Will it use the same system reserved partition or create a new one?

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  1. Posts : 7,606
    Windows 10 Home 20H2
       #1

    Will it use the same system reserved partition or create a new one?


    Last week when I clean-installed 1607, a 500 MB system reserved partition was created. There had been no such partition when I was running 1511.

    Question 1: Next time when I clean-install Windows, will it use this same partition or create a new one?
    Question 2: Next time if I update Windows to a newer version, will it use this same partition or create a new one?
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  2. Posts : 42,734
    Win 10 Pro (22H2) (2nd PC is 22H2)
       #2

    Hello, what you do when you clean install is under your control. You want to install to unallocated space on your disk, so you delete unwanted partitions.

    A normal set of partitions for an EFI-based installation is
    Recovery (450Mb), System (16Mb), Windows, EFI (100Mb).
    Sizes may vary a bit.

    It seems that when upgrading (e.g. 1511 -> 1607) Windows uses some 500Mb of unallocated space to create a second Recovery partition. The old one is redundant, as I understand it. Perhaps that is left to support reverting to the old build. I've not researched it.

    The Windows partition is the same one on upgrading. You need about 20Gb (for Windows.old) + 10Gb spare.
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  3. Posts : 7,606
    Windows 10 Home 20H2
    Thread Starter
       #3

    dalchina said:
    Hello, what you do when you clean install is under your control. You want to install to unallocated space on your disk, so you delete unwanted partitions.
    Next time when I clean-install Windows, how can I prevent it from creating a new system reserved partition? How can I make it re-use the present system reserved partition?

    dalchina said:
    It seems that when upgrading (e.g. 1511 -> 1607) Windows uses some 500Mb of unallocated space to create a second Recovery partition. The old one is redundant, as I understand it.
    https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3086249
    According to the above, it seems that Windows uses the old system reserved partition during the upgrading.
    Am I right or wrong?
      My Computer


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

    Matthew Wai said:
    Next time when I clean-install Windows, how can I prevent it from creating a new system reserved partition? How can I make it re-use the present system reserved partition?
    The question is why is it so important to re-use the present system reserved partition? Is there something custom you have put in it that you don't want to lose? The best way to do a completely clean install is to delete every partition on the hard drive and install to the unallocated space. Windows setup will create a new system reserved partition. If you leave the old system reserved partition there before installing, Windows setup will likely use it, but it will also probably create a new recovery partition and you might end up with one more partition and more hard drive space used up than if you just installed to a completely unallocated disk.


    Matthew Wai said:
    https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3086249
    According to the above, it seems that Windows uses the old system reserved partition during the upgrading.
    Am I right or wrong?
    Correct.

    dalchina said:
    A normal set of partitions for an EFI-based installation is
    Recovery (450Mb), System (16Mb), Windows, EFI (100Mb).
    Sizes may vary a bit.
    @dalchina, since the OP has a 500MB System Reserve Partition, his computer is likely using legacy BIOS and MBR partitioned disk.
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 7,606
    Windows 10 Home 20H2
    Thread Starter
       #5

    NavyLCDR said:
    The question is why is it so important to re-use the present system reserved partition?
    If the present system reserved partition is not re-used, I will have to extend it into the unallocated space resulting from deleting the Windows partition and then delete the whole extended partition before clean installation.
    If I simply delete both partitions, will they automatically merge into a single unallocated space, into which Windows will be installed?

    NavyLCDR said:
    since the OP has a 500MB System Reserve Partition, his computer is likely using legacy BIOS and MBR partitioned disk.
    I confirm this.
      My Computer


  6. Posts : 13,896
    Win10 Version 22H2 Pro and Home, Win11 Pro and Home
       #6

    To avoid any confusion with partitions when doing a clean install, after doing a backup copy of any data I don't want to lose or that exists nowhere else, I use the free GPARTED LiveCD to wipe all partitions from the HDD putting it back to its as-shipped [from the factory] condition then do the clean install, sets all the defaults. I don't mess with the small partitions which usually are 500MB or less. But then my first computer back in '92 had a 120MB HDD, second upgrade was to a 210MB HDD and third was to 3x 345MB HDDs and it's been going that way ever since, always bigger, better, faster.
      My Computers


  7. Posts : 7,606
    Windows 10 Home 20H2
    Thread Starter
       #7

    Berton said:
    wipe all partitions from the HDD putting it back to its as-shipped [from the factory] condition
    I will not do that because many files are on drive D. I will only delete drive C, i.e. the Windows partition, and the system reserved partition. Will they automatically merge into a single unallocated space after the deletion?
      My Computer


  8. Posts : 13,896
    Win10 Version 22H2 Pro and Home, Win11 Pro and Home
       #8

    Matthew Wai said:
    I will not do that because many files are on drive D.
    The question would then be, is D: a partition on the only physical HDD in the system or is it a separate HDD? I use 2 physical HDDs [C: and D:] most of the time so as to keep my data stored separately from the Windows drive. By default at install time, my boot/system drive contains C: and has both an unnamed Basic 450MB Recovery partition and a System Reserved 100MB partition, neither has a drive letter assigned [by default] and do not show in File Explorer.
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  9. Posts : 7,606
    Windows 10 Home 20H2
    Thread Starter
       #9

    Berton said:
    The question would then be, is D: a partition on the only physical HDD in the system or is it a separate HDD?
    The former.
      My Computer


  10. Posts : 13,896
    Win10 Version 22H2 Pro and Home, Win11 Pro and Home
       #10

    In that case I'd leave well-enough alone in fear of screwing things up beyond the point of recovering. I find such small partitions are actually quite unimportant for normal use.
      My Computers


 

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