SOLVED Saving to second hard drive

[Jakilion]

Hello reader,
I have recently bought an Asus G73JW laptop. When opening My Computer, it shows up with 4 Hard drives. These drives are originals that came with the computer, i didnt install them or anything and are totally blank. i have a Steam account and have filled up my first hard drive quite fast. When trying to install a game, steam has errored me notifing that i could not install because there wasnt enough space on the C drive. i was wondering if there was anyway to allow me to install my game and any more that I buy without having to reinstall steam to one of the other hard drives. and if this is the only case, how do i go about doing it. i run on windows 7 (obviously). if you need to know anything else, ill try to respond ASAP. i dont know my way around computers that well, only my games.

Thanks if you can help that would be great, if you cant, thanks anyway.

 

[TrainableMan]

Are the other 3 just partitions on the same physical drive or actual separate physical drives? Is anything on the other drives?

Control Panel \ Administrative Tools \ Computer Management. Under Storage pick Disk Management.

If they are simply partitions on one physical drive then you could merge the partitions to make one bigger partition. W7 can only do this if the partitions are side by side on the drive and the partition on the right, when displayed in disk management, is empty; other paid programs do not have these limitations.

Or you can move your data files over to another partition so your OS partition has more space. Normally games will allow you to specify a different folder as to where to install and this includes a drive letter; I don't use steam so I'm not sure of its' install particulars.

 

[Jakilion]

Thank you for replying,
This laptop that i bought has had these drives pre-installed into the laptop, i have not installed them myself.
I went to the disk mamagement: i have 2 disks: Disk 0 and Disk 1.

inside of Disk 0 is 3 storage sections: an un-named section with lable 'Healthy (primary Partition)', OS or my C drive with lable 'Healthy' (System, Boot, Page File, Active, Crash Dump, Primary Partition)', and 'Data' or my D drive which is 'Healthy (Logical Drive)'

Inside of disk 1 there are 2 storage sections with names SDATA1 and SDATA2 ((F and (G respectively) both are primary partitions.

if i could merge the primary partitions, i would really like to know how (a step by step would be very handy). If i could make the D: drive (Data) a primary partition too, i would be very happy. if you need screenshots ill try and get something up

Thanks again for your help

 

[Jakilion]

Ive just finished watching a youtube vidieo of how to merge partitions and want to confirm. So i have to delete the second part (my D drive) and make it unalocated then i can extend my c drive.

But can this work with my second disk? Can i use the partitions from my second disk to increase disk space?

 

[TrainableMan]

The unnamed section is likely a recovery section or something. I assume you listed them left to right so that makes it first and not much you can do to reclaim it without third party partitioning software. Plus if it does have recovery files you might want it.

Is drive D: empty? Is F: empty? G: empty? I'm going to bet since you call it Data that it is not empty. I am hoping that F: and G: are empty.

What I suggest is this...

The youtube video is correct but I suggest you start with F & G NOT C.
Move all the files off of G: to F: if there are any (or to DVDs or flash drives etc if F: does not have room)
Then Delete G and extend F: as in the video. (so G is gone and F is bigger)

Then you move all your D: Data to F: (If you actually already had any data on F: then make sure to rename any folder names that match those on D: because you need to bring the D: folder structure over exactly as it was). Depending how much data is on D: this may take some time to move all that data.

Then with D: empty you merge C: with D: (Delete D: and Extend C: so D: is now gone as in the youtube video).

Finally you rename F: to D: so none of your programs ever even realize D: is no longer on the same physical drive. To do this go back into Disk Management and select F: with your mouse and then right-click. Choose Change Drive Letter and Paths. Change it to D:

At this point I would reboot to make sure everything went smoothly.

That should be the solution.

Notes:
Don't run any programs except Windows Explorer while you are fixing this to avoid data not being on the drive where it looks.

FYI my internet service is in and out tonight so I just have to answer when I can

 

[Nibiru2012]

WOW! Reading TM's reply above made me dizzy!

If it were me I would set things up similar to this:

Drives (partitions) C & E are one Samsung 500GB HDD and Drives (partitions) F & G are the other Samsung 500GB HDD. Drive D is my optical DVD-RW burner drive.

You can set up your system the way you want, but me being a traditionalist I prefer to keep my D drive (and sometimes E drive if I have two optical drives) in their respective traditional lettering sequence that's been followed for years.

It's these commercial computer makers that screw it all up with their superfluous partitioning and such. But then they are forced to make their systems appeal to the broadest, lowest common denominator.
Kinda like the way the major beer makers do... make a crappy product that 90% of beer drinkers sort of like.

 

[TrainableMan]

He doesn't want so many partitions. When done my method he will just have the two and they will be the traditional C: and D:. And I'm just trying to make sure he doesn't loose any data in the process or have ini and registry entries expecting data on D: and it not be there.

 

[Nibiru2012]

He doesn't want so many partitions. When done my method he will just have the two and they will be the traditional C: and D:.

C and D is NOT traditional for hard drive lettering, it's C & E, D is for optical drives. That's following the "traditional way".

He can do as he pleases, I was just offering an alternate method.

Besides it is best to put the Paging File on a separate partition on a second hard drive, preferably at the front of the hard drive, for faster smoother paging file operation. That's how most of the ubergeeks do it. I just lettered my hard drive partitions on my second hard different to suit my preferences.

 

[TrainableMan]

Actually traditional is that the first partition of each physical drive got a letter starting at C: and only after that, then the CD-Rom(s) (we didn't have DVD-Roms then), followed by drive letters for each logical partition on the first harddrive, continuing with the logical partitions on the second harddrive, etc.

 

[Jakilion]

i have no files in D: or F: or G: my computer has automaticly named them Data, but they are empty. would it be possible to merge the F: and G: into my C: drive? *edit* even if they are one a second disk (Disk 1, instead of Disk 0)

Thanks

 

[TrainableMan]

Not easily. I have heard of software spanning physical drives to create one virtual disk but I doubt it's worth the risk plus you are actually better off separating your data from your OS.

If they are empty then it's simple ...
As in the Youtube video, Merge C: and D:, Merge G: & F:, then name G: to D: (... or if you prefer to think like Nibs then rename your DVD-Rom to D: and then rename G: to E: )

BUT...
Nibs did have a good point that you might improve your system by making a small partition for a pagefile on the second physical drive. You would likely want to resize G: smaller and then just call the remaining big chunk D: (or E: if you decide on D: as your DVD-Rom) If you decide to do this make mention of it so he can get you the ideal size and instructions.

 

[Jakilion]

Thanks for the help guys, i might just have the 2 drives: C and D. but thanks for the suggestion

*Edit*
ok, ive managed to extend the second disk into 1 section called F:

But....the first section wont let me expand, when i delete the D: drive it becomes free space, and the option to expand is not highlighted. this may have something to do with D: drive having the lable: "Logical Drive".

any ideas?

 

[TrainableMan]

Is D: immediately to the right of C: in the picture or is that undefined piece in there? Could you take a screenshot and attach it (use the post reply button rather than the quick reply box because it ha the attachments paperclip icon).

 

[Jakilion]

There are 2 screenshots (or should be) the first is the normal shot, the second is when i have deleted the drive. i hope they work

 

[TrainableMan]

When you right click on the free space, what options are available?

 

[Jakilion]

options:
1. New simple volume
2. New spanned volume (disabled)
3. New striped Volume (disabled)
4. Delete partition
5.Help

 

[Nibiru2012]

It's all yours TM. Besides why is a 19.53 GB partition before the main OS partition.

This setup is totally messed up and IMHO needs to be wiped clean, hard drives reformatted and a new install done.

He could just download Partition Wizard and make a bootable CD and do it from there. It is free and should do the job.

Again the factory screws up the way an OS should be setup.

 

[TrainableMan]

That's the Free Space options? OK, What happens when you delete the partition?

Nibs, my hunch about that little piece is that it is a recovery partition for the OS like some companies hide on their drives instead of shipping you the OS DVDs but I don't know.

What you could do is clone the OS partition of Disk 0 over to Disk 1 and then change the boot order in BIOS essentially making the system boot up from Disk 1 and at that point you could completely wipe the disk currently in 3 pieces.

Also, by any chance, have you tried assigning a drive letter to that little piece just to see whats in there?

 

[Jakilion]

im really sorry, i have no idea what you want me to do and i probably woldnt understand how to do it anyway

 

[TrainableMan]

For now lets deal with that free space then.

If you select it and right-click you said one option is "delete partition". Please CONFIRM that is for the Free Space Not your C: Drive, as I don't want you to delete your real files. If it is for the Free Space then try it ... Delete the Free Space partition.