Solved Extending system partition into non-contiguous space

I'm running windows 8.1 on a Chuwi Vi10 - a chinese tablet with a dual boot windows - android setup. On board the device comes with only 32gb, of which 10GB is used by the android OS, which I don't use anyway. I have deleted the android partitions, though they are to the left of the windows partition. All the android partitions were removed using diskmgmt. The MSR partition of 128MB remains before the system partition, which does not show on diskmgmt, though is shown by 3rd party partition managers.

Using advice for 3rd party applications in this thread I attempted to extend the partition. All failed to extend the partition.

I have also tried to boot to a USB with Partition Magic/GParted (created and tested to be bootable using Unetbootin on Windows 7) though get "System doesn't have and USB boot option. Please select other boot option in Boot Manager Menu." This could be a vendor specific message though. Using the EFI boot menu there are indeed only 3 options (Windows, Android and EFI shell). I checked some boot settings, which showed that USB booting was enabled.

I also installed EasyUEFI to attempt to alter the EFI boot menu, though this was unsuccessful. Interestingly, EasyUEFI showed additional EFI boot entries for USB, Network and CD/DVD which do not show when attempting to actually boot.

I have already backed up the PC using the System Backup. Short of creating another partition and just using that in Windows, is there anything that I can do to either boot to USB and use a UNIX partition manager to move around the partitions, or somehow fix the 3rd party partition managers. It seems that the MSR can be removed safely - perhaps this is interfering with the extension somehow?

All help greatly appreciated.

I have also tried to boot to a USB with Partition Magic/GParted (created and tested to be bootable using Unetbootin on Windows 7)

Click to expand...

Instead of Unetbootin. Try: Rufus - Create bootable USB

You have to boot with EFI, MBR won't work. If you flash EFI Linux Live compatible ISOs (for example GParted) with Rufus, the UEFI menu will show the USB entry as EFI USB, and then you will be able to boot it. You can also try rEFInd Boot Manager.

BTW, if this helps you and others, DO NOT DELETE INSTALL.WIM FILE FROM RECOVERY PARTITION, otherwise Windows WON'T BOOT.
We will have to check another way to get space... (Besides not installing Office)

If the order of the partitions on your drive is:

former Android space -- former Android space -- MSR partition -- OS partition

Then you can NOT extend the OS partition to the left of the MSR partition. Partitions have to be contiguous space.

You should look into using the Minitool Partition Wizard. This should enable you to move the MSR partition to the left and then, extend the OS partition into the new unused space.

duhow said:

You have to boot with EFI, MBR won't work. If you flash EFI Linux Live compatible ISOs (for example GParted) with Rufus, the UEFI menu will show the USB entry as EFI USB, and then you will be able to boot it. You can also try rEFInd Boot Manager.

BTW, if this helps you and others, DO NOT DELETE INSTALL.WIM FILE FROM RECOVERY PARTITION, otherwise Windows WON'T BOOT.
We will have to check another way to get space... (Besides not installing Office)

Click to expand...

My systems boot fine without a recovery partition, or an install.wim image anywhere. Is this something this tablet somehow requires?


Ok appros, to fix your system follow these steps.

Rake your flash drive and format it as FAT32.

Download this file: GParted

Unzip that file onto the formatted FAT32 flash drive.

Now you can EFI boot that flash drive with your tablets firmware.


When you get inside gparted you're going to want to move the recovery and windows system partitions over to the left, but don't grow the NTFS partition from Linux, if there is even that option. I'm not sure how exactly your windows boots, but if it boots via uefi, then I'm confused at where your EFI system partition is, and where the boot files are located. (Most UEFIs don't have NTFS drivers in them by default)

So check which partition table the disk is with gparted. There should be an option to view disk information.

Reply back on how things went, if you had any trouble, and definitely let me know which partition table the disk uses (MBR or GPT) so we can continue.


I'm very familiar with UEFI and it's boot process, but completely unfamiliar with this hardware and it's firmware implementation, so if you think I'm not understanding something correctly, please explain in detail what you think I missed.

Instead of Unetbootin. Try: Rufus - Create bootable USB

Click to expand...

Thanks, Rufus allows creation of GPT disks, which Unetbootin does not.
This allowed me to boot into GParted successfully.

Just to clear things up, the structure is as follows on the drive (from GParted):
ESP - 64 MB
Unallocated space - 9.30 GB
MSR - 128 MB
Windows System Partition - 14.4 GB
Images (Recovery partition) - 5.3 GB

I am not deleting the recovery partition as I suspect duhow may have thought. This page shows where the Images partition is and where the MSR is https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn594399.aspx when using WIMBoot. The MSR partition is not a recovery partition. For your easy reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Reserved_Partition

When you get inside gparted you're going to want to move the recovery and windows system partitions over to the left, but don't grow the NTFS partition from Linux, if there is even that option.

Click to expand...

Once in GParted, I do not have the option to move the MSR or grow the Windows System partition.

This thread SOLVED: Need help extending recovery partition (Page 1) â has some information about GParted being unable to move smaller than 256MB partitions - which of course means that the MSR is too small to be moved.

You should look into using the Minitool Partition Wizard. This should enable you to move the MSR partition to the left and then, extend the OS partition into the new unused space.

Click to expand...

I tried Mini Tool again and actually found that it allowed me to copy the MSR partition and then delete the original, which of course allowed me to resize the system partition. On applying this, Mini Tool asked me to restart, after which booting failed. It seems that the MSR partition is absolutely necessary for booting.

The bootable usb has been incredibly useful now, as I have been able to confirm that Mini Tool moved the MSR partition. I then resized the windows partition, though it still will not boot. Currently, windows is claiming to be repairing disk errors.

I managed to get the USB boot working with Rufus USB creator.
I tried using Mini Tool partition wizard again, and copied the MSR partition to the left and then tried to expand the Windows partition. It instructed me to restart before beginning, which caused some boot issues.
I used GParted to expand the Windows partition, though I am still having boot issues.
I tried following this guide How to repair the EFI Bootloader in Windows 8 - fixedByVonnie which created another entry in the boot manager for Windows, neither of which work.

PC now will try to boot, fail and instruct me to insert some kind of installation media. Before following the guide above, it would give me the windows tools to use, which I can't access any more.
I think that the bcdboot command just duplicated some dodgy settings, and somehow modified the old one as well.
I may need to make a Windows 8 repair USB now, and attempt to get this booting.
Any suggestions for getting the tablet booting again?

Also, according to https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn594399.aspx without an install.wim the recovery partition could be deleted. With the install.wim it is necessary. I didn't delete the Images partition, though I believe the MSR reserved partition was somehow damaged by Mini Tool.

I think for some security matters that your tablet won't allow you to boot from USB disk. I might have two ways to work the around:
1. use AOMEI Partition Assistant, a freeware which can use any unallocated space on the disk to extend partition,
2. since you have backed up you system(make sure that the MSR partition is included in the backup), you format the disk(delete all partitions on the disk) and then restore the system backup to the disk.

I have just fixed the boot issues. The tutorial I followed instructed me to backup the BCD, which I restored with a Windows 8.1 32-bit recovery USB. This allowed me to boot to the recovery (Images) partition and use the Refresh tool. This solved the problem as it repartitions windows and then installs rather than just copying like the image restore does.

I now have an extra 9.4 GB!

I have a problem. I also use Chuwi Vi10 with Windows 10, but the problem is that there are a lot of registry errors, which is why it is automatically overloaded.