Windows 10: HDD Arrangements

You should be able to delete all of them except for the EFI System Partition. It is highly recommended to keep the active recovery partition as well (which will be ~500 MB in size) to retain functionality of the Windows 10 Recovery Environment menu should you need to boot into it. That is the info that reagentC /info will show - which partition is the active recovery partition. Then you will have to use MiniTool Partition Wizard Free to move the partitions that are remaining to take advantage of the free space created by deleting the old partitions.

 

A "clean" alternative here with a "clean" outcome: image entire disk to external media (with, for example, Macrium Reflect or something as reliable), then perform a clean Win10 install on the disk (i.e., deleting ALL partitions using Custom Install option).

You'll have 4 partitions then, in order: 450MB recovery partition, 100 MB EFI system partition, 16 MB MSR, all the rest as C: partition with OS.

Then restore the C: partition over top/in place of (overwriting) the clean installed C: partition. Then expand or shrink C: just enough to fit in the desired size of D: partition you want, restore D: partition and expand to suit.

 

The Reagentc /info data shows the recovery image location to be partition 8 which in my post to NavyLCDR is the 24 GB PVR_DRV. I presume therefore that I can delete partitions 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6 without problem and Partition 8, i.e. the OEM recovery partition if I do not intend to go back to the original delivered Win 8. Am I correct in my assumptions?

 

Delete 8 and you'll have no advanced boot/ troubleshooting options. If you're OK with that as a price of getting rid of the PBR image, then go for it.

Otherwise, you can get a lot more standard and less confusing partition layout with the clean install strategy - getting rid of the PBR partition along the way.

 

It would appear that this is the route I may have to take. However, I rolled back my Win 10 a couple of days ago to Build 10240 after the April Patch Tuesday installed Build 1511 that completely screwed up my system. However, if I do a clean install, I presume that Win10 will install the latest build 1511 and that the recovery drive will be associated with this build - what happens when I overwrite this with a copy of my c:\ drive based upon Build 10240 - will this cause problem with the system in the event that I need to roll it back at some point? I will also have to backup my D:\ drive as this contains all my data which I always keep separate from the OS for security.

Would just like to be clear on the consequences of making these changes to the system as I don't want to end up spending hours trying to sort out problems resulting from taking inappropriate action or having to reinstall all my other programs.

 

The recovery drive and its functionality won't differ between build 10240 and build 10586. However, since your original OS partition is pointed to partition 8 for recovery that will have to be reset, i.e,. after restore to the clean installed partition, "reagentc /info" will probably come up with recovery disabled or partition not found - in that case, a simple "reagentc /enable" will find the recovery in partition 1 and update the pointer for you.

As I advised you to image the entire disk, i.e., ALL partitions, you would already have included backing up your D: drive/partition and it'll be available for restore.

As long as you START with a reliably imaged ENTIRE disk, you always have a way to get back to where you started from if things go pear-shaped on you.

 

I would never have guessed that partition 8 would be the active recovery partition. If it was my computer, I would do exactly as Word Man suggests. That will free up 24-25 GB of space. There is a way of creating your own Windows Recovery Environment partition as well so you could manually replace the 24 GB recovery partition with a 500 MB partition.

 

My thanks to Word Man and NavyLCDR for your suggestions.

I will 'bite the bullet' and do a clean install as suggested, but can't spare the time until next weekend - will let you know the outcome. In the meantime, just one final question if I image the entire disk to external media using Macrium Reflect - does this simply image the C: and D: drives or does it also include the other hidden partitions?

 

It will include all the partitions on the hard drive. I would recommend you make a bootable DVD/USB flash drive of Kyhi's recovery drive from this forum. It contains Macrium Reflect Free and other utilities that will be very useful should you run into problems:
Windows 10 Recovery Tools - Bootable Rescue Disk - Windows 10 Forums

Also, read the first post linked above - if you have a Windows 10 install USB - you can copy over the boot.wim file and make yourself a very useful combined recovery and installation drive.

 

Apologies for what are probably stupid questions, but if I make an image of the entire disk, when I copy this back to the hard disk won't it simply recreate all the partitions and associated data I currently want to clean up?

One other issue I have that caused me grief when I did a clean install of Win 10 on my other desktop is that Windows required the original OEM Windows licence number to register Windows 10. However, unlike my other desktop and laptop where this information is on a sticker, there is nothing on the Lenovo PC. How can I find the original Licence number?

 

If a computer (actually it's M) had W10 installed and activated at any time, you don't need to enter license of windows that it was upgraded from any more on that MB. You can skip entering license when you do clean install. It should be already noted on MS severs.

 

You wouldn't restore the entire disk, ONLY your C: partition and, after making room for it on the disk, your D: partition. You image entire disk, do clean install, and then only selectively restore the old C: and D:. All the other partitions are left behind in the backup because those have been replaced during the Win10 clean install.

 

I'm afraid I fell at the first fence: tried making an image of my HDD to my NAS with Macrium Reflect, but the program does not recognize my NAS shares. I set up Network Logon under the tools button for \\MyNAS\Public, with correct user name and password, but when I try to select the network drive where the image will be be stored, I get the error message: Windows cannot access \\MyNAS - with the error code 0x80070035. Furthermore, none of the mapped shares show up as drives when I try to select a folder. Windows automatically logs onto the NAS without any problems and other software that use the NAS also logon without a problem. So what is causing Reflect to fail to recognize the NAS? Any thoughts on what is causing the problem and solutions would be appreciated. Also, Reflect shows that much of the hidden partitions is free space.

 

This version Technicians license explained - Macrium Software
might be able to do that but not free.

 

Don't try to access the NAS directly. Try mapping a drive letter first and then access that drive letter. This trick works with older software that has difficulty accessing network drives.