User's Manual

112 Appendix E:An Introduction to Disk Partitions
CAUTION
As Figure E–10, Disk Drive Being Destructively Repartitioned shows,
any data present in the original partition will be lost without proper
backup!
Non-Destructive Repartitioning
Here, you run a program that does the seemingly impossible: it makes a big partition smaller
without losing any of the files stored in that partition. Many people have found this method
to be reliable and trouble-free. What software should you use to perform this feat? There are
several disk management software products on the market. You will have to do some research
to find the one that is best for your situation.
While the process of non-destructive repartitioning is rather straightforward, there are a number
of steps involved:
• Compress existing data
• Resize the existing partition
• Create new partition(s)
Let’s take a look at each step in a bit more detail.
Compress existing data
As Figure E–11, Disk Drive Being Compressed shows, the first step is to compress the data in your
existing partition. The reason for doing this is to rearrange the data such that it maximizes the available
free space at the "end" of the partition.