Add another partition to 4 partition drive for dual boot

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ASKER

Thanks, Temody,
You have no problem with creating a 5th partition???

You BIOS is not UEFI - you can't. Create a VM.

Why do you want to dual boot? Just upgrade from Windows 8.x to Windows 10, you don't have to wait long, as it is due to be released on the 29th of July, less than 2 months from now. The upgrade is free for an year. Since an upgrade replaces your old OS, you wouldn't have to dual boot anyway.

ASKER

It's GPT so that means I can shrink the "C:" ????

rindi, this is a work laptop that I want to be able to show my customers the difference.

Pete

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ASKER

You know, rindi, that's maybe a better idea. I put one of the earlier builds, 10049 I think, on the Oracle VM with no problem.

I think I'll try both now that I know I can dual boot.
The laptop has a touch screen that I like to demonstrate also with the metro screen. Which I can't stand, myself.

With Windows 8,x Pro, and if your CPU supports SLAT, you can use Hyper-V which is a feature of Windows 8.x Pro and above. That is a type 1 hypervisor and it's performance should be better than Virtualbox, which is only a type 2 hypervisor. Sometimes though it is easier to use VBox...

Maybe you should give leew some credit too, he was the first to suggest a VM...

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh824839.aspx
The screen shot you presented is not a standard GPT boot drive as recommended by MS and typically created by Windows Setup, as I understand GPT from the above link. Not sure how/why your system is setup like that.

I agree, that's why also I thought you weren't using a GPT disk. It looks just like a normal MBR setup to me.

Gary Case

"The screen shot you presented is not a standard GPT boot drive as recommended by MS and typically created by Windows Setup, as I understand GPT from the above link. Not sure how/why your system is setup like that. "

"I agree, that's why also I thought you weren't using a GPT disk. It looks just like a normal MBR setup to me. "

==> Guys ... you're confusing a GPT disk with one that's set up for a UEFI boot. In fact, the screenshot shown in the question very clearly shows that it IS a GPT disk. If it was an MBR disk, the 4th partition would not be a primary partition => it would be a volume inside an extended partition [the picture would show that with a green border inside the blue partition markers]

ASKER

The laptop was just returned to me from Asus after a hard drive failure while still under warranty. That's the same 4 partition setup as when I first got it.

Normally a GPT disk includes an "efi" partition, which usually is around 300MB or so in size. I can't see that partition in the screenshot.

ASKER

rindi, look at the 100Gb,

BTW, been hanging around since 2002 and never had 2 Savants, ! Prodigy + an MVP helping me.

OK, that wasn't visible in the first screenshot.

Gary Case

It wasn't visible => but it HAD to be the case, since all 4 partitions are shown as primary partitions. As I noted before, that would NOT be the case with an MBR disk.

Gary,

Either you've missed something in your explanation or you are mistaken. You CAN have 4 primary partitions instead of 3 and an Extended on an MBR disk. See screen shot below:

Further, in my experience, UEFI systems are very new still. While Vista *MAY* have supported it and Windows 7 does, the VAST majority of systems are NOT UEFI enabled. Those that are, at least with Win8 and if I'm remembering correctly Win2008R2 based systems, will automatically make a disk GPT at install.

I think what threw me was the suggestion that the second partition was a recovery partition. The first is too small to be a Win RE partition and the MSR partition should 128 MB - but there is NO 128 MB partition in this disk (reference the link I provided earlier - which is for Win8, but even the Win7 version says the same - https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd799232%28v=ws.10%29.aspx)

Gary Case

You can indeed have 4 primary partitions => but WIndows will not create them -- you have to use a 3rd party partition manager to do that. When you create a 4th partition in Windows Disk Management, it's automatically created as a volume in an Extended Partition.

Since the partition structure shown in the question is clearly a "standard" setup, I didn't think there was much doubt that it was not done by somebody using 3rd party utilities.

Actual, Windows DISK MANAGEMENT will not create them. Setup could if scripted, I believe and DISKPART most DEFINITELY can. That's how I did it. And the asker clearly knows diskpart.