how do I merge 2 partitions?

Hi, the other day I started to mess around with vistas Disk Management. I basically wanted to create a partition for Windows 7 and delete my recovery partition (which i used a seperate guide for). Long story short, now I have 3 partions (Vista, Windwos 7, and Backup) and 10GB of unallocated space which used to be my recovery partion (for which I could create a 4th partition easily). However, I would like to add this unallocated space of 10GB to my Vista partion but right clicking on the vista partition in Disk Management doesnt give me the option to Extend the partion, neither do the other two partitions.
Anybody knows how to do this? Have I done soemthing wrong for breaking my HDD into 4 slices? Worst case scenario, is there a way to merge all partitions together again, and start all over?

Thanks in advance!

 

You'll need to used a third party software such as gparted, as, like you have discovered, vista's disk mangement won't let you extend your system partition. I ran into an issue similar to this myself.

If you use gparted download it here, then burn to disk and boot from cd.

 

Maybe you don't need to merge those two partitions. Just delete the unallocated space and enlarge your Vista partition. Here's something for your reference: How to Resize Vista Partition?

 

I'm a little confused here, isn't that basically the same thing? And once you delete a partition doesn't it become unallocated?

Another question, do partitions have to be next together to merge? For instance, if I have unallocated space at the right of my D drive, can I add it to C:?

 

Acronis Disk Director suite is a very useful bit of software for playing around with disk partitions, moving, resizing, shuffling, etc....

 

Ive learned that with vista's disk manager you can only extend a partition with unallocated space if it is directly to the RIGHT of the the partition being extended. In my case the unallocated space of 10 GB (previously recovery partition), is to the left of my Vista partition thus it wont let me extend it. I wonder if a 3rd party app will let me do it.

 

Yes. You can do what you want with, among other apps, Acronis' Disk Director Suite. You can also do that with gParted, or so I understand from those who've used that app.

 

In XP PartedMagic (GParted) let me shrink C (to the left) and add to D.

 

Hi Hiker,
"Just delete the unallocated space and enlarge your Vista partition. " by unallocated space, I mean the unallocated space of 10 GB (previously recovery partition) as totono said. Sorry~
I never use the disk manager built-in Vista. But Easeus Partition Manager can help resize and MOVE partitions. I mean, it's not a case whether your partition is at the left or right. You can move your partition during the resizing process and it won't cause data lose via Easeus PM.

 

vista built in one should work fine.. but if not try paragon disk manager i have found it works perfect for this type of task

as ^^ said delete the unwanted recovery partition. then extend the exisiting one. then after that you can create a new partition either during install or from the vista disk manager

 

Search the internet for Hiren's BootCD. It has a dozen or so partition editors (including the ones mentioned above).

Be careful, I once was resizing a partition (which I had done plenty of times before), and the program hosed my partition table. I had to use an NTFS recovery application to get my data back. Not a fun experience.

 

try this one, defrag first then after that go to disk management right click your local disk then extend it the unallocated disk.

 

i ended up using acronis disk director and worked fine...i recommend it

 

That's a good utility; glad it worked for you!