Encryption Problem... Please help :(

Hi everyone..
A few weeks ago I installed truecrypt to keep some of my files safe. I set aside a partition or volume 7gb total. Today I installed Vista Ultimate and figured It would get deleted. It didn't. My C drive is still reading 73GB even though it should be 80. I installed truecrypt again to see if I could see it on there and couldn't find the partition any were... is there anything I can do to get that space back? Any programs? Thanks a lot

Mike

 

The catch-all way would be to format your entire hard drive, and reinstall your OS of choice.

 

Or one of the partition programs from Acronis or Norton should allow you to recover the space non-destructively.

 

Yeah that's what I figured... how would I format it?

 

Pop in the Vista disk, and when you get to the screen asking for the drive you wish to install to, select the drive - the entire hard drive, not just a partition - and tell it to format it. Once done, you should have all 80 available to install on.

 

When you mention a round # like 80GB it concerns me, what is your HDD?

 

Well wen I installed it, it just gave me the option of C drive... the partition with all my encrypted stuff is on M, but doesn't show

 

80gb. It was standard on inspirons last year...

 

That's what I'm getting at, my HDD is 160GB when they sell it. Based on base 10, computers are based on base 2 so Windows and infact the correct capacity is 148.82GB not far off from your 73GB, 74.41GB for your 80GB not enough to hide 7GB but not the correct #. So what's up? I'm not sure but would like to know!

 

It has never been 73GB on XP or other versions of Vista Ive tried... this is Ultimate though. Wouldn't it still show as C's capacity as 79 or 80gb tho?

 

I agree # is wrong so I am confused, but I expect 74.41 not some random #. No the correct # is 74.41 not 79 it is not a guess it is for real not made up 80GB base 10 is 74.41 base 2 no if ands or buts, no guesses.

 

ok your not understanding... C drive says 73gb. My HD is 80gb. I had a encrypted (that we can't find) partition that was 7gb. Wheres the 7gbs? It cant be windows because that is installed on the C drive

 

Boot into Windows, open an (elevated) command prompt and type the following commands:

DISKPART
SEL DISK 0 (<--tha'ts a zero)
LIST PART

This will display all of the partitions on your disk. If the 7gb partition really exists, this utility will display it.
Here is a sample from my laptop:

C:\>diskpart

Microsoft DiskPart version 6.0.6000
Copyright (C) 1999-2007 Microsoft Corporation.
On computer: XXXXXXXXX

DISKPART> sel disk 0

Disk 0 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> list part

Partition ### Type Size Offset
------------- ---------------- ------- -------
Partition 1 Primary 49 GB 1024 KB
Partition 2 Primary 26 GB 49 GB

 

You need to understand you never had 80GB, never had never will, please read what I wrote so in the future you know.

 

Dare I say you never had a problem.

 

Ok I just tried that and that second partition won't show up. I was on a page that said my Disk was 80GB (exactly) and my C was 73. I guess the only thing to do is wipe the entire HD. Are there any good software for that?

 

i see no problem my inspiron 1501 came with a 60 gb hdd shows as 51.1 gb i cant believe you made an entire thread for something this simple it deleted your second partion and its now fine

 

No,

80GB as per spec is 80*1000(MB)*1000(KB)*1000*(Bytes)

Divide by 1024 instead of 1000 and you end up at 74GB or so, given that partitions are never the ENTIRE drive, and 73GB sounds about right, you haven't lost any space.

 

Exactly. The space was never missing to begin with.