Windows 10: Partition layout

Here is the win10 Forums Win 10 Installation Tutorial , I think you are at Step 13

Windows 10 - Clean Install - Windows 10 Forums[2]=Installation%20and%20Setup#step13

 

Where it says where do you want to install Windows, it only shows my SSD, no other drives.

And no 5 partitions, just one hole partition which can't be deleted nor formatted.

I did do Top gun instructions which maybe deleted my partitions?

 

Yes that's correct

 

Oh ........ well yeah that answers that question *Smile you didn't say it says "unallocated" already , don't format it or anything , just click next

Follow along from step 13 in the link above....

I'm here if you have more ???'s

 

Sorry I didn-t mention it was unallocated.
W10 has now been installed, I think it is a clean install.
See a photo of my partitions.
Is this good ?

Thanks

 

*Party*Party*Party*Thumbs*Thumbs*Thumbs I am so happy I could *cry*cry*cry how about you ? *Smile

All looks good you wont see the 4th MSR partition in Disk Management but you will when you install MR and MiniTool Partition Wizard 9 (Free)

KB

 

Do a Windows Key +R and type winver <enter> you will get a DBX showing you the Win10 version

KB

 

Next get MR installed and backup the whole SSD to your external Drive......

Then got to Start>Settings>Update>check now and see if you are indeed fully upto date

 

Yes I am very happy it's sorted, and I really appreciate your support, thanks to you I have a clean version of W10.
so now the plan is to install Macrium Reflect and back up W10, I'll check it out and I'll probably ask for your help to make sure I get it right, as I am not familiar with MR.
i will post tomorrow the current W10 version.
should I install Windows updates, drivers, and my usual programs ( antivirus, ccleaner, malwarebytes...etc) then back up the image or should I do it with how W10 is now? Then maybe set up scheduled back ups.
some drivers are a pain to install automatically and I have to install them manually, like sound drivers.

 

I would install MR and do a backup and then do ALL the other Stuff and then do another MR Backup , so if needed you can fallback to the latest image if somehow things get screwed up again .

Turn on System Restore , AND Create one, so you have restore points too , some versions of Win10 disable it by default, you can create a Restore point before you install any piece of Hardware or Software , so you can revert it if needed too.

System Restore Point - Create in Windows 10 - Windows 10 Forums

 

I understand, I will do that.
out of curiosity, what is the difference between installing W10 again as I did today from the MCT tool USB, and recovering with MR from a back up image of how W10 is now ? Since they will both install W10 to this current state, am I correct ?

 

Exactly ^^^ OP , I used diskpart cmd to clean and re configure *this beta win OS MBR Legacy BIOS-SSD for this new UFEI-GPT PC in my specs and you can re initialize it and re format it to one GPT or MBR NTFS volume in Disk manager and just let windows clean install media handle the windows partitions and either scrape your data you parked on another HDD or from a back up and put it on the healthy partition via file explorer directory trees or maybe run your back up restore routine if it doesn't change partitions or at least anthing outside of healthy NTFS storage volumes ....just did all that and re installed some exe when I got this new PC it was cake walk without macrium reflect or any of that for this dual boot HHD/SSD test mule .

OP ,In your case you can just clean it with diskpart then exit and let a windows media custom install format and partition it for you like topgundcp said and put your data and whatever back on it

OP ...here are my drive images note the 1 GB UEFI GPT /NTFS metal HDD is a new HP OEM configuration with the AU rolled into it and otherwise unaltered ,the small new volume is ofc the SSD I'm using now with 14915 with the UEFI GPT /NTFS volume with the two hidden GPT recovery partitions presumably at each end and where the HDD boots as Vol 3 and the SSD as vol. 7 and presumably the two new vol (c: ) identical GPT recovery partitions are vol 5 & 6 .

 

As of today yes ....but as time goes by you will install programs and updates etc etc which will all be in the latest image so you don't need to reinstall from Day One again , unless really needed. It is also way faster to Re-Image a clean install with MR , than to install clean , takes 12-15 mins to run a re-image for me..... , not a day long process *Smile
I don't do major Windows Updates and stuff like that without doing a MR backup 1st , it worth the 15-20 mins it takes for peace of mind knowing, if there is a snafu by me or M$ i can just re-image and i'm back up and running asap.

Generally I use a USB Key for MR but a CDRW will do , as it should be updated when MR is updated every few months too.

KB

 

It shows version 1607 ( OS build 14393.0 )

 

So far, in Macrium Reflect, did "image this disk" and saved the image to my external drive, I'll also copy it later to my NAS.
The size of the image is 10GB.
I also created a system restore point in Windows ( had to configure security first on all the drives ).
Then installed updates, and programs, and did another disk image.
I saved both of them on my external drive, in a folder called Macrium Reflect Back ups.
However, i did notice that the XML files get saved in "my documents" in a folder called Reflect, so i moved that folder to my external drive too.
I think this is it, i'm happy with how the PC is performing, and i want to back it up every now and then.

Thank you very much