Windows 10: Wanting to use unallocated space on my hard drive, any dos and don'ts?

Well, I thank you for your warning because now Windows won't boot after I was prompted to restart to apply changes to Partition Wizard. Fortunately, I transferred all my important files to my laptop and I have a Windows 10 installation disc that came with my PC when I bought it. Upon going into Windows Setup, it appears that C: has been untouched, but I need to install Windows somewhere to access them again:




Ignore the bottom photo, I'm not use to sending pictures from my phone to a PC.

 

I'm guessing I should install Windows on the 100 GB partition?

 

That'd be unnecessary...assuming all your files and Windows data is there you can either use startup repair or restore the master boot record and hopefully be able to just boot into Windows like usual...

Try clicking Repair your computer and then startup repair. If that doesn't fix your problem, look into restoring your MBR.
Fix the MBR – Guide for Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1, 10

(not liable for damages to your PC, although I don't think damage can be done while attempting to fix your MBR)

 

I always delete all the partitions and then let Windows install on the free space. However, this may not be the best choice for you. If you want to try to fix the booting issue, there are other methods you can try. If you are wanting to start fresh, then by all means delete the partitions you see and choose the one large free space left for windows. It will create all the necessary partitions during install.

 

Do not re-install Windows. It's easy to fix the boot problem. Boot up the Installation disk, press SHIFT+F10 to open command prompt then type:

mountvol U: /s
del /s /f /q U:\efi\*.*
bcdboot c:\windows /s U: /f UEFI

Reboot

 

Well, for those who just replied to my previous two posts, I'm sorry but I just installed Windows on the 100 GB partition before I any of you responded because I was getting impatient. After this, everything succeeded and I was able to access everything I had before, albeit it's a different partition now (it's D: instead of C*Smile. So by then, I had to deal with getting all my stuff back to the proper partition and I did so by managing to find and launch Partition Wizard again to merge C: and D: but there's a new problem now, unfortunately. After letting Partition Wizard do it's thing following a reboot, I was able to have Windows boot again and login again, but after doing so took a few minutes of "Preparing Windows" and eventually I came to a black screen with only the cursor visible.

I let it sit for a while to see if it would do anything else and unfortunately, after several or so minutes, still nothing's happened. Now I'm afraid I may have lost everything I had on it (except the stuff that I copied and transferred on to my laptop) because if the merging didn't properly happen and/or I don't know where else to install Windows again if I have to. I hope I'm wrong.

 

According to a Microsoft forum moderator, this type of issue can happen as a result of corrupted or missing Windows files. If you have the chance, try running the Windows install disc/flash drive and seeing if the partitions were created/merged successfully, with the expected storage sizes/free space/used space, etc. If that is the case, you might be able to launch startup repair or (if startup repair doesn't fix the issue) command prompt and using the "sfc /scannow" command (without quotation marks).

 

Well, the partitions were merged as the partition with my files is now 930 GB in size (as opposed to 830 GB previously).

Performed Startup Repair, says it couldn't repair.

Launched Command Prompt and entered sfc /scannow, says "Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation."

So now what?

 

Well, I did some online research and one of the solutions to the "Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation" issue was by performing chkdsk c: /r but that didn't seem to do anything as performing sfc /scannow after that again still gave me the same thing:

 

Download a copy of Macrium Reflect Free edition.

Macrium Software | Macrium Reflect Free

Using this tutorial make a Recovery USB or DVD

Backup and Restore with Macrium Reflect Windows 10 Tutorials

Boot the computer using the USB or DVD and look for Fix Windows Boot in the menu.

Use Macrium Reflect Rescue Media to Fix Windows Boot Issues Windows 10 Tutorials

Hopefully it can fix your booting issues.

 

Well, I tried that twice and unfortunately it didn't solve my issue. Thank you for lending a possible solution though.

Okay, from what I know, both partitions have the same Windows files since both have Windows installed in them. I wonder if merging the two partitions together both with the same files necessary for my PC to boot into Windows properly is what is causing this issue.

Although, I that is just a hypothesis and I don't know for sure myself, but I just want this situation to be over with so I can go back to my normal habits of playing games and watching YouTube on a 23" monitor instead of just a little smartphone.

 

If your laptop has the space available, you can use the Macrium boot to access the drive on your PC and back up the data over to your laptop via local network. Then you can clean install windows and copy what you want back over. Just thinking here.

 

That sounds like an option that should definitely work. I can clear some space on my laptop to store the backup. But I need to figure out how transfer that backup through my network.

 

Setup a shared folder on the laptop. Then make sure to take note of the user name and password on the laptop. Once you share the folder, you will see it on Macrium. I used that Macrium boot USB to do it with no issues on my local network. I didn't use password sharing though. I just made the folder accessible by "everyone" and turned off password sharing. If you need any help, let me know.

EDIT**** Macrium will only backup the used part of the disk, not the full size. So it won't be 900GB, the size of your drive. Only the size of the data on it.

EDIT 2**** I am not sure how the network share would work if you don't have a password setup. If needed, setup a password if you don't use one. Just thinking again lol.

 

Where can I find that?