Solved Mysterious Disk Partitions

Any of the disk partition experts here can decipher my disk partitions? I have no idea how they came about. The W11 machine itself works flawlessly, but I like to know what the %^(* is going on, e.g. why is there a 15.00 GB Recovery Partition? Any chance of riskless consolidation?

No Risk no fun!
Diskpart
sel disk 0
sel par 4
set id="de94bba4-06d1-4d40-a16a-bfd50179d6ac"
gpt attributes=0x8000000000000001
sel par 5
set id="ebd0a0a2-b9e5-4433-87c0-68b6b72699c7"
gpt attributes=0x0000000000000000
assign letter=D
sel par 6
set id="ebd0a0a2-b9e5-4433-87c0-68b6b72699c7"
delete
sel par 5
extend
exit

Macrium Reflect (freeware) > create image of drive, warts and all

Minitool Partition Wizard > delete partitions one-by-one, reboot each time. Don't delete the 1st aprtition or the system C:\drive partition

If it all works, expand system partition and/or create your own new partitions with space now available.

That 15gb recovery could be an oem recovery containing the oem media. You can take a peek inside with diskgenius and see if it is something you want to keep.

When you assign a letter to partition 5 and add the id&attrib. you see what is inside.
The above commands doesn't delete the partition!
No need for any 3rd party software!

POLYSIUS said:

No Risk no fun!
Diskpart
sel disk 0
sel par 4
set id="de94bba4-06d1-4d40-a16a-bfd50179d6ac"
gpt attributes=0x8000000000000001
sel par 5
set id="ebd0a0a2-b9e5-4433-87c0-68b6b72699c7"
gpt attributes=0x0000000000000000
assign letter=D
sel par 6
set id="ebd0a0a2-b9e5-4433-87c0-68b6b72699c7"
delete
sel par 5
extend
exit

Click to expand...

@POLYSIUS Care to elaborate what the diskpart commands do?

diskpart commands are pretty dangerous

SIW2 said:

That 15gb recovery could be an oem recovery containing the oem media. You can take a peek inside with diskgenius and see if it is something you want to keep.

Click to expand...

Yeah, the 15gb could be the Dell OEM partition. If I want to keep it, then all I can reclaim is only 2gb?

Yes. You could copy/image oem partition contents to a different disk if you want to free up space on the os disk. Just in case you want to put it back to factory state at some point in the future.

Many computer manufacturers put a recovery partition on their units to make life easier for their tech support teams. When you call up with an OS problem, they show you how to do a restore. Quick for them, but the poor customer has to reinstall all his apps and then update the machine.

Haydon said:

@POLYSIUS Care to elaborate what the diskpart commands do?

diskpart commands are pretty dangerous

Click to expand...

Agreed. Given your need to post in this forum, one can assume you might be new to partition management. Diskpart is not for you at this stage, it's too powerful.

Hence my suggestion of MiniTool Partition Wizard, a more GUI orient5ed program to see what is going to happen. AOMEI Partition Manager (also freeware) is just as good.

In regards to the recovery partition, a couple of comments
- I have never had much success with, and thus little confidence in, any of the Windows 3 R's - Restore, Recovery, Repair
- if you back up your system with regular imaging (Macrium Reflect and/or AOMEI BackUpper, both freeware), you don't need a recovery partition. It can be deleted.

I always wipe the OEM recovery partitions on my systems. They're outdated already before the purchase of the product anyways. I do however backup all drivers from a working system...just in case, and update the backup every time there's a driver update.

According your Profile you are a "Power User" with more than 1700 posts!
So I expect someone knows s.th. about the basic commands for troubleshooting.
I tell you what is a dangerous combination: A Fool and a Tool!
I don't have the time to discuss problems, I solve problems.

There is nothing to backup first, because Partition 3 is untouched.

A backup now is good advice, just in case to make your computer unbootable. We all make mistakes

Folks, with regard to partitions 4 and 6 which are both allegedly Recovery partitions, how do I safely find out what they really are?

Download DiskGenius and you can see what's there.

Do not simply delete the partitions without knowing what it is.

Here you go:
The 1.35 GB partition Partition no 4 is WINRETOOLS. The15GB partition is Image.The 1.06GB partition is DELLSUPPORT,The 12MB Unallocated space is used by Intel Optane and is a must. You obviously have Optane enabled Dell PC/laptop.Please fill in the complte specifications of your Dell machine. Have a look at My Computer below. Without giving full specifications of your PC, if you blindly put the Disk Management screenshot and ask questions, you will only get random replies that may not be correct.

jumanji said:

Do not simply delete the partitions without knowing what it is.

Here you go:
The 1.35 GB partition Partition no 4 is WINRETOOLS. The15GB partition is Image.The 1.06 partiton is DELLSUPPORT,The 12MB Unallocated space is is used by Intel Optane and is a must. You obviously have Optane enabled Dell PC/laptop.Please fill in the complte specifications of your Dell machine. Have a look at My Computer below. Without giving full specifications of your PC, if you blindly put the Disk Management screenshot, you will only get random replies that may not be correct.

Click to expand...

Ah, thanks! How came the image into the partition? Is it common? It also appears to be a compressed image?

I'll second MiniTool free. Simply right click the partition and select 'explore'. Makes life simple.

First make image backup of whole drive.

Then, I would run following from admin command prompt to move winre.wim to C drive


then delete all partions after C drive and then run


to reactivate winre.wim.

POLYSIUS said:

According your Profile you are a "Power User" with more than 1700 posts!

Click to expand...

If only we could tell to whom this response was directed ....

If you're going to reply to someone/thing, courtesy dictates you quote the subject of the reply. This is a discusion forum, not a line-by-line chat room.

POLYSIUS said:

There is nothing to backup first, because Partition 3 is untouched.

Click to expand...

Umm, what about your whole system? as you say, if you're the fool with the tool, then an image backup can always be restored to where you were before