Posted: 4/23/2009 6:24:40 PM EDT
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Just replaced the 30 gig drive in my laptop with a 250 gig drive. I saved an image of my original drive to a borrowed external drive, swapped drives and used the software that came with the external drive to reload the image.
Machine is back up and running but there is a problem. My new drive shows up as a 30 gig drive.. WTF?? Is there any way to make the computer realize that it has 220 more gigs to store stuff in without wiping the new drive and starting the hours long process all over?? ETA some specifics. Dell Inspiron 2200 laptop, Intel celeron processor, Windows XP pro. The reason for imaging the drive inetead of just reloading programs is I have some programs that I no longer have the discs for (mostly control system programming software that I have had for years). It would be a VERY long process to try to locate and reload those programs. I do have a legit copy of XP pro. |
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Quoted:
Find a copy of Partition Magic and extend it... +1 Simplest solution is to extend the primary partition. Partition Magic can do it and leave all files unharmed. I think there are other partition/formatting utilities but I've only used Partition Magic and found it pretty easy. |
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The easiest way would be to go into Control Panel ––> Admin Tools ––> Computer Management ––> go down the list and click on Disk Management.
You should see a Disk 0 (your hard drive) and then the partitions on that drive. You should have a 30gb C drive and the remainder as "unallocated" Right click on "unallocated", select new partition, and follow the prompts. You'll end up with a 30gb C drive and a larger D drive. Its not one big drive, but its easy to do. The nice thing about using more than 1 partition is that if you ever need to reinstall, you can copy all your data to the D drive then blow away the C drive, reinstall, copy back over. Also, keeping your system files in a small primary partition at the front of your HD keeps all your windows files on the fastest part of your hard drive. |
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Quoted:
The easiest way would be to go into Control Panel ––> Admin Tools ––> Computer Management ––> go down the list and click on Disk Management. You should see a Disk 0 (your hard drive) and then the partitions on that drive. You should have a 30gb C drive and the remainder as "unallocated" Right click on "unallocated", select new partition, and follow the prompts. You'll end up with a 30gb C drive and a larger D drive. Its not one big drive, but its easy to do. The nice thing about using more than 1 partition is that if you ever need to reinstall, you can copy all your data to the D drive then blow away the C drive, reinstall, copy back over. Also, keeping your system files in a small primary partition at the front of your HD keeps all your windows files on the fastest part of your hard drive. I had no idea that you could do this without an outside program (makes sense now that I see how). Good to know as I will be replacing some of the drives in my desktop soon. Thanks |
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Still have the 30GB drive? Hook them both up, and use Acronis True Image to clone the drive. I just did this with a 160GB and new 250GB. The 250GB booted just fine, everything still installed, just 100 more gigs of free space. It's exactly what you need.
You can download a free edition, it works for 15 days after install, but you only need it once. |