Disk Management

What is Disk Management?

Disk Management is a system utility for managing hard

disks and the volumes or partitions that they contain.
Disk Management can be utilized to

• create, delete, format partitions (with the FAT,

FAT32, or NTFS file systems), assign drive
letters and much more.

• view partitions and their formatted file systems

on the hard drive.
 How To Access Disk Management?

The most common way to access Disk Management

is via Computer Management:

There are several method to access the Disk

Management, Some are given on next slide.
 Method 1- Start > Control Panel > Administrative
Tools. Double click Computer Management and
then click Disk Management in the left hand
column.
Method 2 - Click Start > Run and type
diskmgmt.msc in the Open: line and click OK.
The Disk Management snap-in will open.
Method 3 - By default, Administrative Tools is
not shown on the Start Menu but if you have
modified the Start Menu (by right clicking the
Start button and selecting Properties >
Customize) so it is shown then just select Start >
Administrative Tools > Computer Management
and then click Disk Management in the left hand
column.
 Opening D.M From CLI

The Disk Management command is the

same in all versions of Windows so these
instructions apply to Windows 8, Windows
7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP.
Follow these easy steps to start Disk
Management from the Command Prompt
in Windows:
 In Windows 7 and Windows Vista, click on
the Start button.
In Windows XP and earlier, click on Start
and then Run.
Type the following command in thetext box:
diskmgmt.msc
...and then hit the Enter key or press the OK
button, depending on where you ran the
command from.
Note: Technically, opening Disk Management
from the Command Prompt would require that
you actually open the Command Prompt
program. However, running an executable
program like diskmgmt.msc from the search or
run box accomplishes the same thing.
 Another Way of Opening D.M

Just press the WIN and X keys

together to bring up the menu, then
click on the Disk
Management shortcut. Beginning
with the Windows 8.1 update, right-
clicking on the Start button works to
bring up the Power User Menu too.
 How To Use Disk Management

Disk Management has two main

sections - a top and a bottom:
The bottom section of Disk
Management contains a graphical
representation of the physical drives
installed in the computer.
The top section of Disk Management
contains a list of all the partitions,
formatted or not, that Windows
recognizes.
Performing certain actions on the drives
or partitions make them available or
unavailable to Windows and configures
them to be used by Windows in certain
ways.
Here are some common things that
you can do in Disk Management:
Partition a Drive
Format a Drive
Change a Drive's Letter
Shrink a Partition
Extend a Partition
Delete a Partition
Change a Drive's File system
 Partition a Hard Drive

To partition a hard drive in Windows 7

means to divide the hard drive into parts
and make those parts available to the
operating system. It's also possible for
an entire hard drive to have a single
partition, which oddly enough is actually
the most common way to partition a
hard drive.
 Steps For Partition

In Disk Management’s Graphical view,

right-click an unallocated or free area,
and then click New Simple Volume.
This starts the New Simple Volume
Wizard.
Read the Welcome page and then click
Next.

The Specify Volume Size page specifies

the minimum and maximum size for
the volume in megabytes and lets you
size the volume within these limits.
Size the partition in megabytes using
the Simple Volume Size field and then
click Next.
On the Assign Drive Letter Or Path page,
specify whether you want to assign a drive
letter or path and then click Next.
Use the Format Partition page to
determine whether and how the volume
should be formatted. If you want to format
the volume, choose Format This Volume
With The Following Settings, and then
configure the following options:
Click Next, confirm your options,
and then click Finish.
The Windows 7 Disk Management tool will now
show the space configured as a new partition.
 Shrink a Partition

Here’s an easy way to shrink a volume

to free up space so you can create a
new partition on your disk.

To shrink a basic volume follow

these steps:
In Disk Management, right-click the volume
that you want to shrink, and then click
Shrink Volume.
In the field provided in the Shrink dialog
box, enter the amount of space by which to
shrink the disk
Click Shrink.
Once you have unallocated space,
you can use that space to create a
new partition by repeating above
partition steps.
 Extend volume

 You can add more space to existing primary partitions

and logical drives by extending them into adjacent
unallocated space on the same disk. To extend a basic
volume, it must be raw or formatted with the NTFS file
system. You can extend a logical drive within
contiguous free space in the extended partition that
contains it. If you extend a logical drive beyond the
free space available in the extended partition, the
extended partition grows to contain the logical drive.
 Create a Spanned
Volume
 A spanned volume is a dynamic volume consisting of disk
space on more than one physical disk. If a simple volume
is not a system volume or boot volume, you can extend it
across additional disks to create a spanned volume, or you
can create a spanned volume in unallocated space on a
dynamic disk.
 You need at least two dynamic disks in addition to the
startup disk to create a spanned volume. You can extend a
spanned volume onto a maximum of 32 dynamic disks.
 When creating spanned volumes
keep these points in mind
 You can extend a volume only if it does not have a file
system or if it is formatted using the NTFS file system. You
cannot extend volumes formatted using FAT or FAT32.
 After you create or extend a spanned volume, you cannot
delete any portion of it without deleting the entire spanned
volume.
 Spanned volumes are not fault tolerant. If one of the disks
containing a spanned volume fails, the entire volume fails,
and all data on the spanned volume becomes inaccessible.
The reliability for a spanned volume is less than the least
reliable disk in the set.
 When creating spanned volumes
keep these points in mind
 You can extend a volume only if it does not have a file
system or if it is formatted using the NTFS file system. You
cannot extend volumes formatted using FAT or FAT32.
 After you create or extend a spanned volume, you cannot
delete any portion of it without deleting the entire spanned
volume.
 Spanned volumes are not fault tolerant. If one of the disks
containing a spanned volume fails, the entire volume fails,
and all data on the spanned volume becomes inaccessible.
The reliability for a spanned volume is less than the least
reliable disk in the set.
 Warning

 This is not for a daily use.

 It may be cause a damage to your hardrive because it
real-time deal with the hardware.