Shelley said:
I have here a once 'suspect'
Once suspect, always suspect. (This doesn't mean you can't use it, but
don't store important data on it without keeping an up-to-date copy
someplace else too.)
What Partition tells me is that I now have 29XXXMb of unallocated primary
space.
I'm not sure what unallocated primary space is. Unallocated space could
be space that's not part of any partition; you could create a new
partition in that space, if that's what it means. OTOH, if it means
unallocated space that's part of an existing primary partition, then
it's already allocated at the partition level, just not at the file level,
and so it would only mean that there's room for more files. Probably it
means the former, since PM is designed to work with partitions more than
files. (If not, an attempt to create a partition will either result in
fdisk telling you there's no space, or else it'll just create a really
small partition. So it's safe to try.)
I would like to ask the groups opinions to the best way to allocate space
for this particular drive ( 2 x 15 Gb, 3 x 10Gb) that *hopefully* (ahem...)
will run XP Home and I am concerned about how to create a solid boot
partition.
I have studied some web sites on partitioning but I really have to admit
that I am struggling to get off base 1 here.
Boot in command-prompt-only mode, or from floppy. (It is possible to use
fdisk with the GUI running, but it is only advisable if you have a firm
grasp on what you're doing.) Type the command FDISK at the prompt and
press enter. FDISK will display a menu of options. Choose the number
for displaying the partition table, and take note of what it shows you.
Now, back at the menu, choose the number for the option that says create a
new partition. It'll ask you whether you want to create a primary partition
or an extended partition (and maybe also offer the option of a logical drive,
if you have an extended partition). Choose the option for creating a primary
partition. (Windows will only boot from primary partitions[1].) It'll ask
you which partition number to use (1-4). Choose one that's not already in
use (as noted from the existing partition table you looked at first). Now
fdisk will ask you what sector to start at. Hit enter to accept the default.
It'll also ask you what sector to finish with, or how large to make the
partition; accept the default again. (It is possible that instead of these
two questions it'll ask you if you want to use all of the available space;
if so, answer yes.) Now, exit FDISK (if there's not an option for exit,
hit the Esc key), and reboot. Run fdisk again, display the partition table,
and take note of the drive letter assigned to the new partition. Exit fdisk,
and format that drive.
There may be slight variations in this procedure, because you're using XP
instead of Win9x, which I'm more familiar with. In particular, at some point
it may ask you (or there may be a menu option) to choose which type of file
system this partition will have (FAT32 versus NTFS). Choose the kind you
want; for a WinXP boot partition, NTFS is usually recommended, unless you
need to be able to read it from Win9x or DOS or write it from *nix, in which
case FAT32 is much more compatible with various OSes. (Linux can read NTFS
with little trouble; it's only write support that's still in alpha; Win9x
and DOS, however, can't even read it. If you have another partition where
you can put data those OSes need to access, you can use NTFS for the boot
partition. On a multiboot system, I recommend having at least one FAT
partition, but it doesn't have to be the boot partition for any OS. If you
will only use WinXP, you don't need FAT at all.)
HTH.HAND.
It's probably also possible to use Partition Magic to do the whole thing,
but you're on your own there; I don't know much about Partition Magic.
[1] Actually, I'm not positive this is true for NT/2K/XP, but in your case
there's no reason not to use a primary partition, so just do that.
