Split the disk into 2 disks. How to partition a hard drive: three easy ways

At any time when using the Windows 7 operating system, you may need to divide the hard drive on which it is installed into several volumes. The most common option is simple forgetfulness, when at the beginning of installing a new OS the user did not create anything on the computer except drive C.

We all know that keeping, figuratively speaking, all your eggs in one basket is very risky. Therefore, we try to follow the recommendation: there should be at least two partitions on the PC. One is for your operating system and necessary programs. The second is for optional add-ons and storage of personal data. Such separation very often helps to save information in the event of problems with the hard drive.

If it so happens that your computer has only one disk, which already contains a lot of important data, including Windows 7 itself, dividing it into several volumes becomes a difficult task. After all, we need not only to get separate disk space, but also to take care of the integrity and performance of the already installed software. This can be achieved using the built-in tools of Windows 7.

Step by step instructions

1. From the Start menu, select Computer and right-click on the icon. Select "Manage" from the drop-down list.

2. The Computer Management window will open. Here, find the “Storage Devices” item and select the “Disk Management” sub-item.

3. In this tab you can see all the disks of your computer. Please note that their numbering starts not from one, but from zero.

In addition to the HDD itself, this list also includes the disk drive (if it is not currently empty) and all storage media connected to the PC - flash drives, external hard drives. Therefore, if they bother you and confuse you in the upcoming work, it is better to disconnect all unnecessary things in advance.

4. We are interested in Disk 0, marked as “Main”. Before you start dividing it, go to “Computer” and check how much space is already occupied on it. Let's say the total volume of our disk is 300 GB, of which 50 GB are already occupied. Since you don't plan to stop using this volume in the future, you need to leave enough free space for data that will accumulate over time. Therefore, the optimal option would be either a division into two equal parts, or, in the case we are describing, 100 GB for drive C and 200 for the future drive D.

5. Let's proceed to the division itself. Having selected Disk 0 in the list, right-click on it and select “Shrink Volume”. The system will poll the selected volume to determine available space for compression, which may take some time.

6. A window will open in front of you with the “Size of compressed space” parameter available for change. By default, the maximum possible size is indicated here - that is, all the free space that is currently on your single disk. But we must also leave some margin for the future section C. To understand what it will be, look at the “Total size after compression” parameter. Now, by specifying the size of your future volume in megabytes, you can choose the optimal ratio between the two partitions.

7. Once you have made your selection, click the Compress button. Now Disk 0 will be smaller, and an area marked as “Unallocated” will appear next to it. This is the unoccupied volume we received. By right-clicking on it and selecting the “Create simple volume” option, you can easily create a new partition.

Partitioning a hard drive is a way to organize information storage, comparable to putting things on shelves in a closet.

In this article you will learn how to partition your hard drive and why.

Most users prefer to divide disks into 2-3 partitions for the following reasons:

• so as not to mix operating system and personal files in case of OS reinstallation;
• for the convenience of manual search for information;
• to install more than one operating system on a computer;
• so that each user, if there are several of them, has his own “corner” for personal files;
• to hide some information from other PC users (along with the section).

Pay attention! When installing operating systems, service partitions are created - boot, recovery, for the swap file, etc., which are not visible in Explorer. These areas are hidden because changing or deleting their contents disrupts the operation of the OS.

Some believe that it is necessary to partition the hard drive into partitions: this way, they say, personal files will not be damaged in the event of a system failure, they will be less fragmented, and, therefore, opened faster.

In fact, the files will not disappear anywhere, even if the OS crashes completely.

And this will not affect performance, especially since modern systems defragment themselves without user intervention.

On the contrary, the system partition tends to fill up quickly, and if there is not enough space on it, the computer will first slow down and then stop loading altogether due to the fact that the system has no room to expand.

Do you think you still need an additional section? Then read how to create it.

Two ways to partition a disk in Windows 7, 8, 10

Capabilities of the installed system

Starting with Windows 7, you can partition disk space using the OS itself, both during installation and after.

There is only one condition: when dividing an existing partition, it is important that there is no less free space in the part being divided than in the part that will be separated.

Let's look at how to divide a hard drive into partitions in a running Windows 10.

• Go to the context menu of the Start button and launch Disk Management.
• Open the context menu of the section you will be splitting. Click Shrink Volume.
• The window that opens after this shows the total size of the compressed area and the space available for compression. From the last one, select a part that will be a new section.
  As you remember, it should not exceed half of the value specified here. Then click the “Compress” button.

• In the wizard window, specify the size of the new volume. If you leave the default value (which is the entire area of ​​unallocated space), the entire area you separated will become a new partition.
  If you specify a lower value, one part will become a volume and the other will remain unallocated. Click Next.

• Assign a letter to the new volume if you want it to appear in Explorer, or mount it as a folder. If you decide to do this later, select “Do not assign drive letter or path.”

• Next, the wizard will offer to format the volume and assign a label to it. A label is a short name for a section that explains what is there. If desired, leave this line blank.

After formatting, the unallocated space will become a full-fledged partition.

Creating a volume during Windows installation

Creating new partitions during Windows installation differs from the method we discussed above in that the shared disk must first be deleted, that is, completely cleared of information.

And then build a new partition structure from the unallocated space.

The breakdown is made at the stage when the program asks you to indicate the location where the OS will be installed. What to do next:

• In the "Where do you want to install Windows?" window. Click the Disk Setup button.

• Mark the partition you are going to split and delete it. Instead, unoccupied space will appear.

• Click the “Create” button (meaning, create a section), specify the desired size and click “Apply”. If the partition being created does not take up all the unallocated space, repeat the operation until there is no unallocated space left on the disk.

Question from a user

Hello. Tell me, I bought a new laptop and it has one hard drive “C:/”. Is it possible to divide it into two disks (I used to have this on my computer), one for the system, the other for files.

It is highly desirable without data loss and system reinstallation. Laptop - Asus (I can't say exactly the model), OS - Windows 10.

Good day everyone!

A fairly typical situation that usually occurs when buying a new laptop or computer. Of course, there is no crime in this, but using a computer with several local hard drives (partitions) is more convenient!

Local drive "C:/"

Imagine the situation: the system has crashed and needs to be reinstalled. If you have one local drive “C:/”, then you will have to first save/transfer all the files, and then install the system. And if you have only Windows and programs on the “C:/” drive, and all documents on another local drive “D:/” (for example), then you will “instantly” reinstall the system and get your PC working properly (and the documents on the "D:/" drive will remain intact, because when installing Windows, only one partition of the disk on which you install the system will be formatted - that is, the "C:/" drive) .

In this article, I will look at a way to partition (or partition) a hard drive in Windows without losing data (perhaps this is the key condition!), and without installing additional software.

How to partition a disk // through disk management

Disk Management- the most necessary tool for working with disks, which is available in all popular versions of Windows 7/8/8.1/10

Every modern version of Windows has a special built-in tool for working with disk drives: hard drives, flash drives, solid-state drives, etc. This tool is called "Disk Management" (which is logical).

Most often it is used in cases : when a disk or flash drive is not visible, when you need to format the media, when you need to resize hard drive partitions (our case), when you need to change the drive letter, etc.

So, below we’ll look at how to make two from one local drive “C:” of 110 GB: “C:” and “G:” (all data will remain on drive “C:” safe and sound. In fact, we’ll just take part of the free space on the “C:” drive for the new “G:” partition. See the screenshot below, and everything will be clear).

Was (left, 1 disk), now (right, 2 disks) // data is in place

How to open Disk Management:

Now, in fact, you can start partitioning the disk...

1) The first thing you need to do is decide which partition of the disk you want to take away free space for the new partition. In my example, I will take away free space from the “C:” drive (you can do this from any other drive).

Note! Please note that on the system disk, in addition to the "C:" drive, there are several partitions necessary for system recovery (in my case, 300 and 100 MB). I'll give you one simple piece of advice: to avoid problems, just ignore them and don't delete/edit them!

After selecting a section, right-click on it and select the function in the pop-up context menu (as in the screenshot below).

Request space for compression

3) Now you need to specify size of compressible space (i.e. the number of free MB on the local disk that will be given to another disk).

In the example below (see screenshot), the size of the compressed space is 30000 MB (number 1. Those. essentially specify the size of the new partition being created ), and the total size after compression is 83494 (number 2. This is how much disk space you will have left, from which you take free space ).

Size of compressible space

4) When the compression operation is completed, a “black” rectangle should appear on your disk with unallocated space (i.e., a new disk partition that needs to be formatted).

To do this, simply right-click on this section (see screenshot below), and select from the menu.

6) In the next step, specify the drive letter (any free one).

7) Last point: you need to specify the file system and set the volume label. I recommend choosing NTFS , volume label you can ask any (this is the drive name you will see when you log into my computer/this computer ) , and check the box next to the item "Quick Format" (as in the picture below).

8) Confirm the entered settings and parameters.

Actually, after waiting a few seconds, you will see that the partition will be formatted and you can start using it (like any other disk). Now it will be visible in "my computer/this computer".

How to get everything back: merging two sections into one

Let’s assume that your task is the opposite: to combine two sections into one (see the visual example in the screenshot below). For my example, I will use all the same disk partitions that I used in the first part of the article.

It was (on the left, 2 disks), now (on the right, 1 disk) - the disk is combined

1) The first thing you need to do is copy and transfer ALL DATA from the disk partition that you want to attach. For example, if you want to add a “G:” partition to the “C:” drive, then copy all the data from the “G:” partition to other media (at least to the same “C:” drive).

2) After that, on the volume “G:” (in disk management), right-click and select the function "Delete volume" . Important! All data on this disk partition will be deleted!

3) By the way, Disk Management is a fairly advanced program, so it will also warn you that the data will be deleted (screen below).

4) After the volume deletion operation, you should see unallocated space (with a black rectangle, as in the screenshot below) . Now this unallocated space can be attached to another disk partition, for example, to the "C:" drive.

To do this, simply right-click on the “C:” drive partition and select from the context menu (as in the screenshot below).

5) Now all that remains is to select the volume that we recently deleted and add it to the “C:” drive. In general, everything is quite simple (screenshot below)...

Mission accomplished!

Note. If you do not have a hard drive, but an SSD (solid state), then all the steps presented above will be performed in a similar way.

Addition. For formatting, partitioning a disk, changing partitions, etc. there are a number of special programs: Acronis Disk Director, Partition Master Free, AOMEI Partition Assistant, etc. They make many operations easier and faster. Therefore, if the functionality presented in disk management , it won’t be enough for you, I recommend using one of these programs. I do not consider them in this article, because... I think that for the task at hand, the “disk management” capabilities are more than enough...

If the list of disks only contains the item Unallocated space, this means there is not a single partition on the hard drive. To partition your hard drive, click the corresponding button in the field that appears Size enter the volume capacity in megabytes and select Apply.

How to partition a hard drive. The process of creating a new partition

In order to partition a hard drive, a system partition is first created, therefore, a dialog box will open on the screen in which the system will ask you to create a partition. And so, we need to create two sections in unallocated space:

1. Select the disk and press Disk setup.

3. Here you are not asked to create a partition on this disk. The figure below shows that by default the entire volume of our hard drive is displayed. And we need to make two disks: Local disk "C" and Local disk "D"

4. In order to create Disk C, enter in the Size window: as much as you need. In my case it will be 50 GB or 51200 MB - click Apply. After Windows will offer to create an additional partition in which it will store system files, click OK.

5. The following figure shows that windows has created a hidden partition to store system files. This section will not be displayed on your computer in any way. And section 2 (Main) is the section that we just created. Next you need to create another partition for Local Disk "D" .

6. Highlight Unallocated disk space 0 and follow the link Create.

7. Windows will offer the remaining free space to create a partition, which is what we need. Click Apply to create Local Disk "D"

8. Now we have divided the hard drive into two parts, now we can continue

We talked about how to create a bootable AOMEI PE Builder Live CD. In this article, I decided to tell you how to partition a hard drive using Windows and the free AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition program.

Why share a hard drive at all? Many laptops and computers are sold with an unbroken hard drive, i.e. exists on disk only one sectionC: for the system and data and additional service sections for programs from laptop manufacturers.

There is a saying: “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” The same is the case with your hard drive in a computer, where your operating system (Windows XP, 7, 8, 10) and your data (documents, photos, music, movies and other data) stored on one partition Your disk. This is not good, because if there is an error on the C: partition (C: drive), all data on this partition is at risk, including your data. Secondly, when reinstalling Windows, if you have only one partition, you need to copy all your data from this partition to another place, which takes considerable time if the volume is large and there is not always an external hard drive or a large flash drive where this data can be copied. And thirdly, it is always convenient to have two or more partitions (disks) for separation systems and data. In this article, I will tell you and show you how to divide your hard drive into two partitions (drive C and drive D). There is no particular difficulty in this, but you need to be careful, as there is a risk of losing data, but there is always a risk of losing in our lives but if you read this article to the end, everything will become clear even to a child. But it will be better if you create a data backup in advance, as I described how to do this. So let's get started...

How to partition a hard drive using meansWindows

Friends, to partition a hard drive using Windows you need to go to “ Computer management" In Windows 8, to do this, right-click in the lower left corner of the screen and select “ Disk Management»

In Windows 7, go to the menu “ Start" and right-click on “ Computer" and in the context menu select " Control", then select " Disk Management»

The window “ Disk Management" We see that the hard drive of our computer (laptop) is divided into partitions. In this case, two partitions: reserved by the system (350 MB), on which Windows boot files are located, and system partition C: (24 GB), on which the Windows system is installed.

Your disk may be divided into three or even four partitions (depending on the laptop model), this does not change the essence, since these partitions are most likely inaccessible to you and are used for laptop manufacturers' utilities.

We are interested in section C: (marked in red in the photo), we must divide it (split) into two parts (section C: and section D:)

Don’t be surprised that in the photo I have a small hard drive (25 GB), since I am showing the whole process on a virtual machine where a hard drive of this size is installed, while for you all actions will take place on a physical computer or laptop. But this does not change the process of partitioning the hard drive. All pictures are clickable.

Right-click on section C: and select “ Compress volume...»

The system polls the hard disk volume to determine the space for compression

In the next window indicate the size compressible space in MB, that is, we indicate how much we will compress the partition so that we can then allocate this space for a new disk partition and press the button “ Compress" We mean that the size of the compressed space is indicated in MB (megabytes), so if you want, for example, to create a new partition of 250 GB (gigabytes), then multiply this figure by 1024 (in 1 GB - 1024 MB), we get 250 * 1024 = 256000 MB.

We also take into account that the system may not give us so much space, since it is already occupied by data.

And one more thing: standard Windows disk management tools can become stubborn and not give as much space as you “ask” for, although you have it free. This can be caused by a number of reasons, one of which is fragmentation of data on this partition. In this case, you need to use special disk management programs, one of which I describe further in this article. Let's read, don't get distracted :)

After compressing the partition, we see that now we have partition C: it has become smaller and additional unallocated space has appeared...

Now we need to create a partition from this unallocated space; to do this, right-click on it and select “ Create a simple volume...»

The Simple Volume Creation Wizard window appears, in which we click “ Next»

We indicate the size of our volume in MB and click “ Next»

Note:

We assign a letter to our new partition (disk). Click " Next»

Let's format our new section with the option " Quick formatting", click " Next»

We see that the wizard has completed creating the volume (partition) with the parameters that we set at the beginning.. Click the button “ Ready»

We see our two partitions in the disk management window: the reduced partition C: and the new partition E:

Voila! Let's go to " My computer"and we see our created additional disk

This is how you can partition a hard drive using Windows, but this method is not always suitable or does not always work properly, so we will look at another option for managing hard drives, this is the multifunctional and free program AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition. With it we will do the same thing and in addition I will show its other main functions.

How to partition a hard drive with a free program

To install the program AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition, go to the official website of the program: and click “ DownloadFreeware»

Click the button " Download Now»

The program will begin downloading to your computer. After downloading, run this file to install

Installing the program is simple, see the screenshots (pictures are clickable)…

To scroll through the pictures, click " Back" or " Forward»

After installation, run the program AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition

Main program window

We see that the C: partition (C: drive) is large and you can “unfasten” the second partition from it. Usually for drive C: a partition of 60-150 GB is enough, I usually leave 80 GB.

Now what are we going to do. We will shrink the C: drive (change the partition), and use the freed up space for a new partition (D: drive). What do we need for this? This program is both a bubble and attentiveness.

So, right-click on section C: and select “ Resize partition»

Enter a new partition size. To do this, “grab” the right circle of the section with the left mouse button and move it to the left... Or indicate the size of the section in numbers in the field “ Partition size»

About the same as in the photo below. I changed the size of partition C: to 80 GB. Click " OK»

Now in the main program window we see that our disk has unallocated space for a new partition(s). Let's use this 🙂 and create a new partition in this disk space. To do this, right-click on the unallocated space and select “ Creating a section»

We indicate the size of our new partition, the program by default offers all the free space, select the drive letter and click “ OK»

Note: If you want to create more than one partition, then indicate the desired partition less than the recommended maximum, and use the rest of the space for one more partition.

To apply all these actions, you need to click the " Apply»

The window “ Deferred operations", where the program shows what operations it will perform on our hard drive before reaching the final result. If you agree with the actions of the program, click " Go»

The program requires a reboot, agree and click “ Yes»

After rebooting, the program waits 10 seconds. We do not press anything during this time. If you want to cancel, press any key...

Let’s make sure again, go to “ My computer"and rejoice!

Well, did you like the free version of the program? AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition?. I liked it. In addition to the fact that the program can divide disks, I will list a number of its main functions:

• Migration of the operating system to SSD/HDD drives;
• Increase, change, move, merge sections;
• Copying a disk/partition;
• Creating, deleting, formatting partitions;
• Creating a bootable CD;
• MBR recovery;
• Convert from MBR to GPT disk and back without data loss;
• Partition recovery;
• Disk surface testing;
• Aligning partitions and speeding up disks, especially SSD disks;
• Converting the FAT/FAT32 file system to NTFS

The program supports all types of storage devices: HDD/SSD hard drives with MBR/GPT disk partition styles, RAID arrays, flash drives.

Here is my video on how to partition a hard drive using the free program AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition

Competition “Like - get a key”!

Friends, there is paid version programs, . In the paid version of the program, in addition to the standard functions described above, additional functions are available:

• Converting a partition from primary to logical and vice versa;
• Distributing free space from a partition to another partition;
• Creating and working with dynamic disk partitions;
• Convert a dynamic disk to a basic disk;
• Changing the partition type;
• Changing the hard drive serial number;
• Free technical support

Full list on the page:

It just so happens that I have 3 license keys for the program AOMEI Partition Assistant Pro Edition cost 32 $ (near 1800 r. for May 2015) and I want to arrange for you contest and draw these keys among your readers!

The conditions of the competition are simple:

1. You need to click just below on one of the social networking buttons

1. In the comments, provide a link to your social network profile.

Summing up:

June 6, 2015 I'll play these 3 keys among those who clicked on one of the social buttons. networks (shared information about the draw) and showed this profile in the comments.

I will assign a serial number to each participant. The selection of winners will be determined randomly using a random number generator on the service www.randstuff.ru/number/ .

Each participant will accept no more than one “ Laika” on one social network. There will be three winners. Each person will receive one license key.

The winners of the competition will receive license keys for the program AOMEI Partition Assistant Pro Edition and will be able to fully use all the functions of this wonderful program. Well, have we started? Who's first? 🙂