Just bought a new Toshiba Laptop, which has 320GB HDD, but it has been partitioned so that C: drive is entitled 'Windows' and has 126 of 148 GB free, and D: is entitled Data, and has 140GB of 148 GB free.

Does this seem odd, as I would have thought the windows partition would need minimal free space for service packs and updates etc, with the most part being saved for Data?
To be fair I wouldnt have a clue how to re-balance the available space to favour the data D: drive so any help or advice would be much appreciated!

 

Actually once its done updates and installed software, the C:\ partition can fill up quite rapidly. But you can probably reduce that partition down to about 70-80gb without any worries. But it does depend on what software you intend to run and how space hungry it is.

Toshiba did a bit of whoopsy with their configuration on some laptops....yours will probably be the same: All user files such as "My Documents" and all its associated folders (my pictures, favourites etc) still saves on C:\ drive. So you may want to check that out and fix it to suit (makes backing up and OS -reinstalls easier if everything personal is on D:\ ).

You can adjust partition sizes by typing "computer management" into the search bar. Open the console, then go to "storage", then "disk management".

Right click on the c:\ partition and click "shrink volume", then set an appropritae size. Once its shrunk, you can right click on d:\ drive and click "expand volume".

 

Super smashing great! Thanks for that Ali.

 

Right, looking into moving all the Users Folders to D: drive, as detailed above by Ali-B, can I just cut and paste it to D: from C: and will all the saved files etc. then automatically go there?

 

Nope can't just copy and paste, on windows xp you need to right click on the 'my documents' folder and then click on the target tab and click move, then choose where you want to put it.

 

Myles - I got a newish Toshiba laptop with a similar partition set up so this thread is useful for me.

One problem I had (unresolved) is that Windows updates seemed to screw up the machine, crashing etc. I was told that there is sometimes a Toshiba/Windows match clash. I have no idea if this is true but wondered if you had had any problems? David

 

That'll wipe the data though in XP, does it keep the data intact in win7? If not partition magic is your friend.

 

Op said it was a new laptop. So I assumed it would be Win 7 or Vista,

But yes, if its XP you need to Use partition Magic.

That way will work, but the links to "my documnets and "my picture" etc will still be on drive C:

IIRC to change the store location of my documents/my pictures/downloads etc, just right click on the relevent one in the start menu, click "properties", then click the "location" tab. There will be an option to move it to a different location. Win7 should be similar, but I'm going on memory here though as I'm currently on a Vista PC.

Can't remember with XP; its been that long since I've last used it .

If you have multiple users using the same laptop, bear in mind each user has its own documents folder. Its best to organise them into folders named the same as the username for easy reference.

 

Sorry, I am on Win 7

 

I have stuffed this up.
I have finished up with 19.53 Gb as unallocated space.
How can I return this space back onto my D drive ?

 

I think I have corrected it - I'm useless at this stuff , but I can't help but meddle!

 

You should have left it they way it was. The reason they did this was so that all your programs are installed into the Windows partition and your personal files go into the other one.

Once you start installing large programs like, Adobe Creative Suite and various games you'll see that this partition starts to rapidly decrease in size.