Confusion with internal drives after updating from Win10 to Win11

rfhar · Feb 10, 2024

I recently updated from Win10 t0 win1 recently, with the help of the good people here update from Win10 to Win11 using the MBR2GGPT app and it changed my internal drives a way that has me confused.

The image above is my Win10 before updating to Win11. Below is the Disk Management after updating to Win 11.

Disk 0 System Reserved is labeled "F" as a separate HD in File Explorer. Although it does have a small txt file in it there is about 16MB of hidden stuff in it. My new (Win11) disk0 shows the "C" partition with three Healthy recovery partitions and a System Reserved partition.
C" partition

File Explorer is shown above after update.

And This is how Macrium Reflect sees my drives.

It works so do not fix it ??? Can I remove the "F" label and leave it with no label? I am concerned about my Backups also.

What do you think?

Win11 ver 23H2 (OS Build 22361.3085)

Winuser · Feb 10, 2024

rfhar said:
I recently updated from Win10 t0 win1 recently, with the help of the good people here update from Win10 to Win11 using the MBR2GGPT app and it changed my internal drives a way that has me confused.

View attachment 86682
The image above is my Win10 before updating to Win11. Below is the Disk Management after updating to Win 11.

View attachment 86683
Disk 0 System Reserved is labeled "F" as a separate HD in File Explorer. Although it does have a small txt file in it there is about 16MB of hidden stuff in it. My new (Win11) disk0 shows the "C" partition with three Healthy recovery partitions and a System Reserved partition.
C" partition

View attachment 86684
File Explorer is shown above after update.

And This is how Macrium Reflect sees my drives.
View attachment 86686
It works so do not fix it ??? Can I remove the "F" label and leave it with no label? I am concerned about my Backups also.

What do you think?

Win11 ver 23H2 (OS Build 22361.3085)

Yes you can and should remove the drive letter F. You can remove it in Disk Management.

rfhar · Feb 11, 2024

Thanks, removing the F on the System Reserved disk was easy.

Is it normal to have five partitions on the disk 0? There are two recovery partitions. I am leery of messing with these and am wondering if I might have trouble restoring a backup.

Winuser · Feb 11, 2024

Windows has been known to make two Recovery partitions. With the very small amount of space taken I would just leave it as is.

rfhar · Feb 11, 2024

Thanks, that was my thinking but I wanted to get it from someone who knows more than I do.

Winuser · Feb 11, 2024

rfhar said:
Thanks, that was my thinking but I wanted to get it from someone who knows more than I do.

If you use a recovery program such as Macrium and not Windows recovery you can delete them but you don't really have anything to gain by deleting them.

TechnoMage2021 · Feb 11, 2024

JFWIW: I learned, many years ago, that Windows will make whatever partitions it needs or wants. It never asks me for permission!

I don't spit into the wind, I don't tug on Superman's cape, and I never futz with Windows Partitions.
They don't belong to me, so I just leave them alone. Doing otherwise can cause all sorts of problems.

TM

Try3 · Feb 11, 2024

rfhar said:
Is it normal to have five partitions on the disk 0? There are two recovery partitions

If you ever decide it is worth an hour's work to get rid of the excess partitions and have only what is 'normal', you can
1 Make a new system image of the entire disk.
2 Clean install Windows [which will leave you with 'normal' partitions] Clean Install Windows 11 - ElevenForumTutorials
3 Restore only your C:\ drive from your system image onto the C:\ drive of the new install.

This will leave all your C:\ drive contents intact [OS, apps, settings, ...]. Unnecessary partitions will have been removed.

All the best,
Denis

hsehestedt · Feb 11, 2024

If you perform a clean install of Windows on a GPT drive you end up with these partitions:

EFI partition (Used by the UEFI BIOS) - No drive letter assigned
MSR (Microsoft Reserved partition) - No drive letter assigned and unformatted
Windows partition - Assigned the drive letter C: and formatted as NTFS
Recovery partitions - (Holds Windows recovery tools) - No drive letter assigned, formatted as NTFS

If you perform a typical unattended installation, then the Windows and Recovery partitions will swap positions with the Windows partition coming AFTER the Recovery partition (not ideal, but not harmful either).

For GPT drives other than the Windows drive you get this:

MSR (Microsoft Reserved partition)
One or more partitions that you create.

Notes on this:

Output from various tools will differ, but some will not even show the MSR partition, but EVERY GPT disk will have one of these.
As was noted, having multiple recovery partitions is not a problem, it just looks a little sloppy. The only real time it is an issue is if you have a particularly small boot drive and you are fighting for every last scrap of space. If that ever happens, let us know and we can help, but it's easier to leave it alone.

Winuser · Feb 11, 2024

TechnoMage2021 said:
I don't spit into the wind, I don't tug on Superman's cape, and I never futz with Windows Partitions.

Winuser · Feb 11, 2024

Try3 said:
If you ever decide it is worth an hour's work to get rid of the excess partitions and have only what is 'normal', you can
1 Make a new system image of the entire disk.
2 Clean install Windows [which will leave you with 'normal' partitions] Clean Install Windows 11 - ElevenForumTutorials
3 Restore only your C:\ drive from your system image onto the C:\ drive of the new install.

This will leave all your C:\ drive contents intact [OS, apps, settings, ...]. Unnecessary partitions will have been removed.

All the best,
Denis

That would be good for a hands on learning experience.

Megahertz · Feb 11, 2024

To find out what recovery partition is in use, open a CMD window as administrator and type:

reagentc /info

It will show in what drive and partition is the active one. Than you can delete the other one.

To put the partitions on the correct order you can do:
- Create a Fat32 EFI partition were it was the System partition.
- Disable the recovery environment
- Boot from a Win 10 and launch a CMD window.
- with Diskpart delete the actual Fat32 partition
- With bcdboot create the Boot manager on the first Fat32 partition
- Back to windows create one big (1G) Recovery partition after C: partition
- Enable the recovery environment on the Recovery partition created

If you wish, I can give you detailed instructions.

zbook · Feb 11, 2024

Please run disk par info > post a share link

https://www.tenforums.com/attachments/bsod-crashes-debugging/355861d1640707960-batch-files-use-bsod-debugging-diskparinfo.bat

Batch files for use in BSOD debugging - Windows 10 Help Forums

Information This thread is for use by the BSOD team to store batch files that can be used to collect additional data, fix settings or anything else that is useful in debugging BSOD problems in Windows 10. The way I see it working is the first

www.tenforums.com

Batch files for use in BSOD debugging - Windows 10 Help Forums

Information This thread is for use by the BSOD team to store batch files that can be used to collect additional data, fix settings or anything else that is useful in debugging BSOD problems in Windows 10. The way I see it working is the first

www.tenforums.com

rfhar · Feb 12, 2024

Megahertz said:
To find out what recovery partition is in use, open a CMD window as administrator and type:

It will show in what drive and partition is the active one. Than you can delete the other one.

To put the partitions on the correct order you can do:
- Create a Fat32 EFI partition were it was the System partition.
- Disable the recovery environment
- Boot from a Win 10 and launch a CMD window.
- with Diskpart delete the actual Fat32 partition
- With bcdboot create the Boot manager on the first Fat32 partition
- Back to windows create one big (1G) Recovery partition after C: partition
- Enable the recovery environment on the Recovery partition created

If you wish, I can give you detailed instructions.

View attachment 86821

rfhar · Feb 12, 2024

Thanks Guys, but I am going to wait a while before messing with the SSD. It does work and I very soon will be quite busy. I am 85 and this body is slowing down. The mind is part of the body. :wink: