Joining a Partitioned Hard Drive

[chris123]

Hi,

Is it possible to join a partitioned hard drive, preferably using free software?
I don't want to have to reformat either, and both partitions have data on them. I could, if required, empty the media partition so one of them is empty.

Thank you in advance.

[peterb]

GPARTED would probably do the job for you - but messing with the partition structure always carries some risk so you should back up the data first.

GParted -- Welcome

Download the .iso image and burn it to a CD rom. Boot from the CD and run gparted. Job done. (Disk will also contain memtest86++ to - another bonus)

[directhex]

it depends on many factors. in general:

1) you will not be able to merge data on several partitions - all but one partitions will be erased, and the remaining one extended

2) partitions can only be extended "to the right" (but can be moved), so in general, you really really want to keep the first partition on the disk as the "safe" one

3) the long-winded exception to 1) is a long, drawn out, risky process whereby you shrink the unwanted partitions as much as possible, shift them to the right of the disk, increase the first partition as much as possible, transfer across as much data as possible, and repeat until the unwanted partitions are gone.

4) partition editing IS A SLOW PROCESS. do not, under any circumstances, press reset on the assumption that something's frozen. that *will* cause all your data to go bye-bye

[peterb]

I'd add a 5) to the above. If you have any worries about the stability of your house power supplies, run the PC off a UPS.

GPARTED (and most other repartitioning software) does repartion safely. If there is space on the disk it copies that data out of the partition - resizes - copies it back in, and if there isn't much slack space, it does this a small amount at a time. It takes longer but is safer. However it isn't worth adding to the risk, and relying on the safety features built in, so just set it going (with or without a UPS) and go and do something else. Anything non-trivial is likely to take hours rather than minutes.