2 HDD/ Drive letter problem....WHY??

[awaisagha]

hi guys...
i have vista sp2 OS installed(this prob is same in win7 too),on my dell studio 1737 laptop...it has 2 hdd options,my primary hdd is 320GB n secondary one is 500GB (purely for data,movies,songs).
when i install OS,n in my computer it takes 500GBs hdd 1st drive as D drive.n then 320GBs D as E...i tell u in little more details...
C..320GB hdd
D..500GB
E..320GB
F..320Gb
G..320GB
----------------
H..500GB n onwards....
(320GB hdd has 5 partitions....)

then i have to go to my computer.right click.properties.manage n change driver letters....i want to know why this happens so...what is its permanent solution...what i can do to solve it.i mean permanently...

 

[clifford_cooley]

Hi awaisagha

I'm still confused as to what you are asking

Can you take a screen capture of disk management, showing all your drives and partitions? Then post the captured image for us to see what you have to work with. How many partitions do you have total?

 

[awaisagha]

i have attached the disk management screenshot...

 

[Core]

Why so many primaries?

 

[Veedaz]

Hi awaisagha

Looking at your drives they could do with a bit of a tidy and this is a great tool for the job and its freeware > http://www.partitionwizard.com/

 

[awaisagha]

Hi awaisagha

Looking at your drives they could do with a bit of a tidy and this is a great tool for the job and its freeware > http://www.partitionwizard.com/

well that software is making partitions and how would i make partitions,i have huge data on these 2 hdds where i would store them.
this condition is after changing driver letters,but when new OS is installed,then disk 2 1st partition is taken as D drive....thats what problem is....

 

[Veedaz]

So what exactly do you want to do with your partitions ? with Partition Wizard you can alter partitions without having to move your data.

 

[Kougar]

I'm not entirely sure I understand the question, what is it exactly you wish to do (or have) as the finished solution?

The drive Windows boots from will always by default become C. If you Dual-boot then the C partition changes depending on which OS you boot from.

 

[jeewing7]

Hi awaisagha,
As I understand your question, every time you try to (re)install windows the assigned drive letters get rearranged and your windows installation ends up on the wrong drive letter.

Your problem stems from the fact that you have so many primary partitions. When you try to install windows it is generally trying to find an unallocated disk space to call home. When it does not see that, it automatically assigns drive letters to the existing drive partitions but bumps everything up one letter. It's an inherent problem to the kernal.

There are two ways around it: Physically remove one of the hard drives from the link. This will force windows to look on only one hard drive for its destination. It will almost always see the first partition as the "C:" drive. The second solution (and the one that always has worked for me) is to constantly create and delete the partition you are trying to install to until it is seen as the "C:" drive. You will know this because the drive letter will show when it asks which drive you wish to install to. There have been a few occasions where I had to reboot the computer (sometimes more than once) and start the whole install over again until it sees the drive letters correctly.

I am curious though why you have your drives divided in so many partitions. Seems archaic to me.

 

[Nibiru2012]

I would disconnect the extra hard drive until you're done installing Windows 7.

It has been customary for the CD/DVD drives to be labeled: D & E drives.

I have changed this in the control panel - administrative tools - computer management - disk management.

I temporarily change the DVD drive letter above any others listed, then I go about in a reverse process of changing each partition to reflect what their drive letters would be after the D & E drive letters. Once that is done then I go back and change the CD/DVD drives to their respective customary D & E designations.

It is best to have no more than 2-3 partitions per hard drive. Once you reinstall Windows 7 on the main hard drive, all those partitions on that drive will then become primary partitions.

I would use the 320 GB hard drive as the primary drive and the 500GB one as secondary drive.

Plug back in the second hard drive and you can use Partition Wizard to combine those partitions, if you want. Use the CD ISO bootable version and boot to it. It will do a better and quicker job of what you want to do.

 

[clifford_cooley]

When you try to install windows it is generally trying to find an unallocated disk space to call home.

Wrong - Unless the whole drive is unallocated space

Windows will Install and Boot to the drive you specify in system BIOS and only to the Active Partition which will be labeled C:\. All other drives will be labeled sequentially as found. If your Windows files and Boot files are both on C:\, all other drive letters can be changed through Disk Management found in Computer Management.

 

[jeewing7]

Wrong - Unless the whole drive is unallocated space

Wow dude.. calling me out like that is wrong. Especially when I phrased it correctly with generally.
Windows will almost always try to install to the first drive partition it sees and give preference to an unallocated drive space. Potatoe/potahto.

 

[clifford_cooley]

I didn't call you out, I called out the bad terminology (unallocated).

Windows does not look for unallocated space to call home. If this was the case you would have trouble installing to any previously created partition. Windows looks for all space allocated and unallocated and calls home the space you specify for the installation.