Hello everybody!
In this video I’ll tell you how to divide
a hard disk, a USB drive or SD memory card
into partitions using Windows tools and with
third-party utilities, and why you may need
this operation.
Users often face a situation of their computer
having just one local disk.
It can cause certain inconveniences and difficulties:
for example, you can lose important data when
reinstalling your operating system, or when
your OS is damaged.
That’s why it’s recommended to divide
a disk into two or more partitions.
Leave one partition for the operating system,
and turn the other into a file storage.
In this case, important data remains intact
even if you reinstall your Windows.
How to partition your hard disk
So here’s what you should do before you
partition a hard disk.
If you’re going to break it into more than
4 partitions, start with finding out what
method of storing data your disk uses - MBR
or GPT.
That’s because MBR lets you create no more
than 4 partitions, while GPT has an unlimited
number of partitions which only depends on
the operating system.
You can watch one of our videos to learn more
about finding out what your data storage type
is.
Find the link in the description.
To partition a hard disk, go to Disk Management:
to do it, right-click on This PC and select
Manage in the menu.
If you don’t have This PC icon on your desktop,
you can watch one of our videos to see how
to add it.
Find the link in the description.
Or you can do it in the Explorer window by
clicking on the tab Computer and selecting
Manage.
Any of these actions will open the Computer
Management window.
In the left-side panel, choose Disk Management.
You can also start Disk Management by right-clicking
on the Start menu and selecting it from the
list.
In the window that opens you’ll see the
list of all disks and all available partitions.
As you can see, I’ve got one system disk
which I’m going to divide into two parts.
Right-click on it and select “Shrink volume”,
and the system will check it to determine
the space available for shrinking.
Then you’ll see a window with the information
on the disk size and this is where you can
select how large your future disk will be.
For example, if you have a hard disk of 1
Tb with 800 Gb occupied, you won’t be able
to create partitions of 500 Gb each.
Windows Disk Management can’t shrink the
volume beyond the point where any unmovable
files are located.
That’s why I can’t extend the future volume
more than it is allowed by the system, and
even if I enter a larger size, the Shrink
button will be inactive.
It’s better if you don’t have any files
saved on the disk though it’s not always
the way it is (in my case, I have to partition
the system disk which contains certain data).
Now click on the Shrink button to start the
process.
After that, a new partition containing unallocated
space will appear in the disk.
To do it, right-click on the space and select
“New Simple Volume”, Next, assign the
drive letter, Next, choose file system, cluster
size, give volume label and select format
type, then click Next and Finish.
When the process is over, the volume will
open in a new window.
That’s all, a new volume has been created,
and that’s the end of the partition process:
as a result, we have the system disk and another
disk in this system.
How to partition a USB drive or SD card
Sometimes you may need to partition a USB
drive or a Micro SD card.
When doing it, there can some problems.
In fact, until Windows 10 Anniversary Update
users couldn’t enjoy all functions of the
Disk Management service to create partitions
in USB drives or SD cards.
They had to use the command prompt, and even
so, all they could get in the end was a single
partition, because Windows did not support
several partitions in USB drives and SD cards.
However, both problems were fixed in the Creators
update.
Now I’ll show you how to partition a USB
drive with the Disk Management service in
Windows 10.
It’s very similar to partitioning a hard
disk.
To start, insert the drive into a USB port
and open Disk Management.
Select the necessary disk; delete all data
and format it to make partitioning more reliable.
If there’s any important data, backup it
to another disk.
Select the drive, “Shrink volume” and
set the partitions size.
If there’s any data on the USB drive, the
system will not let you create a second partition
larger than the free space area as in the
case with a hard disk.
That’s why it’s better to format it and
then click “Shrink.”
Then, you will see the second partition containing
some unallocated space.
Let’s create a simple volume there.
Don’t change anything; assign the drive
letter; at the formatting stage, select NTFS
file system and uncheck the quick format box.
When the formatting process is over, the second
partition should appear in the Explorer.
Partitioning with the command prompt
Using Disk Management is not the only way
to partition a USB drive or hard disk.
You can also do it with the Command Prompt
using “diskpart” command.
Launch the Command prompt as Administrator
and type the commands
diskpart
list volume – this command will help you
to find the disk to partition.
Next.
“select volume” and the disk number – first,
find the number of the volume for partitioning,
and then type the command
shrink desired=SIZE, and give the size of
the disk you want to create in megabytes,
in my case, that’s 3000= 3 Gb.
Then type the command
create partition primary – it creates the
partition, and follow it with
format fs=ntfs quick – this command formats
the disk in NTFS, then
assign letter=K – this command assigns a
letter to the disk - I choose to use the letter
K.
The new disk will appear in the Explorer with
the letter you have assigned to it.
Partitioning with AOMEI Partition Assistant
You can also partition a hard disk with third-party
software.
I will show you how it’s done with the example
of AOMEI Partition Assistant.
Run the program, right-click on the necessary
disk and select the line “Create partition”,
then set the size of the future partition
and click OK.
Then click Apply and continue.
When the process is over, you’ll see the
message “Congratulations!
All operations have been completed successfully,”
and the new disk will appear in the Explorer.
You can download a free version of Aomei Partition
Assistant from the official website by following
the link below this video.
You can’t see a partition
If the second partition on your USB drive
is not shown in the Explorer after you have
partitioned the disk in one of the ways I’ve
shown you, connect it to the computer again,
and run the Disk Management service again.
You’ll see two partitions on one USB drive.
The second partition will most likely be shown
as RAW.
In this case, try formatting it, and 
after that it should open all right.
You can watch one of our videos to learn more
about fixing a RAW disk.
Find the link in the description.
That is all for now.
Hit the Like button and subscribe to our channel.
Leave comments to ask questions.
Thank you for watching.
Good luck.
