Solved Unable to merge a partition using Disk Management

antares

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Hi, I have a laptop with Windows 8 installed in a 256Gb SSD. There's a 32Gb recovery partition whose purpose is to recover the drive to factory install. Since I already imaged this recovery partition to an external drive I would like to delete it and merge it to the main C partition to increase capacity. I know I can do this easily with 3rd party solutions (Easus, etc), but I'd like to do it using the Windows 8 built in Disk Management. I tried but when I right click on the 32Gb recovery partition the only option that shows up is "Help", it does not show any other option that shows for the other partitions (Shrink, etc). Any suggestions? Thanks.
 

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    Windows 8.1x64 Pro
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You need to find and read up on PTEDIT32.EXE .. it will allow you to unhide the drive to an 07 and then its treated like a regular drive again. Maybe delete it and expand c into it. A recovery partition copied to another drive.. its restore feature.. may or may not work. Probably a visit to your laptop makers forums will quickly see omg what do I do now things.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    win8.1
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    lenovo
Your recovery partition is a special EISA (Extended Industry Standard Architecture) partition, Sometimes it does not have a drive letter (partition is hidden) assigned or can be deleted using Disk Management.

To delete the EISA recovery partition, you need to use diskpart.

  1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator.
  2. Type diskpart then hit Enter
  3. Type list disk then hit Enter
  4. Type select disk X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the disk # contained the partition you want to delete
  5. Type select partition X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the partition # you want to delete
  6. Type delete partition override then hit Enter
  7. Type Exit then hit Enter

Now you can merge it using Disk Management Tool.

NOTE: Be careful and Take notes on the size of the disk and the partition you want to delete so you don't accidentally delete the wrong one.
 
Last edited:

My Computer

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  • OS
    8.1x64PWMC Ubuntu14.04x64 MintMate17x64
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    I7 4970K OC'ed @4.7 GHz
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Your recovery partition is a special EISA (Extended Industry Standard Architecture) partition, Sometimes it does not have a drive letter (partition is hidden) assigned or can be deleted using Disk Management.

To delete the EISA recovery partition, you need to use diskpart.

  1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator.
  2. Type diskpart then hit Enter
  3. Type list disk then hit Enter
  4. Type select disk X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the disk # contained the partition you want to delete
  5. Type select partition X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the partition # you want to delete
  6. Type delete partition override then hit Enter
  7. Type Exit then hit Enter

Now you can merge it using Disk Management Tool.

NOTE: Be careful and Take notes on the size of the disk and the partition you want to delete so you don't accidentally delete the wrong one.

I followed your steps but when I click LIST DISK, it shows only "Disk 0" with the full capacity (238GB), without showing any of the partitions. Therefore I cannot proceed with "SELECT PARTITION X" as there are no partitions listed.

P.D.: When I enter the command "DETAIL DISK" after selecting Disk 0, it shows the partitions as "Volumes". The 32Gb factory recovery partition is labeled as "Volume 4", NTFS, Healthy and Hidden

UPDATE: After "SELECT VOLUME 4" I entered the command "DELETE PARTITION OVERRIDE" and now the recovery partition was successfully deleted. I went to Disk Management and I created an E partition (in addition to the system C partition). When I right click on E I see "Shrink" and "Delete" volume, but I don't see "Merge", how can I merge C and E?

UPDATE2: The "Extend" option was unavailable in the C partition, but when I deleted the E partition to unallocated, the "Extend" command appeared when right clicking on C. I proceeded to extend the C partition to the maximum available capacity and apparen tly now the E partition was merged into the C partition (the E partition is no longer listed and the C partition shows full capacity).
 
Last edited:

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1x64 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    self made
    CPU
    Intel Core i7 6700K
    Motherboard
    Asus Z170-A
    Memory
    Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4 2400MHz
    Graphics Card(s)
    Intel HD Graphics 530
    Sound Card
    Onboard Realtek HD
    Monitor(s) Displays
    LG 23EA53 23" LED IPS
    Screen Resolution
    1920x1080 32bit
    Hard Drives
    Samsung 256GB 830 Series SSD main+HGST 4TB 7200RPM as 2nd internal
    PSU
    Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 850W TPG-850M
    Case
    Corsair Obsidian 650DW-1 Midtower
    Cooling
    Noctua NH-D14
    Keyboard
    Logitech K800
    Mouse
    Logitech M510
    Antivirus
    NIS2014
Why not simply use one of the many free partition managers?
 

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    windows 8 pro
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    4GB geil
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I followed your steps but when I click LIST DISK
After step 5, Try again with:
Sorry, I miss 1 step. Type list partition then hit Enter, step 5 and 6 will list the partition



  1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator.
  2. Type diskpart then hit Enter
  3. Type rescan then hit Enter
  4. Type list disk then hit Enter
  5. Type select disk X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the disk # contained the partition you want to delete
  6. Type list partition then hit Enter
  7. Type select partition X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the partition # you want to delete
  8. Type delete partition override then hit Enter
  9. Type Exit then hit Enter
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    8.1x64PWMC Ubuntu14.04x64 MintMate17x64
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Home Brewed
    CPU
    I7 4970K OC'ed @4.7 GHz
    Motherboard
    MSI-Z97
    Memory
    16 GB G-Skill Trident X @2400MHZ
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GTS 450
    Sound Card
    X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Dual HP-W2408
    Screen Resolution
    1920X1200
    Hard Drives
    256 GB M2 sm951, (2) 500GB 850EVO, 5TB, 2 TB Seagate
    PSU
    Antec 850W
    Case
    Antec 1200
    Cooling
    Danger Den H20
    Keyboard
    Logitech
    Mouse
    Logitech Performance Mouse MX
    Internet Speed
    35/12mbps
    Browser
    Firefox
Why not simply use one of the many free partition managers?
Hi, as I mentioned when starting the thread, I know I can use free partition managers to ease the task, but it's cool to learn how to do these things using Windows built in tools.

I followed your steps but when I click LIST DISK
After step 2, Try again with:
Type rescan then hit Enter, step 5 and 6 will list the partition



  1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator.
  2. Type diskpart then hit Enter
  3. Type rescan then hit Enter
  4. Type list disk then hit Enter
  5. Type select disk X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the disk # contained the partition you want to delete
  6. Type select partition X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the partition # you want to delete
  7. Type delete partition override then hit Enter
  8. Type Exit then hit Enter

Hi topgun, as you can see I updated the post and was able to successfully merge the partitions without the RESCAN command. Thanks for your help.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1x64 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    self made
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    Intel Core i7 6700K
    Motherboard
    Asus Z170-A
    Memory
    Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4 2400MHz
    Graphics Card(s)
    Intel HD Graphics 530
    Sound Card
    Onboard Realtek HD
    Monitor(s) Displays
    LG 23EA53 23" LED IPS
    Screen Resolution
    1920x1080 32bit
    Hard Drives
    Samsung 256GB 830 Series SSD main+HGST 4TB 7200RPM as 2nd internal
    PSU
    Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 850W TPG-850M
    Case
    Corsair Obsidian 650DW-1 Midtower
    Cooling
    Noctua NH-D14
    Keyboard
    Logitech K800
    Mouse
    Logitech M510
    Antivirus
    NIS2014
Good to hear it worked. Actually I missed 1 step. I updated the post above with list partition added.
Rescan is not needed, just to ensure that everything is listed.
Please mark as SOLVED.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    8.1x64PWMC Ubuntu14.04x64 MintMate17x64
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Home Brewed
    CPU
    I7 4970K OC'ed @4.7 GHz
    Motherboard
    MSI-Z97
    Memory
    16 GB G-Skill Trident X @2400MHZ
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GTS 450
    Sound Card
    X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Dual HP-W2408
    Screen Resolution
    1920X1200
    Hard Drives
    256 GB M2 sm951, (2) 500GB 850EVO, 5TB, 2 TB Seagate
    PSU
    Antec 850W
    Case
    Antec 1200
    Cooling
    Danger Den H20
    Keyboard
    Logitech
    Mouse
    Logitech Performance Mouse MX
    Internet Speed
    35/12mbps
    Browser
    Firefox
Good to hear it worked. Actually I missed 1 step. I updated the post above with list partition added
Thanks, but apparently as I mentioned I was able to delete the factory recovery partition with your original steps plus a few others I improvised on the go. To recap, this is what I did:

  1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator.
  2. Type diskpart then hit Enter
  3. Type list disk then hit Enter
  4. Type select disk X then hit Enter <==== Where X is the disk # contained the partition you want to delete
  5. Type DETAIL DISK to show the volumes (partitions) within the disk
  6. Type SELECT VOLUME X, where X is the volume you want to delete
  7. Type delete partition override then hit Enter
  8. Type Exit then hit Enter
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1x64 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    self made
    CPU
    Intel Core i7 6700K
    Motherboard
    Asus Z170-A
    Memory
    Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4 2400MHz
    Graphics Card(s)
    Intel HD Graphics 530
    Sound Card
    Onboard Realtek HD
    Monitor(s) Displays
    LG 23EA53 23" LED IPS
    Screen Resolution
    1920x1080 32bit
    Hard Drives
    Samsung 256GB 830 Series SSD main+HGST 4TB 7200RPM as 2nd internal
    PSU
    Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 850W TPG-850M
    Case
    Corsair Obsidian 650DW-1 Midtower
    Cooling
    Noctua NH-D14
    Keyboard
    Logitech K800
    Mouse
    Logitech M510
    Antivirus
    NIS2014
I saw that, just want to add the step to the list so it works as well.
Cheers
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    8.1x64PWMC Ubuntu14.04x64 MintMate17x64
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Home Brewed
    CPU
    I7 4970K OC'ed @4.7 GHz
    Motherboard
    MSI-Z97
    Memory
    16 GB G-Skill Trident X @2400MHZ
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GTS 450
    Sound Card
    X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Dual HP-W2408
    Screen Resolution
    1920X1200
    Hard Drives
    256 GB M2 sm951, (2) 500GB 850EVO, 5TB, 2 TB Seagate
    PSU
    Antec 850W
    Case
    Antec 1200
    Cooling
    Danger Den H20
    Keyboard
    Logitech
    Mouse
    Logitech Performance Mouse MX
    Internet Speed
    35/12mbps
    Browser
    Firefox
I just wanted to ask , if we delete a drive , do we lose the contents of the drive , or do we find the contents of the disk in the drive we merge it into?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 7
I just wanted to ask , if we delete a drive , do we lose the contents of the drive , or do we find the contents of the disk in the drive we merge it into?

Delete a drive and everything it contains is lost forever.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    win8.1
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    lenovo
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