System Reserved Partition???

Wayne wrote:

I have a 300GB hard drive on which I installed W8 some time ago. ...

The Windows 8 newsgroup is over at alt.comp.os.windows-8.

You might want to indicate to those folks if the 300 GB drive was new
and you selected the partition layout in a fresh install of Windows 8 or
if you reused the 300 GB drive from a prior Windows installation or if
your computer (unidentified) is a pre-built that had Windows 8
pre-installed on it. The state of the 300 GB before you did the Windows
8 install is unknown so that it has a large 111 GB partition on it may
have been how it was configured before you installed Windows 8.

On Fri, 8 May 2015 08:37:56 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Wayne wrote:

I have a 300GB hard drive on which I installed W8 some time ago. ...

The Windows 8 newsgroup is over at alt.comp.os.windows-8.

You might want to indicate to those folks if the 300 GB drive was new
and you selected the partition layout in a fresh install of Windows 8 or
if you reused the 300 GB drive from a prior Windows installation or if
your computer (unidentified) is a pre-built that had Windows 8
pre-installed on it. The state of the 300 GB before you did the Windows
8 install is unknown so that it has a large 111 GB partition on it may
have been how it was configured before you installed Windows 8.


Right on alll counts. Sorry 'bout dat.

JW

On Fri, 08 May 2015 08:37:56 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Wayne wrote:

I have a 300GB hard drive on which I installed W8 some time ago. ...

The Windows 8 newsgroup is over at alt.comp.os.windows-8.

You might want to indicate to those folks if the 300 GB drive was new
and you selected the partition layout in a fresh install of Windows 8 or
if you reused the 300 GB drive from a prior Windows installation or if
your computer (unidentified) is a pre-built that had Windows 8
pre-installed on it. The state of the 300 GB before you did the Windows
8 install is unknown so that it has a large 111 GB partition on it may
have been how it was configured before you installed Windows 8.

I agree with looking at windows 7 or 8 groups. Apparently both of these
systems require a so called boot partition which is marked as active, why
I know not.
Dell have two partitions before the main os, in my case windows 7. The
first is quite small and contains diagnostic stuff, quite useful when you
need it. The second contains a recovery image and the needed boot stuff
for windows 7.
If you keep an image of your hd and feel you don't need that recovery
image, which puts the machine back to as purchased state, you can remove
the recovery partition, although I would keep the diagnostic partition.
You can use this link for help:
http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/article.php?id=409
I strongly urge making an image of the windows partitions, I use macrium
free in windows.
Of course, if you only want to use Linux you can simply delete the
unwanted partitions and do a clean install.

wrote:
On Fri, 8 May 2015 08:37:56 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Wayne wrote:

I have a 300GB hard drive on which I installed W8 some time ago. ...
The Windows 8 newsgroup is over at alt.comp.os.windows-8.

You might want to indicate to those folks if the 300 GB drive was new
and you selected the partition layout in a fresh install of Windows 8 or
if you reused the 300 GB drive from a prior Windows installation or if
your computer (unidentified) is a pre-built that had Windows 8
pre-installed on it. The state of the 300 GB before you did the Windows
8 install is unknown so that it has a large 111 GB partition on it may
have been how it was configured before you installed Windows 8.


Right on alll counts. Sorry 'bout dat.

JW

You might want to open diskmgmt.msc program and
take a screenshot of what is displayed. If you are
not currently using a photo hosting site, you can
upload the image to tinypic.com, which is one of
the only sites that doesn't require registration
to upload pictures.

In terms of the advertising it hosts, tinypic.com
isn't very nice. But the function cannot be
beat - image hosting without having to register.

Imageshack used to provide such a service, but they
went all "Facebook", and even threw away all the
old pictures. So now when people dig up an old thread,
all the Imageshack content in it is gone.

Disk Management control panel, also labels the partitions.
It labels the boot partition as "System", and the
system C: partition as "Boot". That's a Microsoft-ism.
Generally, the thing you're currently booted from,
gets most of the labels. The less important partitions
have fewer labels on them.

*******

If you install Win2K twice in a row to a hard drive,
it places the second OS installation in an Extended/Logical
partition. Even if a Primary partition is available. So that
could account for where the Extended plus Logical within it,
came from. A side effect of doing more than one installation.
While a user could mess the disk up like that, it almost
sounds like more than one installation attempt or something.

In Disk Management, you don't want to delete too many of the
things that have labels on them, or your next reboot attempt
will be your last :-)

Paul

"dave cohen" wrote:

I agree with looking at windows 7 or 8 groups. Apparently both of these
systems require a so called boot partition which is marked as active,

Um...no, at least in the general case.

The separate "system" partition is required only if you are using Bitlocker;
I don't know of any other Microsoft environment that requires it although I
don't claim to have a direct line to Microsoft's technical design
management.

The two-partition environment (small active partition and large non-active
one) will be automatically created if you let Windows partition the disk.
Windows installs and runs without complaint if you create and format a
single active partition.

Joe

Ken1943 wrote:
On Fri, 8 May 2015 16:07:12 +0000 (UTC), dave cohen
wrote:

On Fri, 08 May 2015 08:37:56 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Wayne wrote:

I have a 300GB hard drive on which I installed W8 some time ago. ...
The Windows 8 newsgroup is over at alt.comp.os.windows-8.

You might want to indicate to those folks if the 300 GB drive was new
and you selected the partition layout in a fresh install of Windows 8 or
if you reused the 300 GB drive from a prior Windows installation or if
your computer (unidentified) is a pre-built that had Windows 8
pre-installed on it. The state of the 300 GB before you did the Windows
8 install is unknown so that it has a large 111 GB partition on it may
have been how it was configured before you installed Windows 8.
I agree with looking at windows 7 or 8 groups. Apparently both of these
systems require a so called boot partition which is marked as active, why
I know not.
Dell have two partitions before the main os, in my case windows 7. The
first is quite small and contains diagnostic stuff, quite useful when you
need it. The second contains a recovery image and the needed boot stuff
for windows 7.
If you keep an image of your hd and feel you don't need that recovery
image, which puts the machine back to as purchased state, you can remove
the recovery partition, although I would keep the diagnostic partition.
You can use this link for help:
http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/article.php?id=409
I strongly urge making an image of the windows partitions, I use macrium
free in windows.
Of course, if you only want to use Linux you can simply delete the
unwanted partitions and do a clean install.

I believe any partition before C: cannot be removed. I know for sure the
100mb partition should not be removed. I have two netbooks(7) and a
laptop(8), I'm still not sure what partitions to image. This Asus laptop
has a 1tb hdd. The C: partition (300gb+/-) is way to big for how I use a
computer, 100gb is plenty. I am afraid to play with them because not
being sure of how Asus uses them.


KenW

The boot partition can be removed. I've done it,
using instructions here. The caveat at the top of this
article, states there is an MBR versus GPT issue,
and this procedure is for an MBR setup only. There
really wouldn't be any incentive to remove from GPT,
because GPT supports so many more partitions.

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/article.php?id=409

Basically what you're doing, is moving boot files
onto the main partition, and at the same time,
preventing full disk encryption. So if you were
doing BitLocker full encryption of C: partition,
this would not be recommended either.

The reason for *wanting* to remove System Reserved
on my Windows 7 laptop, was to free up a primary
partition, and allow a dual-boot style installation.
I have both the old (Acer OEM) OS and the new vanilla
OS on the same hard drive. If I "forgot" something
from the old install, it's online and ready to be
copied.

Paul

dave cohen wrote:
On Fri, 08 May 2015 08:37:56 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Wayne wrote:

I have a 300GB hard drive on which I installed W8 some time ago. ...

The Windows 8 newsgroup is over at alt.comp.os.windows-8.

You might want to indicate to those folks if the 300 GB drive was new
and you selected the partition layout in a fresh install of Windows 8 or
if you reused the 300 GB drive from a prior Windows installation or if
your computer (unidentified) is a pre-built that had Windows 8
pre-installed on it. The state of the 300 GB before you did the Windows
8 install is unknown so that it has a large 111 GB partition on it may
have been how it was configured before you installed Windows 8.

I agree with looking at windows 7 or 8 groups. Apparently both of these
systems require a so called boot partition which is marked as active, why
I know not.

Not necessarily.

The System Reserved is the System partition which contains the system
files start the booting process then pass control to Boot Partition
which holds and loads the O/S

On Windows 7 and Windows 8 the System Reserved is automatically created
by the Windows during the clean install process....though it is not
required. One can actually place all system and o/s files on the same
partition thereby the system and boot partitions becoming one and the
same partition.


--
...winston
msft mvp consumer apps

dave cohen wrote:

I agree with looking at windows 7 or 8 groups. Apparently both of these
systems require a so called boot partition which is marked as active

Under Windows 7 and with a non-partitioned (new) drive, the installer
will create a 100 MB "recovery" partition and the rest of the drive gets
a partition for the OS. That way, users didn't have to dig around for
the install CD to boot it into Recovery mode. Instead they could hit a
hotkey during startup to boot from the recovery partition.

Some folks (e.g., me) didn't want 2 partitions for the Win7 install. To
get the Win7 installer to use just 1 partition meant booting to use some
3rd party partition manager to create a partition(s) on the hard disk.
The Win7 installer would not alter the partitioning if you told it to
reuse an existing partition. So everything (other than the Recovery
mode, of course) went into 1 partition.

I suspect Win8 does the same thing but I've not had to bother installing
it and the workstations that I work on are images setup by the IT folks
so they do whatever setup they want.

"VanguardLH" wrote:
dave cohen wrote:

I agree with looking at windows 7 or 8 groups. Apparently both of these
systems require a so called boot partition which is marked as active

Some folks (e.g., me) didn't want 2 partitions for the Win7 install. To
get the Win7 installer to use just 1 partition meant booting to use some
3rd party partition manager to create a partition(s) on the hard disk.

Why bother with a third-party product when DISKPART does everything you need
to create a one-partition system? At almost any point in the setup process
before you specify which partition to use for Windows, press SHIFT+F10 to
open a command window. Run DISKPART, then create, format, and make active
the partition you want to use. Exit DISKPART and the command window, then
(if you're sitting at the partition selection dialog) refresh the window by
pressing F5, and finally when asked select the newly-created partition.

I suspect Win8 does the same thing but I've not had to bother installing
it and the workstations that I work on are images setup by the IT folks
so they do whatever setup they want.

7 and 8 work the same way as far as partitioning requirements are concerned.

Joe

Hi, Joe.

Why bother with a third-party product when DISKPART does everything you
need to create a one-partition system?

Or use DiskPart's user-friendlier GUI, Disk Management (diskmgmt.msc). DM
will do almost everything DiskPart will do and is easier for most users to
handle.

RC
-- --
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX

Microsoft Windows MVP (2002-2010)
Windows Live Mail 2012 (Build 16.4.3528.0331) in Win8.1 Pro w/Media Center


"Joe Morris" wrote in message ...

"VanguardLH" wrote:
dave cohen wrote:

I agree with looking at windows 7 or 8 groups. Apparently both of these
systems require a so called boot partition which is marked as active

Some folks (e.g., me) didn't want 2 partitions for the Win7 install. To
get the Win7 installer to use just 1 partition meant booting to use some
3rd party partition manager to create a partition(s) on the hard disk.

Why bother with a third-party product when DISKPART does everything you need
to create a one-partition system? At almost any point in the setup process
before you specify which partition to use for Windows, press SHIFT+F10 to
open a command window. Run DISKPART, then create, format, and make active
the partition you want to use. Exit DISKPART and the command window, then
(if you're sitting at the partition selection dialog) refresh the window by
pressing F5, and finally when asked select the newly-created partition.

I suspect Win8 does the same thing but I've not had to bother installing
it and the workstations that I work on are images setup by the IT folks
so they do whatever setup they want.

7 and 8 work the same way as far as partitioning requirements are concerned.

Joe

R. C. White wrote:
Hi, Joe.

Why bother with a third-party product when DISKPART does everything
you need to create a one-partition system?

Or use DiskPart's user-friendlier GUI, Disk Management (diskmgmt.msc).
DM will do almost everything DiskPart will do and is easier for most
users to handle.

RC

Diskpart will do "clean" and "cleanall".

I ran into a case just yesterday, where I actually
needed to "clean" to get out of a jam. Disk Management
by itself would not have sufficed. That leaves the
disk "uncommitted" as to whether it is MBR or GPT
based. I'd managed to plug a GPT disk into this computer,
and wanted to change it. "Clean" did the job.

It's like my toolbox, includes claw hammer and sledge hammer.
A clever hammer user, finds uses for both, even if the
sledge hammer *is* a bit clumsy.

Paul

Joe Morris wrote:

Why bother with a third-party product when DISKPART does everything you need
to create a one-partition system?

Because I would need a bootable instance of Windows or the Recovery CD
to use diskpart.exe (which I do use in batch scripts for onlining and
offlining disks and assigning and removing drive letters). The 3rd
party partition managers don't need much of an OS just to get its
dispatcher to load and transfer control to the partition manager
program.

Diskpart is obviously a console-mode program. Yes, you can list disks
then select the correct disk so you can then list partitions on the
selected disk and then select a partition. This is like playing that
ancient Zork console-mode game where you gave instructions of where to
move but had to remember where you were to know to where you moved. The
3rd party partition managers don't necessarily use graphics but still
use a layout that let the user better understand at a glance what disks
they have, how they've been partitioned, which are primary versus
logical, their sizes, and so on. Simply easier to visualize what is
your current setup and what your proposed changes will do.


At almost any point in the setup process before you specify which
partition to use for Windows, press SHIFT+F10 to open a command
window. Run DISKPART, then create, format, and make active the
partition you want to use.

You sure there isn't a SELECT DISK command in there to tell diskpart on
which disk you want to create a volume (partition)? See, that's why a
GUI-like 3rd party partition manager is easier to use. You don't have
to keep entering ? or command ? inside of diskpart to remember how to
use it. I doubt the OP is a sysadmin that is doing this daily (plus
they would be using sysprep images, anyway). Few users know about
diskpart, few of those that do remember all the commands, and of those
remaining few there are still times when you get the commands in the
wrong order.

Unless you are also aware that disks are enumerated starting with zero
and partitions are enumerated starting from 1 it is easy to end up
formatting the wrong partition. For example, the HDD may have 2
partitions already created where the 2nd one was for and still has data
files. Unless your careful and can visualize in your head just what the
diskpart commands are doing, you could easily **** up.

Just because diskpart is available doesn't make it the best tool to use.
Remember there is UNDO function with diskpart. Most 3rd party partition
managers (well, those that I've used) let you see what will happen *if*
you applied the commands you queue up but have not yet committed.
Seeing before applying gives the user a safety net.

While I use diskpart.exe within batch scripts (along with feeding a text
file as the input of commands to diskpart), I really would not recommend
it to a normal user. I don't many IT folks that bother with it, either,
unless they're also scripting its use. With one backup program that
allowed pre- and post-commands in a backup job, I had the pre-command
run a batch file that ran diskpart that read a input text file with
commands to online the 2nd hard disk and assign a drive letter so the
backup program could use that partition on that hard disk to save its
image files. After the backup job ended, the post-command ran a batch
file that ran diskpart that read an input file with commands to remove
the drive letter and offline the hard disk. That meant most users and
processes could not access the backup files except for a window of
opportunity while the backup job was running. Eventually I went back to
a prior backup program that could read and write from a partition that
had a non-standard partition type in the partition record in the
partition table and never had a drive letter assigned to that partition
(and the non-standard partition type prevent most but not all disk
utilities from knowing what file system was used in the partition). I
lost the disk offline/online function but could add that since the prior
backup program also allowed pre- and post-commands in a backup job.

So, yes, I know about diskpart.exe but don't recommend it when a
single-time config session will alter the layout on the disk. Better to
see what's there and what's going to be there after applying your queued
up commands.

R. C. White wrote:

Hi, Joe.

Why bother with a third-party product when DISKPART does everything
you need to create a one-partition system?

Or use DiskPart's user-friendlier GUI, Disk Management
(diskmgmt.msc). DM will do almost everything DiskPart will do and is
easier for most users to handle.

How can you run diskmgmt.msc, a GUI app, before Windows is even
installed?

| I believe any partition before C: cannot be removed. I know for sure the
| 100mb partition should not be removed.

C drive is a relative term. It's generally whatever
OS is booted.

The boot partition is not necessary.
Dells are unusually messy, with 2 partitions typically
set in front of the OS, but it's fixable. The Terabyte
link should explain how to eliminate the boot partition
by moving boot files to "C" drive; the restore
partition is only relevant if one does not use disk
image backup. If one *does* use disk image backup
there's no need to image the entire hard disk and
any extra utility/boot/restore partitions are just
unnecessary complication and clutter.

I seem to remember Wayne asking just recently
about partitioning the same disk, which makes me
wonder what he's doing. Frankly I don't think any of
this is really a topic that can be covered in a newsgroup.
If someone wants to research and understand how it
all works then I'd strongly recommend getting rid of
all the extra partitions. But one needs to understand
what one's doing in order not to lose the whole thing.
If someone is not going to do that research I would
recommend leaving it all alone. Unfortunately, it's just
not a simple issue with a simple answer, and both Dell
and Microsoft have done their best to complicate it. On
top of that, there are widely varying preferences when
it comes to partitioning and backup, making it even more
confusing for someone who's hoping for a simple yes/no
answer.

| Why bother with a third-party product when DISKPART does everything you
need
| to create a one-partition system? At almost any point in the setup
process
| before you specify which partition to use for Windows, press SHIFT+F10 to
| open a command window. Run DISKPART, then create, format, and make active
| the partition you want to use. Exit DISKPART and the command window, then
| (if you're sitting at the partition selection dialog) refresh the window
by
| pressing F5, and finally when asked select the newly-created partition.
|

In the original case described by the OP, Windows
is already installed. That's the case most people
are dealing with.

In addition to what VanguardLH said, I wouldn't
leave *anything* to Windows functionality, much
less limited, obscure command line tools. Windows
has always been very "parochial", assuming that a
PC is always a machine with a hard disk, with one
copy of Windows on that disk. As I recall, the last
time I did a Dell restore it erased the data partitions
without asking and took over the entire disk! With
friends like that, who needs hard disk crashes?

It's just not safe to assume anything with Windows
install operations. For that reason I always just let
it do its thing, then clean up the mess, make a disk
image, and never have to actually install that
particular OS copy again.

I always do it all with 3rd-party tools. In my case I
use BootIt, which I can't compliment enough, but other
people also rave about other tools. The reason for using
3rd-party tools is that such tools do more (for instance,
Windows disk operations won't make a FAT32 partition
over something like 32 GB), without needing abstruse
incantations typed into console windows, and they can
be trusted to do what you want rather than what the
Microsoft designers think you should want.