Help with partitions

Hi,

I am a new thinkpad user, I have a T410i.

I have a c: & q: drive in my machine. I want to partition the c: drive. Is there any app in thinkpad that will do the work?

q: drive is named lenovo. Is it necessary??? Should i keep it or format????

 

Assuming your OS is Windows 7, then click on control panel, then "system and security", then "create and format hard disk partitions" in "administrative tools".

I would keep any existing partitions. If you wish to have further partitions, then divide the much bigger partition (probably "C;" or "SW_Preload" - should show lots lots of unused space).

However, before doing anything to your partitions, ensure you
1) have a set of Lenovo rescue disk created for your machine
2) Create an image on an external HDD of your present system ("control panel", "system and security", "backup and restore", "create a system image")
3) Have a further independent backup of all files that you would miss in the event of disaster onto an external HDD. One way to do that is to use the brilliant free Microsoft software Synctoy from Download details: SyncToy 2.1.

If your OS is XP, then you will need to use a third party partition manager.

 

If you have Windows 7 or Vista you can click on the start globe and type: "diskmgmt.msc" to start the built-in partition manager. It allows you to shrink your C: drive and create additional partitions in the unallocated space you have created. Be careful with this tool. You may not be able to access your recovery partition if you change the size of the C: drive. As long as you have made recovery disks as mentioned above, you can delete the recovery partition to reclaim the space and do whatever else you like.

Another tool, more powerful than Windows diskmgmt.msc, is PartEd Magic. It's a linux-based partition manager that you boot from. It's a free program, just Google it, download the .iso and burn it to a CD. It can deal with nearly every file system known to mankind.

If you're going to shrink your C: drive I suggest defragging it first to consolidate files. This makes the whole process a lot faster and easier. You might also delete any older restore points before defragging and resizing. If you don't use hibernation, get rid of the huge "hiberfil.sys" in the root of your C: drive. You can't see it unless you type "dir /a" to show all files (hidden, system, etc.).

Open an administrative command prompt and type:
"powercfg.exe -h off" (without the quotes). This will delete the huge file and give you more shrinkage room. The hibernation file is usually about the same size as the amount of RAM in your computer, sometimes more.

 

Thank you.