Hello everyone, in this article I will show you how to create a partition on your hard drive with two different ways. The first method is based on the use of third-party programs, the second - using the operating system. Both methods are equally effective. But the first will require searching and downloading the program, the second will require the latest versions of Windows, starting with Vista.
Before we begin.
Friends. I enter in a separate paragraph what should be written immediately. My fault, but better late than never: the ideal partitioning of a disk into several partitions is at the STAGE OF INSTALLING THE VERY FIRST SYSTEM. That is, at that moment when the disk is pristine and there are no partitions at all! The Windows Installer GUI allows you to do this without any problems. If you decide that there will be 2 or more copies of Windows on your computer, prepare for that IN ADVANCE. But, since most computers come with pre-installed operating systems, read on.
Why do you need to create multiple partitions?
There are several reasons, but I will name the most important for any user.
Reason one - safety. Having a single logical drive, in the event of a system failure, you risk losing access to all data and, most importantly, the usual system settings. Splitting the hard drive into two or more logical ones will allow you, by storing all important data on a specially dedicated partition, to save the data and save a lot of time on subsequent recovery. On the same disk you can store a copy of the system registry, restore points, etc.
Reason two – the ability to install a Windows backup on an additional logical drive. These can be copies of different or identical generations, there can be two, three or more. For what? It's safety again. In the event of failure of one Windows versions Without wasting time, you can use the capabilities of the second one before finding out the reasons for the crash of the main copy of Windows.
It's time to create a partition on your hard drive.
How to create a partition on a hard drive. First appointment. If you have Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, etc. This task is easily solved on the systems described. In some cases, the built-in Windows utility will not be enough, but for the current task it is enough.
TERMINOLOGY
The limitations of the MBR table may generally allow you to create only 4 partitions, assigning a Latin letter to each of them. First section ( Primery), which can be labeled as Active, will tell the BIOS which partition should contain system files systems that are needed for Windows boot. If the active partition also contains OS files, it is named as Bootable chapter.
The owner of our laptop already has two partitions on the experimental device. These are VistaOS and DATA. Your disks are probably called differently.
And we will create a third one. Let's click:
On the left side of the computer management window, select the item Disk management:
A partition map will appear on the right side. Let me remind you that we already have two. The system is stored on one, we will not touch it, but we will pay attention to the second.
Right-click on it and select Compress volume...
Specify the size of the future partition. I will select approximately 25 GB (I will indicate 25000 MB from the keyboard) and click on the button Compress.
Oops! A new piece has appeared. But this is not a full-fledged disc yet.
Let's format it properly. Right-click on it and select the command Create a simple volume... The Create Simple Volume Wizard appears. All we need to do is follow the instructions and click OK. In the settings you can select the letter of the future volume, I left the suggested F. It will take a few minutes to format the disk and that’s it.
A new logical drive has appeared in the system New Volume F about 25 GB in size, which has nothing to do with other disks.
How to create a partition on a hard drive. Reception second. We will use FREE program for working with partitions. A lot of them have already been released, and all of them are quite suitable for home use in terms of functionality. I will offer you the first one I come across called AOMEI. You can download the version AOMEI Partition Assistant or check for a later version on the manufacturer's website. The advantages of using programs like this are advanced functionality, which I advise you to take a closer look at.
- Install the program on your computer. This won't cause any problems. Agree to all terms and conditions and launch.
- Yours with all sections will appear in the program window. The owner has already created one of the sections. So let's create another partition using the program AOMEI Partition Assistant. To repeat the experience, by the way, I had to roll back to the initial stage, when the hard drive was divided into two logical partitions.
As in the first case, we will take a bite from drive D, on which NON-SYSTEM files are stored. As in the first case, we will bite off about 25 GB of space.
- Open the program and in its main window you will see already familiar features with two logical sections:
- The steps are the same as in the Windows version. Select a free disk and right-click on it. Let's choose a team Resize partition and indicate with the mouse directly in the window the desired size of the future partition.
- Unallocated space will appear. We will immediately create a section in it. By default, it will be assigned the same letter F.
- In the upper left part of the program, click on the button Apply with a green tick. Agree to all changes and click OK. In a couple of minutes everything is ready.
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Some users do not know how to split one disk into several logical partitions, but this can be very useful. If you have several logical partitions, you can store information not on the system volume. In this case, the risk of losing it when reinstalling the system or formatting the disk is sharply reduced. This article will tell you several ways on how you can create a second volume D, both using standard tools and using third-party software.
Using Disk Management to create a new partition
The built-in disk management utility will allow you to perform all the necessary actions, and this program is present in all the latest versions of Windows. To run it you need pressWin+R enter diskmgmt.msc.
In the window that opens you need select drive C(or another section that you want to divide), you need to right-click on it and select the item “ Shrink Volume" In the next window you need to write the size of the new volume D; according to the standard, all free space is indicated there. But it’s worth leaving at least ten gigabytes of the system disk free space for new programs and system files. 
After this it will start formation process. At the end of it, unallocated space will appear on which you need to right-click. 
Here you just have to select the item marked in the picture. In the next window you need to select letter for the new volume, in our case it is D. 
Then it was suggested write the name volumes, and also select the file system and cluster. Here everything can be left as default. After this, formatting will be performed and the new logical partition will become available for use.
Using the command line to partition disks
Separation can also be done using the console. To do this, you will have to open it with administrator rights and enter the following operators:
Application of Aomei Partition Assistant Standard
There are quite a lot of applications that help manage logical partitions, as well as cut off and create new partitions. You can find many examples on the Internet, but here we talk about one utility. After the user downloads and installs it, you need to go to Main menu, select the desired hard drive, then right-click and select “”. 
In the next section you will have to indicate the number of megabytes for a new section. 
Then all you have to do is click OK, and then Go.
After this, the device will reboot and you can use the new partition.
I am glad to welcome you again to my blog! We continue to deal with hard drives and today we’ll talk in more detail about things that seem to lie on the surface. When formatting media and marking it up, many do not pay attention to the phrases “simple volume”, or “compound volume”, “main”, “active”...
As a rule, when buying a computer or laptop, everything is already done for us and the disks are divided into volumes. But when we ourselves try to do something with our equipment (purchase, replacement, or just decided to get smart), problems arise - we made the wrong partition active, the system stopped loading, and so on. Today I will have a little theory in my release, because I can’t live without it. Read, take into account.
A simple hard disk volume is...
It all started with good old MS DOS from Microsoft. It was also called “disk operating system” (DOS). After all, there were computers back then that also ran on tape cassettes. The history of MS DOS began in 1981, its legacy is preserved in Windows 10. This is interesting to us primarily because it was Microsoft that invented partitions (or volumes).
The fact is that at that time MS DOS could “see” and use a relatively small area of the hard drive. And they were produced “large” (by the standards of that time), the space was excessive. This was one of the reasons that Microsoft came up with the idea of dividing hard drives into separate volumes, which became, as it were, separate disks for this operating system.
Later, when more perfect systems all this was useful. Capacious devices were needed. Requirements for fault tolerance, speed, and reliability of information storage have increased. Progress has led to the emergence of such concepts as “simple”, “composite”, “alternating” sections.
A simple volume is the most common phenomenon in nature. Take one hard drive and create a volume(s) (or partition). This is how everything is done on our home computers.
The advantages of this solution are that it is simple, the cheapest, and quite suitable for a home computer. System performance is limited by the read/write speed of your hard drive. Fault tolerance with this solution has the lowest indicator. Hard drive failure is a common occurrence.
How to create a simple volume on a hard drive?
Such a simple volume is quite suitable for a home computer. The loads are small. You can easily create it in at least three ways. This is most often and easiest to do when Windows installation. The second method is to partition the hard drive with a third-party program (for example, Acronis), using the operating system. We have already discussed the first method in this article. The second method is most preferable for new disks, before installing operating systems, or if you decide to be clever, for example, placing a bootloader on a flash drive.
Using the installed operating system (third method) they make basic, logical, and extended ones when it is necessary to create partitions for storing information. This is done through the Disk Management snap-in or using the command line.
Creating a simple Acronis disk director volume
Let's launch our Acronis Disk Director. The program will display all connected devices and the partitions available on them. In this case, we have a new hard drive connected and it is not initialized.
To initialize the disk, press the appropriate button...
Consider markup styles when creating sections. IN in this example classic scheme - MBR. If you already have markup in GPT style, then new ones should also be in GPT style. To accept the changes, click “Apply pending operations”:
Now you can proceed directly to creating volumes. Click on the link that appears " Create Volume«:
Our volume will be a basic, logical volume for storing data. Therefore, we need to determine its size, file system, select a letter and label (for example, I put the label of the logical drive as DATA and the system drive as Sys).
Then click “Finish”, and then again “Apply pending operations”.
Creating a volume via the command line (cmd)
The need to create a volume via the command line may arise in case of problems, or you can do it out of habit :), as you like. In the first case, we launch the command line from the installation distribution. In the second, through Start you need to launch the command line as Administrator:
Launch the Diskpart utility (we will work with partitions through it). It is not hard. We will enter instructions into the command line one by one. Our first team will be DISKPART:
With the next command we should get a list of installed disks. I currently have two connected:
On disk “zero” I have a system, the other (“1”) I need to split into partitions. This is what I will tell the program with the command select disk 1:
How to make a simple hard disk volume the primary one?
The primary volume is the partition on which the operating system files reside. In Windows, if you create volumes through the command line or through Disk Management, the first three volumes created are always primary. In order for the system to boot, it must be placed on the main partition.
If you select a logical volume, the system will automatically convert it to primary when installing Windows. We continue to work in command line. Enter the command create partition primari to create a main partition:
Partitions can only be created if there is unallocated space on it. If your disk is already partitioned, then most likely you will not be able to create partitions:
If the device is new, then creating partitions will be very easy. But, in my opinion, in Windows it is easier to do this through the Disk Management snap-in, everything is more clear there.
Making a hard drive volume active in Windows 7, Windows 10
Windows programs automate the volume creation process to a certain extent. When installing the system, it itself splits the main volume into additional partitions, copies the boot loader there, and the system sees this partition as active. And the system won’t let you do anything else. In the same Diskpart, enter the command List volume
...and we get a list of created volumes on all connected devices. Special programs are another matter. For example, Acronis Disk Director allows you to create partitions for any operating system, in the order in which you need it. Here you just need to click on the selected volume with the mouse and make it active:
In the Disk Management snap-in (Windows 7, Windows 10), you can also select and make any partition active, even on a flash drive.
Just keep in mind that there can only be one active volume in the system. It is from there that the download occurs. If you already have one, then after creating a new one it will no longer be bootable. The letters of other drives may also change, and some programs may stop working. This rare option is used in both Windows and Linux to increase the security of data access.
Anyone who has such a flash drive will be able to boot the computer. If you choose such a scheme, then of course it will be better to make all the settings initially during installation rather than redoing an already existing structure.
For installation of a second operating room system required Creation additional section on your hard drive. Simply put, we need to visually divide the physical disk into two logical ones (one for Windows, for example, the other for Linux or MacOS). This method is widely used in education. Nowadays, schools and institutes install Linux (due to the inexpensive license and virus invulnerability) and the familiar Windows for ease of use. On a home computer, problems often occur (especially for people who work more with software) when one or another program cannot start or simply “slows down”. Due to ignorance, similar problems are always attributed to a “malfunction” of the program itself. Not at all. It's all about incompatibility with the operating system. Therefore, it is not harmful to install a second OS for confident use of the software in the case when the native “OS” cannot cope with the task.In addition to how to install a second system, hard drive shared also directly to unload the system. Why unload it? The thing is that Windows eventually “scatters” parts of files, both temporary and permanent, across the entire logical disk. This logical division of the file always occurs. But if the system was not cleared of temporary files for a long time and did not tolerate cleaning the registry, and indeed if it is standing for a long time, then many new files " can't find a place", since the old logical data continues to remain on the disk, although it is no longer used. Therefore it would be appropriate partitioning one large disk a few small ones so that increase system performance and do not clog your memory with gigabytes of unnecessary information. Another advantage of this method is that the files will be arranged “on shelves” (one disk, for example, for photos, and the other for installing games and other large programs).
How the disk is partitioned.
The process of dividing a disk into volumes cannot be fully described in words, but some actions must be described at least in order to have the most superficial understanding of it. So, it was said above that the disk is only physically a shiny and flat circle, but visually it is represented by many logical memory cells merged into a single whole until it is displayed on the computer one logical drive. After separation, part of the cells loses all connection with the rest and becomes an independent disk.For disk partitioning additional software required. It can certainly be downloaded from the Internet. And there are as many such programs as there is information about methods of division. The network is literally teeming with discussions and questions on this topic. But most of the methods provided can simply be called inadequate. Firstly, the disk will have to format, which will lead to loss of information recorded on it(there is, of course, the option to copy it; but again, you will need Portable Hard Drive, which not everyone owns). Actually, this article will tell you how create a partition without formatting.
How to create a partition on your hard drive without formatting
Let's get started right away. First, close all windows and active programs, such as Skype, Torrent, ICQ.Click on the " START"(the button is located in the lower left corner of the desktop). An interactive menu will pop up.
- Next select “ Control Panel» by clicking the left mouse button. A window with computer management icons will appear on the desktop.
- Double-click the left mouse button to open “ Administration" The window will refresh.
- Of the seven shortcuts that appear, you need to double-click to open one - “ Computer management».
- On the left side of the pop-up window you need to find the tab “ Disk management» and double-click on it.
The existing ones will be highlighted on the right side. this moment disks and their characteristics. Carefully select the drive on which you want to create the partition.
One right-click on the selected disk will bring up the disk's context menu.
- In the context menu, left-click on the item “ Shrink Volume».
The scan of free disk space will begin.
- Next, you need to enter the amount of free disk space (it will be the maximum for the future partition).
- Click the button Compress" The process will take up to several minutes depending on the size of the disk.
- A new section has appeared. But he is not yet ready for full-time work.
- Right-click on the newly created partition. From the context menu, select " Formatting" The process of formatting the empty space into a usable disk partition will begin, which will be assigned its own letter.
- The computer must be restarted for all changes to take effect.
Please note that when choosing a size you need to be extremely careful to avoid possible erasure of files. The main advantage of the described method is that no need to format the entire disk.
