How to Create a Partition in Windows

Do you want to partition your hard drive for free? The graphical utility built into Windows XP can do it just fine. You should already have unused space on your disk (and hence two partitions, one containing Windows, and the other is empty of any information, because the utility that manages disks can create a partition without loss of data).

To create a partition, right-click the icon for the desktop and click manage. Click on the Disk Management icon.

Disk Management

Right-click on the free space (which appears with a green stripe) and click create a logical drive. A wizard will launch in order to create a new partition.

Partition Wizard

Click Next. Then select logical drive and click next.

Logical drive

A new screen will appear, now is the time to choose the size of the partition in megabytes. Enter a value of your choice or leave the proposed value (the maximum).

Size of the partition

Once the partition size defined, click next. Then select the option "Assign the following drive letter" and choose a drive letter. If you mount the partition as C: \ my documents, when you see the file, you will enter in fact to another partition, but everything will be transparent, as if it was a regular folder.

Assigning a logical drive letter

Then select "Format this partition" with the following settings and choose your file system. NTFS is well suited for rights management (if you have sensitive documents, for example). However, it is less efficient than the FAT 32. Also, NTFS allows for large single files. FAT 32 does not allow big files above 2GB ins size.

Regarding the size of the allocation unit, a high value you will save performance at the expense of disk space. Once this is done click next.

Formatting the Partition

The wiard will then display a summary of the details for your partition. It is now ready to use! I recommend moving your documents to a separate partition on your disk. I recommend this because if the time comes where you have to re-install Windows, you can do so without losing your documents. A partition acts as a separate hard disk. Your data will also be safer on a separate partition too.