I might have tried that myself, without consulting a web article, because
all the partitions are on the one disk and not spanned.
But, no matter what you're doing with TestDisk, the biggest liability,
is that the size computed isn't right. I don't know if TestDisk has
any "divisible by 63" preferences, like some Partition Managers I know,
and any time you're doing anything like this, either the size can be
modified slightly, the starting offset, or the spacing between partitions.
Sometimes, even the order of the partitions in the new partition table
are wrong (which causes boot.ini to need an ARC path correction, or
whatever the equivalent of that would be in the BCD of a Win7/Win8
install).
Reversal of partition order, can be causes by the previous use of a
Partition
Manager. As long as you know how to hand edit a boot.ini, you can fix that.
Partition Magic did that to me once, when transferring partitions from one
disk to another, and it required using another tool later, to have the
partitions reversed again, preventing Windows from booting.
So, yes, I like TestDisk for these kinds of experiments, but even in the
simplest of situations (rebuilding a Basic disk), it can make spaghetti out
of the disk drive. As long as the users "knows what the answer is" and has
a fair idea of what sensible numbers would be for the partitions, then
"go for it".
I've probably already told my story about the "deleted partition". I had
a disk with four partitions, deleted one, and later, needed to use
TestDisk.
TestDisk found all four partitions, but the end of the third partition,
overlapped the fourth partition. (And that's because, the fourth partition
really should not have been there - it was nominally "deleted".) What
I've learned about this, is in future, if I delete a partition,
I'm going to write zeros over the space with "dd", so TestDisk can't
find it
And then when it scans, it'll only find three.
Paul
http://tinyurl.com/6y8nr4z
Well, you've gotta laugh, man. In fact I had a good belly-laugh at that.
I'm going to try TestDisk on just one partition; my SpareSpace one in
which I've put one little Notepad file called "The only thing here".
Here's the Aomei FAQ for what it's worth. It's beyond me. I don't feel
up to contacting them either as they advise in their error message. I
don't speak their lingo.
Ed
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FAQ
1. In what situations can dynamic disk be converted to basic
with Aomei Dynamic Disk
Manager?
1）Situations in which you CAN convert dynamic disk to basic:
l The dynamic disk consists of only simple volumes, and moreover, the
number of each simple
volume slice is one.
l The dynamic disk consists of only mirrored volumes, and
moreover, the number of each
mirrored volume slice is one.
l The dynamic disk consists of both simple volumes and mirrored
volumes, and moreover, the
number of each simple volume slice or mirrored volume slice is one.
2）Situations in which you CANNOT convert dynamic disk to basic:
l There are spanned volumes, striped volumes or RAID5 volumes on
dynamic disks.
l The number of simple volume slice on a single dynamic
disk is more than one, namely
discontiguous simple volume.
l The number of mirrored volume slice on a single dynamic disk
is more than one, namely
discontiguous mirrored volume.
3）Advice:
l For spanned volumes and discontiguous simple volumes, please use
"Resize/Move Volume"
to shrink volume or change volume location so that turn them into
contiguous simple volume
(single volume slice).
l For mirrored volume, please use "Shrink Volume" to decrease its
capacity so that it becomes
contiguous mirrored volume. Besides, we suggest you
break mirrored volume before
converting.
l For striped and RAID5 volume, please use "Remove Drive
from RAID" to remove the
dynamic disk you want to convert from the RAID array.
l For striped, mirrored and RAID5 volume, you can also use "Move
Volume Slice Wizard" to
migrate all the volume slices
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2. Can I convert partitioned GPT disk to MBR with Aomei Dynamic Disk
Manager?
Aomei Dynamic Disk Manager can convert GPT disk which has 4
partitions at most to MBR
without losing data. If the number of partitions on GPT disk is more
than 4, the conversion from
GPT disk to MBR is unavailable. Because disk based on MBR can only
create up to 4 primary
partitions.
3. After converting a dynamic disk contained mirrored volume to basic,
why Windows Disk
Management snap-in shows a "Missing Disk"?
Because the mirrored volume consists of two dynamic disks, if you only
convert one of them to
basic, the "Missing Disk" will appear; however, "Missing Disk" will
disappear naturally when you
simultaneously convert two dynamic disks to basic. We suggest you break
mirrored volume before
converting.
4. How to extend RAID0 (Striped), RAID1 (Mirrored)
and RAID5 volume with Aomei
Dynamic Disk Manager?
l For RAID1 (Mirrored) volume that consists of only two dynamic
disks, it is easy and safe to
extend RAID1 (Mirrored) volume with "Resize/Move Volume" if the
two dynamic disks are
equal in size; if not, such as 100GB disk1 and 300GB
disk2, in such case, you can only
extend RAID1 (Mirrored) volume to maximum 100GB.
Then, in order to extend up to
300GB, you need to add another 300GB disk
(hereinafter "disk3") to your system and
convert disk3 to dynamic disk. After that, please use "Move
Volume Slice Wizard" to transfer
all mirrored volume slices on disk1 to disk3 and then extend
RAID1 (Mirrored) volume to
300GB with "Resize/Move Volume". Besides, this method also
applies to RAID0 (Striped)
and RAID5 volume.
l For RAID0 (Striped) and RAID5 volume, it is easy and safe to
extend RAID0 (Striped) or
RAID5 volume with "Resize/Move Volume" if there is enough
unallocated space on each
disk where the RAID0 (Striped) or RAID5 volume locate; if not,
you have to add another
large enough disk to your system and convert it to dynamic disk.
After that, please use "Add
Drive to RAID" to extend RAID0 (Striped) or RAID5 volume. For
example, the current size
of RAID5 volume which consists of 3 X 100GB disks is 200GB, you
can use "Add Drive to
RAID" to extend RAID5 volume to 300GB by adding a new 100GB disk
to RAID5 array.
5. Why need "Move Slice" function?
Every dynamic volume consists of many volume slices, for example,
spanned volume has two
volume slices at least and RAID5 volume needs three volume slices
at least. However, system
volume is so special that it consists of only simple volume which has
just one single volume slice.
In order to extend system volume, there must be some contiguous
unallocated space before or
behind C drive; if not, you can use "Move Slice" or "Move Volume
Slice Wizard" to transfer
volume slices located before or behind C drive to other places
or disks so that there will be
contiguous unallocated space to extend system volume.
6. After committing pending operations and restarting
computer, why the drive letter
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disappeared?
If the drive letter disappeared, please restart computer once
again to make drive letter visible.
Besides, you can use "Change Letter" to reassign a drive letter to the
volume.
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