Hi,

I have a 500 GB sata2 drive. I made a huge mistake partitioning it! I only created C: and D: drives!
C: OF 100 GB
D: OF 400 GB

Now I noticed everything runs really slower and the Hard Disk sounds like it's going to die from being loaded! sso only solution I heard was to make smaller partitions.

Now the problem is my HDD is FULL How can I partition the D: Drive without losing DATA?
and what suggested partition size shall I create? 100 GB for each?

I have alot of games and this huge parition makes them run slower than usual! Defrag doesn't help at all anymore!

Regards,
AJ

Question for you. When you first started using the drive with these partitions were your games playing OK at that time? If so, what makes you think this is an issue with the partition size. If you installed NTFS the default cluster size is 4k regardless of the partition size. That is one of the main advantages of NTFS.

How much disk space is left on each of the partitions?
Where is your swap file located and what is the size?
What amount of RAM is installed?

If you have enough slack space Partition Magic can further divide the 400GB partition but I don't think that is your problem. I could be wrong.

Now the problem is my HDD is FULL How can I partition the D: Drive without losing DATA?

I agree with OtheHill (post 1). You basically cannot use Partition Magic because it requires plenty of available HD space in order for it to install, & to work.

i_Xp/VistaUser

I agree with O/Hill and XP User: your problem is not partitioning the drive. I suspect that your problem is an over-stuffed hard drive. You cannot totally stuff a drive with data; Windows requires a certain amout of space on the drive, including a swap file. I think a Slaved drive for storage is in the future for you. Drives are cheap now-cruise Newegg.com, there will be a bargain there.

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day;
Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime;
Then industry pollutes the water and kills all the fish.

OtheHill : well answering your questions below

when I first partitioned it there was slowness in games an applications. I thought it was a HDD failure sent it back to vendor for checkup or replacement there was nothing wrong. yet I insisted on replacing it and so they did!

C: 100GB 40 GB free. SWAP file is on C Drive swap file size 1024.

PC RAM is 2 GB DDR2.
VGA CARD nVidia 7950GX2.

Drive D: Has around 50 GB of free space and yet when the free space was more same issue of slowness I reinstalled windows several times and I do use an original windows platform.

I've asked around and they all suggested that 400GB is a too big of a partition isn't that the case?

Regards,
AJ

oh and yes it is NTFS for sure :)

Regards,
AJ

IF u want to resize the partition BACK UP EVERYTHING importaint! partition magic can resize the partitions but some freeware programs can do that for you. good luck

Did you install the Moard chipset drivers after installing Windows? Check to see if your drive is running in DMA. The 400GB partition is about 87% full.

Defragging probably won't work. Defrag needs 15% free to run. If that partition is mostly games I don't know how fragmented it can get, as I am not a gamer.

From what I have read here harddrive speed isn't as important as graphics and RAM with games.

What is the speed of your drive and how much cache?

Are you using integrated graphics for your display?

OtheHill: what drivers? what's DMA? got no clue on what you were speaking of in the first paragraph haha.

Anyways my PC is pretty fine CPU 4MB cache 1.86 intel conroe duo 2.

graphics is nVidia 7950GX2 which has 1 GB of ram. and PC has 2 GB of DDR2 ram. really it aint supposed to be so slow! it takes like a whole minute to open up D: drive from "MY COMPUTER"

maxtor01: I can't backup anything cause I have no where to back them up I got like 120 GB's of games! and like 100 of video clips. can partition MANAGER move everything WITH the data still on?

Regards,
AJ

Go to device manager and post what is listed under harddisk controllers. Click on the + and then right click the channels, one by one selecting properties> advanced settings. Transfer mode for both device 0 & 1 should be set to DMA if available.

If your Hdrive is a SATA interface there is no DMA. There should be some settings and a speed test button.

The MBoard chipset drivers are model dependent. Post your MBoard model and I will post a link to the latest chipset drivers.

If you can't determine the MBoard model it should show during the POST screens at startup. If not, download a utility called SIW. You should be able to use it to find the MBoard model.

Here are the specs below for all my devices and date of drivers and provider of driver :) and btw I LOVE SIW I have it for like a year now.

MB :
Manufacturer Intel Corporation
Model D975XBX
Version AAD27094-305
Chipset Model 82975X Memory Controller Hub
South Bridge 82801GH (ICH7DH) LPC Interface Controller

CPU :
Number of CPU(s) One Physical Processor / 2 Cores / 2 Logical Processors / 64 bits
CPU Full Name Intel Core 2 Duo
L2 Cache 2048 KB

HDD :
Vendor : Hitachi
Model : HDS725050KLA360
Size : 500 GBytes
Interface : IDE SATA-II
Temprature : 43 ºC (109 ºF)
Revision : K2AOAB5A
Logical Disks C: D:
Controller Buffer Size on Drive 15607 KBytes
PIO Mode Support 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4
DMA SW Mode Support Not Supported
DMA MW Mode Support 0 - 1 - 2
UDMA Mode Support 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 (ATA/66) - 5 (ATA/100) - 6 (ATA/133)
Current UDMA mode 5 (ATA-100)

Regards,
AJ

You need to do what I said. That may tell me if the MBoard chipset drivers are installed and if your drive is running as it should. Your specs state in is a SATA II interface. Go to the listing for the SATA controller and run the test. Your drive is running in IDE compatibility mode.

blah am just going to format my C: Drive and tell you how the outcome is!!! I've tried every other possible way maybe cause this windows XP has been smacked here since umm last year back in march 2006 lol since last format I've changed RAM VGA 2 HDD's and a PSU.

I think a format will do it good can I install WIN XP and WIN VISTA BUSINESS EDITION?

I have them both purchased.
please reply as soon as possible if it's a can do. cause I will be formatting in less than 24hours
Regards,
AJ

Suit yourself. I would verify that your computer is suitable to run Vista. It may not be.

OtheHill,

Hello again,

Well I got an old 80 Gig IDE HDD of mine made it the master drive and slammed the SATA2 one as the slave formatted it's old XP partition and smacked vista on the 80 GIG. well all is working smoothly I need to upgrade my ram only.
And I read alot of reviews about my HITACHI HDD. 500GB one. it's mainly used for DATA storage file not to run an OS. it's much faster now weird huh?

Why wouldn't vista run better?
CPU 1.86GHz Dual core 2.
RAM 1 GB <-- Needs upgrade I'll get 3 extra GBs. wind up with 4GB.
MOBO : Intel XBX975.
VGA : nVidia 7950 GX2

all is running well on it so far no lagness nothing bad (i hope it remains this way) haha. :)

Thanks for your help once again mate

Regards,
AJ

If you had installed XP on that drive it would run faster too. All OSes get bloated if you don't keep after the cleanup.

Hitachi wouldn't have been my first choice in a drive.

When expanding your RAM to 4GB expect the number to actually be about 3.5GB. I think that applies to Vista.