recovery, ms stuff etc backup Windows 7?

When I build a windows 7 system, I use gparted to create C and D
partitions. C is small and easy to backup with Acronis...life is good.

If I let win7 partition the drive, it adds a 100MB one that messes up the
ordering and confuses the Acronis backup system so the restore won't boot
without jumping thru some repair hoops...so I don't do that.

I bought a used HP laptop. Had one visible C: partition, but it
was so locked down that I gave up and did the factory restore.
Now, it has four partitions.
199MB System NTFS hidden
238GB C: NTFS
14GB Recovery with D: label NTFS
103MB HPTools.. at the end. FAT32 hidden

What I'd like to do is hide the recovery partition,
split C: into
20GB C:
118GB D:

AND NOT LOSE THE LINKAGE TO THE RECOVERY PARTITION
so I can use the boot hotkey to restore the new C: using the system recovery
partition.
AND FIX UP THE PARTITION POINTERS SO ACRONIS CAN
BACKUP/RESTORE THE PARTITIONS AND THE SYSTEM WILL BOOT.

Google finds me lots of info on shrinking/adding partitions.
I'm finding nothing about how to keep the linkages to the system
factory restore process.

Then, there's the problem that I already have 4 primary partitions.
Is that still the maximum? Have to do something about that.
BUT
I have other situations where this is not a problem, so still
need a solution that splits partitions without screwing up the
drive ordering and confusing the backup/restore/recovery programs.

Need some freeware or tutorials or something...