Multiple Free Space Regions May Appear on Dynamic Disks

ID: Q241389

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Windows 2000 Advanced Server
Microsoft Windows 2000 Datacenter Server
Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional
Microsoft Windows 2000 Server

SUMMARY

Windows 2000 supports two types of disks: basic disks and dynamic disks. For additional information, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q175761 Dynamic vs. Basic Storage in Windows 2000

Basic disks that are upgraded to dynamic disks retain legacy partition table (hard-linked) entries to allow Windows 2000 Setup to recognize and use them during a new installation. Unfortunately, this may also cause some confusing combinations of partitioning and free space representations in the Disk Management tool, especially when you are deleting multiple partitions or what used to be logical drives in an extended partition that contain hard-linked partition table entries. These are displayed as separate but contiguous free space regions that cannot be combined or removed in any way. The sizes of the individual free space regions matches the legacy partition table entries remaining after you delete a dynamic volume.

If you perform a fresh Windows 2000 installation, any previously deleted volumes that still have a legacy hard-linked partition table entry are identified as "unformatted or damaged." This occurs because Disk Management never deletes legacy partition table entries on dynamic disks when you delete dynamic volumes until all volumes containing legacy hard-linked partitions are deleted.

Disk Management can still use the noncontiguous free space regions when you are creating new volumes. This does not affect disk usage or functionality in any way, but it may seem in Disk Management that you should combine the free space regions.

MORE INFORMATION

Removing the legacy hard-linked partition table entries allows Disk Management to combine the separate free space regions and display a single contiguous free space region. This also corrects the "unformatted or damaged" partitions from being displayed during Windows 2000 Setup.

CAUTION: Removing the legacy hard-linked partition table entries prevents Windows 2000 from being installed on that disk without damaging other underlying dynamic volumes that may exist, so use discretion when you decide to perform this procedure. Do not perform this procedure on the current system/boot disk, because doing so may render it unbootable.

For additional information about dynamic disks and Windows 2000 Setup, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q227364 Dynamic Volumes Are Not Displayed Accurately in Text-Mode Setup

Every dynamic disk has at least one type 0x42 partition table entry. This signifies that Logical Disk Manager (LDM) is managing the disk and that volume information is kept in a private region (the LDM database) at the end of the physical disk. If you have a dynamic disk with additional partition table entries (multiple 0x42 or an 0x05 entry), they represent hard-linked partitions.

You can convert a hybrid dynamic disk to a pure dynamic disk by using the Dskprobe.exe tool to remove all partition table entries except the first type 0x42 entry. You should also change the single remaining type 0x42 partition table entry to describe the entire disk by changing the Ending Cylinder and Total Sectors fields. You can extract these values by clicking Volume Information on the Drives menu in Dskprobe. Be sure to subtract the relative sector (where the partition starts) from the Total Sectors value displayed before entering the new Total Sectors number in the partition table.

NOTE: You can find detailed information about using Dskprobe.exe in the Windows 2000 resource kit.

Upgrading a basic disk that contains pre-existing partitions to a dynamic disk also prevents Disk Management from extending any volumes using the NTFS file system that contain hard-linked partition tables. For additional information, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q225551 Extending or Spanning Simple Volumes on Dynamic Disks

Removing the legacy partition table entries has no effect on this behavior because the LDM database still has them flagged as legacy volumes. You must delete the NTFS volume and then re-create it before extending is allowed.

Additional query words:

Keywords : kbenv kbtool
Version : WINDOWS:2000
Platform : WINDOWS
Issue type : kbinfo