Possible upgrade problem because of location of System Reserved part?

I want to to an 'upgrade' from Win 7 to Win 10, but I messed up when installing Win 7 - my "system reserved" partition ended up on a non-system drive (see attached). I don't want to carry over this mistake to Win 10... (plus the Win 10 upgrade says to disconnect all non-system disks -- something I guess I should have done when installing Win 7)

What is the best way to resolve this? Can I fix this in Win 7 then upgrade? If so, how?

Thanks,
\Dave

Hello,

Yes it would be worth making changes before you upgrade. The System Reserved partition holds the Boot Manager code and the Boot Configuration Database so if you delete it you won't be able to boot. The following tutorial from the seven forums shows the correct way to delete it and then carry out a startup repair to ensure your system will be able to boot afterwards by adding a new boot loader and BCD to the Windows partition. Make sure you have the necessary W7 installation disk or system repair disk. Obviously you will have to adapt the instructions to match your disk structure and location of your System Reserved partition.

Windows 7: System Reserved Partition - Delete

This is what I would do, you'll need a blank DVD or USB flash drive (8 gb):

1. Make a bootable USB/DVD of Kyhi's recovery tools:
Windows 10 Recovery Tools - Bootable Rescue Disk - Windows 10 Forums

2. Boot from it. Use MiniTool Partition Wizard to copy the system reserved partition on Disk 1 to the unallocated space at the end of Disk 2. Make sure that the new location for the System Reserved partition on Disk 2 gets marked as active. Make sure you actually click the apply button.

3. Shutdown. Disconnect disks 0 and 1. While I was at it, I would move Disk 2 to the first SATA port on the motherboard so that it becomes Disk 0. Restart the computer with only the hard drive containing Windows and the new System Reserved partition.

4. Once booted into Windows, attempt to run the upgrade to Windows 10. If it fails it is likely the System Reserved partition is too small.

5. If it fails, reboot into Kyhi's recovery disc, shrink C: drive partition by 100 MB not GB!. Add the 100 MB to the system reserved partition, click apply.

6. Reboot and try the upgrade again.

An alternative:

Do steps 1 and 3 first except you will probably get an error when you try to boot the computer. Boot Kyhi's recovery disc and run Macrium Reflect Free. Select the fix Windows startup utility under the restore menu to restore booting. Then reboot and try the upgrade.