HDD Arrangements

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  1. Posts : 19
    Windows 10
       #11

    NavyLCDR said:
    We need to see the results of: reagentc /info
    run from an elevated ("run as administrator") command prompt, please.
    Thanks for the suggestion - I ran reagentc / info as administrator. A command line screen opens and after a few minutes a bunch of text is written, but the command line screen immediately closes, so don't know what the info is. Am I doing something wrong or is the info written to a log file somewhere, if so where?
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 18,424
    Windows 11 Pro
       #12

    Exspextations said:
    Thanks for the suggestion - I ran reagentc / info as administrator. A command line screen opens and after a few minutes a bunch of text is written, but the command line screen immediately closes, so don't know what the info is. Am I doing something wrong or is the info written to a log file somewhere, if so where?
    Right click on start icon. Select Command Prompt (Admin) from the list. Command prompt should open. Then you can enter reagentc /info
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  3. Posts : 19
    Windows 10
       #13

    NavyLCDR said:
    MiniTool Partition Wizard free will explore just about any partition without having to assign it a drive letter and it will show system files that won't show up normally under Windows file explorer even if a drive letter is assigned.

    The thing with manufacturer's recovery partitions is that most of them require the manufacturer's proprietary recovery software to actually use them. Lot's of people keep these ~25 GB partitions on their hard drives after they upgrade to Windows 10 and, in reality, they would not have the manufacturer's software required to do anything with them.

    The first thing I do when I purchase a new off-the-shelf computer is boot it from a Macrium Reflect rescue disk and store an image of the hard drive on my NAS. Then I take a peek at the manufacturer's software load for about 24 hours, export the drivers, and then do a clean install of the OS I want on the computer without the manufacturer's bloatware by completely wiping the hard drive first. If I need to go back to manufacturer's software load, I restore the image I made from when the computer was new.
    Had look at the partitions using Partition Wizard Free. I could see the data in all of the partitions, with the exception of the partition sitting between my C; and D: drives which show 0 bytes of data and refused to open (see attached) - I only uploaded the main screen of the program as I did not want to clutter the forum with images of all of the partitions, but can upload images of data on the individual partitions if this would help. All the partitions I could open appear to contain recovery data but none of the file names made much sense.

    As I have no intention of going back to the original OEM Win 8 - I have a Win 10 recovery disk and as all the drivers that come with that work on my PC can I not simply delete all these partitions to free up the space?
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails HDD Arrangements-capture-1.jpg  
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 18,424
    Windows 11 Pro
       #14

    Exspextations said:
    As I have no intention of going back to the original OEM Win 8 - I have a Win 10 recovery disk and as all the drivers that come with that work on my PC can I not simply delete all these partitions to free up the space?
    You should be able to delete all of them except for the EFI System Partition. It is highly recommended to keep the active recovery partition as well (which will be ~500 MB in size) to retain functionality of the Windows 10 Recovery Environment menu should you need to boot into it. That is the info that reagentC /info will show - which partition is the active recovery partition. Then you will have to use MiniTool Partition Wizard Free to move the partitions that are remaining to take advantage of the free space created by deleting the old partitions.
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 1,579
    Windows 10 Pro
       #15

    A "clean" alternative here with a "clean" outcome: image entire disk to external media (with, for example, Macrium Reflect or something as reliable), then perform a clean Win10 install on the disk (i.e., deleting ALL partitions using Custom Install option).

    You'll have 4 partitions then, in order: 450MB recovery partition, 100 MB EFI system partition, 16 MB MSR, all the rest as C: partition with OS.

    Then restore the C: partition over top/in place of (overwriting) the clean installed C: partition. Then expand or shrink C: just enough to fit in the desired size of D: partition you want, restore D: partition and expand to suit.
      My Computer


  6. Posts : 19
    Windows 10
       #16

    NavyLCDR said:
    Right click on start icon. Select Command Prompt (Admin) from the list. Command prompt should open. Then you can enter reagentc /info
    The Reagentc /info data shows the recovery image location to be partition 8 which in my post to NavyLCDR is the 24 GB PVR_DRV. I presume therefore that I can delete partitions 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6 without problem and Partition 8, i.e. the OEM recovery partition if I do not intend to go back to the original delivered Win 8. Am I correct in my assumptions?
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails HDD Arrangements-reagentc-info.jpg  
      My Computer


  7. Posts : 1,579
    Windows 10 Pro
       #17

    Delete 8 and you'll have no advanced boot/ troubleshooting options. If you're OK with that as a price of getting rid of the PBR image, then go for it.

    Otherwise, you can get a lot more standard and less confusing partition layout with the clean install strategy - getting rid of the PBR partition along the way.
      My Computer


  8. Posts : 19
    Windows 10
       #18

    Word Man said:
    A "clean" alternative here with a "clean" outcome: image entire disk to external media (with, for example, Macrium Reflect or something as reliable), then perform a clean Win10 install on the disk (i.e., deleting ALL partitions using Custom Install option).

    You'll have 4 partitions then, in order: 450MB recovery partition, 100 MB EFI system partition, 16 MB MSR, all the rest as C: partition with OS.

    Then restore the C: partition over top/in place of (overwriting) the clean installed C: partition. Then expand or shrink C: just enough to fit in the desired size of D: partition you want, restore D: partition and expand to suit.
    It would appear that this is the route I may have to take. However, I rolled back my Win 10 a couple of days ago to Build 10240 after the April Patch Tuesday installed Build 1511 that completely screwed up my system. However, if I do a clean install, I presume that Win10 will install the latest build 1511 and that the recovery drive will be associated with this build - what happens when I overwrite this with a copy of my c:\ drive based upon Build 10240 - will this cause problem with the system in the event that I need to roll it back at some point? I will also have to backup my D:\ drive as this contains all my data which I always keep separate from the OS for security.

    Would just like to be clear on the consequences of making these changes to the system as I don't want to end up spending hours trying to sort out problems resulting from taking inappropriate action or having to reinstall all my other programs.
      My Computer


  9. Posts : 1,579
    Windows 10 Pro
       #19

    Exspextations said:
    It would appear that this is the route I may have to take. However, I rolled back my Win 10 a couple of days ago to Build 10240 after the April Patch Tuesday installed Build 1511 that completely screwed up my system. However, if I do a clean install, I presume that Win10 will install the latest build 1511 and that the recovery drive will be associated with this build - what happens when I overwrite this with a copy of my c:\ drive based upon Build 10240 - will this cause problem with the system in the event that I need to roll it back at some point? I will also have to backup my D:\ drive as this contains all my data which I always keep separate from the OS for security.

    Would just like to be clear on the consequences of making these changes to the system as I don't want to end up spending hours trying to sort out problems resulting from taking inappropriate action or having to reinstall all my other programs.
    The recovery drive and its functionality won't differ between build 10240 and build 10586. However, since your original OS partition is pointed to partition 8 for recovery that will have to be reset, i.e,. after restore to the clean installed partition, "reagentc /info" will probably come up with recovery disabled or partition not found - in that case, a simple "reagentc /enable" will find the recovery in partition 1 and update the pointer for you.

    As I advised you to image the entire disk, i.e., ALL partitions, you would already have included backing up your D: drive/partition and it'll be available for restore.

    As long as you START with a reliably imaged ENTIRE disk, you always have a way to get back to where you started from if things go pear-shaped on you.
      My Computer


  10. Posts : 18,424
    Windows 11 Pro
       #20

    Word Man said:
    Delete 8 and you'll have no advanced boot/ troubleshooting options. If you're OK with that as a price of getting rid of the PBR image, then go for it.

    Otherwise, you can get a lot more standard and less confusing partition layout with the clean install strategy - getting rid of the PBR partition along the way.
    I would never have guessed that partition 8 would be the active recovery partition. If it was my computer, I would do exactly as Word Man suggests. That will free up 24-25 GB of space. There is a way of creating your own Windows Recovery Environment partition as well so you could manually replace the 24 GB recovery partition with a 500 MB partition.
      My Computer


 

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