Need advice on shrinking windows ntfs partition

[pranav]

Hi Everyone!

I have Ubuntu 11.10 installed on a lenovo s10-3t netbook. Everything is fine. However, the default windows 7 partition, the "C drive" is taking up a huge chunk of the space. The goal is to not break anything, windows, grub, etc. and also not lose any data and manage to do the following:

1. shrink the C drive to about 70 GB (if this is possible at all)

2. Create a new 120GB partition that will be accessible from windows as well as ubuntu, seeking your recommendations on the filesystem to choose?

3. I want to take ur advice on how to go about doing this using gparted or any other tool(preferably GUI). Since I will create a new partition, i am worried grub will break and i wont be able to login to anything at all!

I have a bootable pen-drive (thats how i installed ubuntu on the netbook) in case we need to use it at some point.

I have shared the breakup from Gparted in the attachment.

205848

Looking forward to your advice and suggestions to better utilize the space on my hard drive instead of letting it stay dormant in windows, the only catch is i dont want to format windows as other family members use the netbook occasionally and they hv certain things installed on windows n such that i dont want to meddle with.

Thanks to the wonderful Ubuntu community in advance!

[Megaptera]

For 2.I think ntfs is the only simple option for a file system readable by both Ubuntu & Windows.

Useful guide here:
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/35807/how-to-harmonize-your-dual-boot-setup-for-windows-and-ubuntu/

[papibe]

I would start doing all you can do from Windows 7 first:

In order to avoid any possible problem I would start defragmenting the partition. I would even do it a couple of times.
Then I would use Disk Manager (http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/resize-a-partition-for-free-in-windows-vista/) to reduce the partition.

From experience, you may even need to repeat the process a couple of times since Windows7 kind of act 'greedy' when reducing its own partition (defrag -> reduce partition size).

I would only use gparted unless you can't get the size you want using Disk Manager.

Note that Windows 7 will probably complain the next time it boots with a smaller partition. Let it do its 'adjustments' and you'll be fine.

Hope it helps.
Regards.

[pranav]

For 2.I think ntfs is the only simple option for a file system readable by both Ubuntu & Windows.

Useful guide here:
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/35807/how-to-harmonize-your-dual-boot-setup-for-windows-and-ubuntu/

Thanks for sharing the article, its actually useful and i will follow those steps once my partitioning is thru to have a seamless workflow irrespective of the OS i use.

Truly appreciate you sharing your thoughts! Cheers.

[Quackers]

Yes, defrag first (at least once) then using Windows Disk Management console shrink the C: drive. It will tell you how much it can be shrunk by in the pop-up window that shows. You can shrink by less than that amount if you want, but not more (without further jiggery pokery).

[pranav]

I would start doing all you can do from Windows 7 first:

In order to avoid any possible problem I would start defragmenting the partition. I would even do it a couple of times.
Then I would use Disk Manager (http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/resize-a-partition-for-free-in-windows-vista/) to reduce the partition.

From experience, you may even need to repeat the process a couple of times since Windows7 kind of act 'greedy' when reducing its own partition (defrag -> reduce partition size).

I would only use gparted unless you can't get the size you want using Disk Manager.

Note that Windows 7 will probably complain the next time it boots with a smaller partition. Let it do its 'adjustments' and you'll be fine.

Hope it helps.
Regards.

I will def. follow your defrag tip! I almost forgot about defrag. Its a great suggestion. Would you have any thoughts on my other question about the inclusion of a new partition breaking GRUB?

Thanks for sharing your suggestions! Absolutely appreciate it.

[Quackers]

My shared data partition is NTFS, though I think other types may now work too. Such a new partition would not break Grub if you are using a later version (and you are if using 11-10's version).

[fdrake]

never mind... i just noticed your screen shoot...