How to boot Win10 without the System Reserved Partition ?


  1. Posts : 403
    Win10 32bit v20H2
       #1

    How to boot Win10 without the System Reserved Partition ?


    It is possible in Win8. If it is possible in Win10, I'd like to know how.
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  2. Posts : 803
    10 Pro Preview x64
       #2

    Yes it is. At minimum if you have EFI you need 2 partitions - An ESP containing your boot files as that is where EFI system looks, and your OS partition. MS recommends a 128MB MSR (Microsoft Reserved) partition as well before the OS partition but it will boot and run fine without.

    For a BIOS install you only need 1 partition (unless you use bitlocker). I have a BIOS install and have just one partition - the recovery files are placed on C:\.
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  3. Posts : 403
    Win10 32bit v20H2
    Thread Starter
       #3

    adamf said:
    Yes it is. At minimum if you have EFI you need 2 partitions - An ESP containing your boot files as that is where EFI system looks, and your OS partition. MS recommends a 128MB MSR (Microsoft Reserved) partition as well before the OS partition but it will boot and run fine without.

    For a BIOS install you only need 1 partition (unless you use bitlocker). I have a BIOS install and have just one partition - the recovery files are placed on C:\.
    Thank you. I'm a bit thrown by all those acronyms. I got advice elsewhere that worked PERFECTLY for me. It requires a new install but then does what is needed. I reproduce it here :
    Choose custom install and then select the advanced drive options. The advanced drive options will give access to the partitioning tools. Delete all but the System Reserved Partition. Then stretch the System Reserved Partition to the
    size you want the Operating System Partition to be. Once the system reserved partition has been resized, continue with the installation.
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  4. Posts : 803
    10 Pro Preview x64
       #4

    I don't know what you mean by system reserved partition really. There is your MSR which is microsoft reserved partition which is not required, fixed in size and probably not what you mean.

    If you mean you want you C: drive to take half your disk (or whatever) then at install time do pretty much as you describe above - delete all the partitions and create one the size you want. You'll then end up with empty space after that you can format as a data partition. You should only do that on an empty disk though.

    Is that what you want to do? If not please post a picture of your disk management and explain what you are trying to do - dual boot, leave space for a data partition etc.
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  5. whs
    Posts : 1,935
    Windows 7
       #5

    Yes you can boot without the system reserved partition. Just copy the bootmgr to C. Here is my little tutorial that shows you how too do it. It is very easy:

    Bootmgr - Move to C:\ with EasyBCD - Windows 7 Help Forums

    PS - It works in Windows 10. I just tried it out.
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  6. whs
    Posts : 1,935
    Windows 7
       #6

    Yes you can boot without the system reserved partition. Just copy the bootmgr to C. Here is my little tutorial that shows you how too do it. It is very easy:

    Bootmgr - Move to C:\ with EasyBCD - Windows 7 Help Forums

    PS - It works in Windows 10. I just tried it out using build 10049.
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  7. Posts : 403
    Win10 32bit v20H2
    Thread Starter
       #7

    adamf said:
    I don't know what you mean by system reserved partition really. There is your MSR which is microsoft reserved partition which is not required, fixed in size and probably not what you mean.

    If you mean you want you C: drive to take half your disk (or whatever) then at install time do pretty much as you describe above - delete all the partitions and create one the size you want. You'll then end up with empty space after that you can format as a data partition. You should only do that on an empty disk though.

    Is that what you want to do? If not please post a picture of your disk management and explain what you are trying to do - dual boot, leave space for a data partition etc.
    "and probably not what you mean.": I'd say the opposite. MSR qualifies for the (extra) partition I want to not have. As I reported above, I am very happy with the results of the procedure I outlined. "You should only do that on an empty disk though" I did it on a disk, all of whose space was available to the O/S. Because you have asked me to 'explain what you are trying to do', I will go into the following complex rant.
    CLONING exists and allows me to make a WORKING copy of a system. I can afford to ruin that copy by experimentation-that-goes-wrong, because I still have 'the original'. When technology was less reliable than now, I learned to keep copies of the last few stages of my system - as I changed-it-for-any-number-of-reasons. I did that by having a few suitably sized partitions on a much larger hard drive, and clone the most recent system over the partition with the oldest system on it. But the cloner I use, can only clone one partition to one other. A Win10 system comes as a pair of partitions, so I want to reduce that to ONE, to be able to continue my security habit.
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  8. Posts : 803
    10 Pro Preview x64
       #8

    For BIOS based PC one partition is fine. You can either install it on one partition (by formatting the partition manually at install time as you did before) or move the boot files as @whs describes in his tutorial. It works fine - I use one partition on 10.
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