Resizing partition without destroying recovery partition

Question

I've just bought an MSI Prestige 14 Evo A12M, which comes with 1TB disk partitioned as in DISKPART Details below. I want to resize Windows 935GB partition into a Windows 150GB and Data 785-GB. Technically no problem, but when I did it on my previous Lenovo, 10 years ago, I've run into similar situation like in this thread (TL;DR; windows recovery system, stopped recognizing recovery partition). Lenovo One-Key Recovery Feature broken after resizing partition

So my question are:

Is that Lenovo specific issue, as I didn't find articles for other manufacturers?
Is this old technology related, as my issue was 10 years ago and in the mentioned thread, it was 5 years ago.
Should I undertake any specific steps to avoid the issue?

DISKPART Details

Disk 0 is now the selected disk.
DISKPART> list partition
Partition ###  Type              Size     Offset

Partition 1    System             300 MB  1024 KB
  Partition 2    Reserved           128 MB   301 MB
  Partition 3    Primary            935 GB   429 MB
  Partition 4    Recovery           900 MB   935 GB
  Partition 5    Recovery            17 GB   936 GB
DISKPART> list volume
Volume ###  Ltr  Label        Fs     Type        Size     Status     Info

Volume 0     C   Windows      NTFS   Partition    935 GB  Healthy    Boot
  Volume 1         SYSTEM       FAT32  Partition    300 MB  Healthy    System
  Volume 2         WinRE tools  NTFS   Partition    900 MB  Healthy    Hidden
  Volume 3         BIOS_RVY     NTFS   Partition     17 GB  Healthy    Hidden

I am not sure why you need to do this. My 3 main computers all have 1 TB SSDs. No need to partition. Just set up a workable folder structure. That will maximize your disk space and usage. — John, Aug 18 '23 at 21:49
Well, there is some data that you want to wipe out during windows recovery (most of the installed software) and there is some data that you want to keep, such as GIT repositories, pictures, etc. Yes I know that you can restore windows and keep old data but that used to be not the best option for a system performance, and probably still is. Anyways, that is not the question :) — Bart, Aug 18 '23 at 22:02
By keeping data in large folders it is very easy to manage. Easier in fact, than partitions. — John, Aug 18 '23 at 22:04
"I want to resize system partition into a System 150GB and Data rest-GB." -- Are you sloppy with names? The System partition is currently only 300MB. Are you actually referring to the Primary partition? — sawdust, Aug 19 '23 at 02:42
@sawdust sorry, you're right. I've fixed names. I want to partition Windows into Windows + Data — Bart, Aug 19 '23 at 08:17
@JoepvanSteen well yes and no. My problem, may be related to different issues, so an answer to any question might resolve my problem — Bart, Aug 19 '23 at 09:28
@John It's always recommended to separate user data from C: and put it on its own partition; this prevents inefficient inconveniences when imaging the OS partition or restoring an OS image — JW0914, Aug 19 '23 at 12:41
@Bart You have two recovery partitions, partition 4 [WinRE] and partition 5 [an OEM Push Button Restore [PBR] image partition]; so the OEM PBR functionality still works after resizing the OS partition, simply update the dism script(s) that reside on partition 5 after doing so. That being said, OEM PBR images are more inconvenient than they're worth, as they don't update - you can create and configure your own PBR images and not be inconvenienced in the process if it ever has to be used by regularly appending new backups to the PBR WIM image. — JW0914, Aug 19 '23 at 12:46
@Bart Please do not screenshot terminal output, instead please copy and paste it into a code box within a question/answer — JW0914, Aug 19 '23 at 12:49
JW - I dropped partitions a quarter of a century ago and no bad outcomes but much easier management — John, Aug 19 '23 at 14:28
@JW0914 Also thank you for a link to your excellent DISM article. That doesn't answer my original question. However, it is a better approach and answers a question that I had in my mind, if I could edit PBR image :). Thx a lot :) — Bart, Aug 19 '23 at 23:37
@John it's not about anything "bad" happening, it becomes an inconvenience when imaging the OS partition if user data is primarily kept on the OS partition, as either extra steps must be taken to exclude the data when imaging the OS partition, or the data is imaged with it and balloons the image; WIMing also becomes easier since imaging the OS partition usually has to be done from WinPE/WinRE. It also causes inconveniences when having to restore an image - it takes me ~20min if I need to restore the uncompressed ~165GB OS partition from a WIM versus the uncompressed 1.5TB with user data. — JW0914, Aug 20 '23 at 12:28
@Bart Resizing the OS partition shouldn't affect the OEM PBR partition; it potentially could affect PBR scripts, and if so, all that would need to be done is editing those specific scripts, depending on how the PBR restore scripts are written in regards to partitioning and partition sizes. Resizing the OS partition won't affect the OEM PBR image options shown on the Advanced screen of WinRE, as UEFI uses a specific GUID to identify WinRE recovery partitions (what the OEM PBR partition is) and the customized WinRE Advanced screen has no config files that reside on the OS partition. — JW0914, Aug 20 '23 at 12:33
@JW0914 After becoming confident that I could fix or replace the PBR partition, I resized the "Windows" partition using GUI "Disk Management". Now, when I press F3 during boot-up, it takes me to the PBR menu(with the blue Windows style). When I select "restore system," it launches a custom MSI system/application that prompts me to confirm the system restoration. I haven't gone through with it because I've already installed some apps and other things, but I assume it works. Thank you again! I would answer the question directly, but since I haven't tested it, I don't want to make any guarantees. — Bart, Aug 21 '23 at 09:39

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Aug 19 '23 at 11:55

It may very well be that the code that is responsible for restoring your operating system is programmed in a very simple manner and is based on some hardcoded assumptions that you can't change.

Once you violate those assumptions by modifying your partition layout the code fails.

You are probably thinking about shortening the windows partition and inserting the data partition into the newly created space behind the windows partition.

It might make a difference if you are inserting the data partition as last partition but that would require moving the volumes 1,2 and 3 towards the windows partition. That moving process is risky and its time consuming.

Proposal

As separating your data is a good idea I would bite the bullet, modify the partition table as intended and creating a system backup (containing volume 1,2 and 3 from your installation using some commercial software run by a USB pen drive.

When finished remove your main drive from your computer and insert a new blank one and try to restore the freshly made backup.

That would be a very good test, however it is a bit time consuming, I don't have a spare SSD and I have a sticker, on one of the cover screws, that says "FACTORY SEAL". So not impossible, but a bit impractical :( — Bart, Aug 19 '23 at 22:40
I am regularly confronted with people who suddenly have lots of time trying to recover their data after trying to save time by resizing and moving partitions. — r2d3, Aug 20 '23 at 12:47

Resizing partition without destroying recovery partition

1 Answers1