Partitioning ?! and renaming Windows Drive

[hdmk]

I have two hard drives, a WD800JB [F:] [nice ] and a Seagate 20 gig 5400rpm job [C:].

Obviously the WD800JB is the main drive [even though its F:].

When I installed windows, it installed to the WD800Jb - which was labelled as the F: Drive. How can I change this? I've got Partition magic 8, but it says that if I rename the drive [back to C], Windows may not boot....?

(BTW - Running XP Pro.. the 20gig is FAT32, the WD800JB NTFS)

I want to partition this drive into several sectors, one for windows and program files, one for games, one for file storage - should I have one for a swap file as well? - how do I make that partition a swap file?

Thanks.

 

[Nodsu]

Even though you installed Windows on F:, the boot process still takes place on C:. If you make F: C:, you have to repair the windows installation to make it work.

 

[StormBringer]

You might also want a partition for CD assemblies if you do much burning. As for the Swap partition, create the size you want for it, then in System Properties>Advanced>Performance>Advanced>
Virtual Memory, click Change and point it to the partition you created. Set Min and Max to the max size the partition allows.

 

[hdmk]

so I'd have to reinstall windows if I renamed the drive from F: to C: ?

 

[Rick]

No, you can make your Windows drive C:, but your Windows installation will be unbootable.

You can use the Windows XP CD to repair your installation afterward, which will write a new boot sector to your drive. But this may not be enough, since XP will need the system files etc.. The most simple thing to do is to do a repair, which you can do just like you were "installing" windows.. Press Enter to install Window XP and it will detect previous versions of Windows. It should ask you if you would like to repair your installation. If it does not ask, do not continue. If it does ask, then continue as if you are going to install Windows XP for the first time.

This will reset all of your drivers etc...

 

[Mictlantecuhtli]

Is it such a big deal to have the operating system on something else than C:?

Pitiful operating systems with those drive letters :giddy:

 

[poertner_1274]

I was waiting for something like that

 

[hdmk]

bah......I did the deed....and ended up having to re-install windows BAH! And I can't get NAV2003 to re-install properly either.......

*SULK* [must learn to back up files]

 

[negroplasty]

I got the EXACT same thing happening to me, well apart from renaming my main hard drive, but with installing NAV03. I got it installed in the end, after about three clean installs of Windows, I realized that I might have had something running in the background that interfered with it, so I disabled everything on msconfig and sure enough, it fixed it. So then all I had to do was enable all of the programs one bye one until I found out which was causing the problems and permanently disabled it. Hope this same strategy works for you as it did for me, good luck :grinthumb !

 

[P&L]

Partitioning problems

Hi!
I need your help.
I installed windows on my new hardrive.
While installation I divided it on 2 partitions(I have 2 cd-roms, too).
When I opend "my computer", I saw a strange thing:
my first partiton got C, my first CD-ROM got D, my second partion got E .....
It's SATA hardrive and both CD-ROMs connected to same IDE.
How I can "rename" second partition, HELP!!!!
:hotbounce

 

[poertner_1274]

Why do you need your 2nd partition renamed? Does it really matter? I can't see why this would affect anything.

BTW
:wave:Welcome to TechSpot:wave:

 

[Liquidlen]

I did not get here quick enough it seems.Just in case anyone else is in this situation.You can change the BOOT Drive letter to C:\ (There are some prerequisite conditions, so read crefully)
Go here; http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;223188
I have done this and it does work. There are some situations where it helps to have the Boot drive letter as C:\, no one thought of any?

 

[DelJo63]

so I'd have to reinstall windows if I renamed the drive from F: to C: ?

Partition Magic has a tool to reassign Drive Letters. I've used it for other
partitions, but never from X->C.

Did you read the manual?

 

[PanicX]

wow, waking up a thread over 2 years old, craziness.

Anyhow, use can rename your drive letters using the Disk Manager. (Right Click "My Computer" select "Manage", then click on "Disk Management") You should be able to rename any drives without issue EXCEPT the system partition. That takes finesse.