I got my XP Pro pre-installed from Dell... in case such OEM info helps. I have this basic C drive that came pre-loaded with software from Dell and I am trying to create a logical partition on this drive. The Disk Management utility (XP Pro) suggests this: "Right-click an unallocated region of a basic disk, and then click New Partition, or right-click free space in an extended partition, and then click New Logical Drive." But if I do that on the graphic displaying the Basic Disk 0 with 90% free space, I do not get the create partition option. I just get the "Change drive letter and path" option. What am I missing here? Thanks.

one thing is that dell is real strict on there hardware and software. i guess the best way to do it is to find a program call partition magic and partition it while you still have the os on there. then load the os onto the partition side and reformat the bigger side.

I guess the reason I couldn't proceed was that already the whole of the hard drive was allocated to 'C' primary partition, and there's no feature in Disk Management to resize partition. Thus, it looks like I have to use Partition Magic.