PC Hacks

Hack #43. Create a New Partition with PartitionMagic

Create new partitions from free or existing partition space with PartitionMagic.

PartitionMagic is one of the most popular tools for working with disk partitions under Windows. It lets you create, delete, resize, merge, or prepare partitions for different operating systems. Working on a disk drive with a couple of existing partitions is one of the things PartitionMagic is great for because its wizards show you the state of existing partitions, let you borrow space from an existing partition (actually shrinking it to make room) for a new partition, and provide three levels of safeguards to help protect your existing data before any changes are made to your disk.

In this hack, I take you through making a new partition in free space on an existing drive. Your first step is to acquire a copy of PartitionMagic and install it on your PC. You can buy and download a copy online from Symantec's web site (http://www.symantec.com). Once installed, PartitionMagic is at your service to help you perform many disk-related tasks. To create a new partition, follow these steps:

1. From the PartitionMagic menu select "Create a new partition" (Figure 5-8).

   

   Figure 5-8. PartitionMagic's main dialog and menu

2. Select where you want the new partition to be created (Figure 5-9). This is where the value of a tool like PartitionMagic becomes impressive; the program ...