Windows 10: How do I stop Windows from using a partition?

Hello everyone,

Here is a picture of my current partition setup:




I recently had a different version of Windows on the second Partition. After installing Windows 10 to the last partition, everything on the second partition was deleted. Now the second partition is a System partition. I want to make it so Windows cannot use/write to the second partition, and only use the last. I want to do this because I need to recover files from the second partition, and stopping Windows from using this partition would reduce the number of files being overwritten. Also, I want to ensure anything on the second partition is moved so Windows can still use them.

Sorry if this is this is the wrong section.

:)

 

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You have answered your own question. Yes, that is the only way for now.

 

Welcome to the forum. The only sure way is to not use Windows boot from a recovery software CD or Linux CD that's the only way

 

Thank you, glad to join the forums. So currently I'm good as long as I don't boot with a recovery CD?

 

The partition layout you are having now is quite unusual. The system reserved partition should only be 500MB containing the Recovery Environment (WinRE.wim) and BCD (Boot Configuration Data) instead of 116GB. What you should do is to assign a letter to System Reserved partition and move all personal data from this partition to either D: drive or C: Drive then shrink it to 500MB. Merge all unallocated partitions to D: or C:

The correct partition layout should be: 500MB System Reserved, C: Drive, D: Drive.

 

topgundcp, thank you for the reply. When I assign a drive letter and look inside, there is around 423MB of system files there. Will these files ever change? I need Windows to stop writing stuff there because I can't immediately recover my files using an undelete program.

 

No, unless there's a major update then Windows usually creates an extra 450MB Recovery partition, normally after C: Drive.

Windows will have no way to write stuff in this partition since this partition will be hidden by not assigning any drive letter to it, not sure why you think it will.

Not to offend any body but I don't understand the reasoning in post #2

 

I read it as follows - I've not changed any words but added punctuation to show my interpretation.

If the aim is data recovery, then not using Windows sounds like a valid approach (although I'm no expert).

 

Are partitions isolated from overwriting deleted data? As in, if I write in my last partition, will it overwrite deleted data in the second partition?

 

NO. Each partition has its own MFT (Master File Table)

 

What was on the 1st partition (19.53 GB | Unallocated)?

You might want to use that space to create a new 500 MB System Reserve (SR) partition, mark it active and run bcdboot to copy the system files there.

If the unallocated space can be used, then you would also want to mark the 2nd Partition inactive

This would allow you to more easily manage the 2nd partition (current SR)

As I understand it, there are files on that partition that were deleted after you installed Win10 on the 4thpartition and you want to try to recover some of those files. You want to limit writing there so that recovering files will be more successful.

You have to be careful - a MBR initialized disk can only have 4 primary partitions or 3 primary partitions + 1 extended partition (4 is the magic number). I only raise the caution because I suggested creating a new SR partition which brings your layout up to 4 partitions.

What is your strategy for the recovery?

 

Not sure also ....maybe Poster 2 thought OP could scrape that widows data to another drive or healthy partition with Linux but having done that successfully here only with a visible healthy windows partition and not deleted data on a failing windows drive that wouldn't load windows I'm at same thoughts as your question here but I back up anthing important or that I want to keep anyway .......seen too many HDD /PSU and mainboards fail since DOS and Win 3.0 ,ppffttt.....and that's just at home .*really

 

Unless I misunderstood the original question that OP was concerned about data will be written on this System Reserved partition and that's why the follow up question was raised in post #8.

To clarify a little bit more on MBR disk. Depending on how you install Windows ie. if you previously format the disk then Windows will put the Recovery & BCD together in C: drive without creating the System Reserved Partition. However, with this configuration, you won't be able to use bitlocker feature. System Reserved partition is needed if you are using bitlocker.

 

I could be wrong Dino, but post# 1 sounds like data recovery to me *Cool

How everything got deleted on par 2 doesn't really matter - it got deleted and cj1094 seems to want some of the data back so it can be used by the new install.

That's how I read it at least *Wink

+edit
Looking at the layout in post# 1, it seems as though cj1094 places a data partition before the system partition. If that held true for the previous install, then the data might have been in what is now unallocated space.

And if that's the case, then Partition Wizard, Partition recovery, might be the best way to recover the data. That's why I asked about it in post# 10

I don't want cj1094 to take any action in post 10 until more information about the data is provided. I believe that's the concern expressed about writing to the partition. If the data was in the 19.53 GB of unallocated space, moving the SR there would overwrite a few hundred MB of data.-edit