Managing Disks : Using the Disk Management Utility (part 2) - Understanding the Disk Management Utility

2. Understanding the Disk Management Utility

The Disk Management utility, located under the Computer Management snap-in by default, is a one-stop shop for configuring your disk options.

First off, to have full permissions to use the Disk Management utility, you must be logged on with Administrative privileges. You can access the Disk Management utility a few different ways. You can right-click Computer from the Start menu and select Manage and, then in Computer Management, select Disk Management. You could also use Control Panel => Administrative Tools => Computer Management.

The Disk Management utility's opening window, shown in Figure 2, shows the following information:

• The volumes that are recognized by the computer

• The type of disk, either basic or dynamic

• The type of file system used by each partition

• The status of the partition and whether the partition contains the system or boot partition

• The capacity (amount of space) allocated to the partition

• The amount of free space remaining on the partition

• The amount of overhead associated with the partition

Figure 2. The Disk Management window

Windows 7 also includes a command-line utility called Diskpart, which can be used as a command-line alternative to the Disk Management utility. You can view all of the options associated with the Diskpart utility by typing Diskpart at a command prompt and then typing? at the Diskpart prompt.

The Disk Management utility allows you to configure and manage your disks. Let's take a look at some of the tasks that you can perform in disk administration.

2.1. Managing Administrative Hard Disk Tasks

The Disk Management utility allows you to perform a variety of hard drive administrative tasks. These tasks are discussed in the sections that follow:

• View disk properties.

• View volume and local disk properties.

• Add a new disk.

• Create partitions and volumes.

• Upgrade a basic disk to a dynamic disk.

• Change a drive letter and path.

• Delete partitions and volumes.

2.1.1. Viewing Disk Properties

To view the properties of a disk, right-click the disk number in the lower panel of the Disk Management main window and choose Properties from the context menu. This brings up the disk's Properties dialog box. Click the Volumes tab to see the volumes associated with the disk, as shown in Figure 3, which contains the following disk properties:

• The disk number

• The type of disk (basic, dynamic, CD-ROM, removable, DVD, or unknown)

• The status of the disk (online or offline)

• The capacity of the disk

• The amount of unallocated space on the disk

• The logical volumes that have been defined on the physical drive

Figure 3. The Volumes tab of a disk's Properties dialog box

2.1.2. Viewing Volume and Local Disk Properties

On a dynamic disk, you manage volume properties. On a basic disk, you manage partition properties. Volumes and partitions perform the same function, and the options discussed in the following sections apply to both. (The examples here are based on a dynamic disk using a simple volume. If you are using basic storage, you will view the local disk properties rather than the volume properties.)

To see the properties of a volume, right-click the volume in the upper panel of the Disk Management main window and choose Properties. This brings up the volume's Properties dialog box. Volume properties are organized on seven tabs: General, Tools, Hardware, Sharing, Security, Quotas, and Previous Versions. The Security tab and Quotas tab appear only for NTFS volumes. All these tabs are covered in detail in the following sections.

General The information on the General tab of the volume's Properties dialog box, as seen in Figure 4, gives you a general idea of how the volume is configured. This dialog box shows the label, type, file system, used and free space, and capacity of the volume. The label is shown in an editable text box, and you can change it if desired. The space allocated to the volume is shown in a graphical representation as well as in text form.

Figure 4. General properties for a volume

The label on a volume or local disk is for informational purposes only. For example, depending on its use, you might give a volume a label such as APPS or ACCTDB.

The Disk Cleanup button starts the Disk Cleanup utility, which you can use to delete unnecessary files and free disk space.

This tab also allows you to configure compression for the volume and to indicate whether the volume should be indexed.

Tools The Tools tab of the volume's Properties dialog box, shown in Figure 5, provides access to three tools.

Figure 5. The Tools tab of the volume's Properties dialog box

Click the Check Now button to run the Error-checking utility to check the volume for errors. You would do this if you were experiencing problems accessing the volume or if the volume had been open during a system restart that did not go through a proper shutdown sequence.

Click the Defragment Now button to run the Disk Defragmenter utility. This utility defragments files on the volume by storing the files contiguously on the hard drive.

Click the Back Up Now button to open the Backup Status And Configuration dialog box, which allows you to configure backup procedures.

Hardware The Hardware tab of the volume's Properties dialog box, shown in Figure 6, lists the hardware associated with the disk drives that are recognized by the Windows 7 operating system. The bottom half of the dialog box shows the properties of the device that is highlighted in the top half of the dialog box.

Figure 6. The Hardware tab of the volume's Properties dialog box

For more details about a hardware item, highlight it and click the Properties button in the lower-right corner of the dialog box. This brings up a Properties dialog box for the item. Your Device Status field should report that "this device is working properly." If that's not the case, you can click the Troubleshoot button to get a troubleshooting wizard that will help you discover the problem.

Sharing On the Sharing tab of the volume's Properties dialog box, shown in Figure 7, you can specify whether or not the volume is shared. Volumes are not shared by default. To share a volume, you can click the Advanced Sharing button, which will allow you to specify whether the volume is shared and, if so, what the name of the share should be. You will also be able to specify who will have access to the shared volume.

Figure 7. The Sharing tab of the volume's Properties dialog box

Security The Security tab of the volume's Properties dialog box, shown in Figure 8, appears only for NTFS volumes. The Security tab is used to set the NTFS permissions for the volume.

Figure 8. The Security tab of the volume's Properties dialog box

Previous Versions The Previous Versions tab displays shadow copies of the files that are created by System Restore, as shown in Figure 9. Shadow copies of files are backup copies created by Windows in the background to allow you to restore the system to a previous state. On the Previous Versions tab, you can select a copy of the volume and either view the contents of the shadow copy or copy the shadow copy to another location. If System Restore is not enabled, then shadow copies of a volume will not be created.

Figure 9. The Previous Versions tab of the volume's Properties dialog box

Quotas Quotas give you the advantage to limit the amount of hard disk space that a user can have on a volume or partition (see Figure 10). There are a few options that can be configured when enabling quotas. By default, quotas are disabled. To enable quotas, check the Enable Quota Management check box.

Figure 10. The Quota tab of the volume's Properties dialog box

The Deny Disk Space To Users Exceeding Quota Limit check box is another option. When this box is enabled, any user who exceeds their quota limit will be denied disk storage. You can choose not to enable this option, which allows you to just monitor the quotas. You also have the ability to set the quota limit and warning size. You can also log all quota events as they happen.

2.1.3. Adding a New Disk

New hard disks can be added to a system to increase the amount of disk storage you have. This is a fairly common task that you will need to perform as your application programs and files grow larger.

How you add a disk depends on whether your computer supports hot swapping of drives. Hot swapping is the process of adding a new hard drive while the computer is turned on. Most desktop computers do not support this capability. Remember, your user account must be a member of the Administrators group to install a new drive. The following list specifies configuration options:

Computer doesn't support hot swapping If your computer does not support hot swapping, you must shut down the computer before you add a new disk. Then add the drive according to the manufacturer's directions. When you've finished, restart the computer. You should find the new drive listed in the Disk Management utility.

Computer supports hot swapping If your computer does support hot swapping, you don't need to turn off your computer first. Just add the drive according to the manufacturer's directions. Then open the Disk Management utility and select Action => Rescan Disks. You should find the new drive listed in the Disk Management utility.

Creating Partitions and Volumes Once you add a new disk, the next step is to create a partition (on a basic disk) or a volume (on a dynamic disk). Partitions and volumes fill similar roles in the storage of data on disks, and the processes for creating them are the same.

2.1.4. Creating a Volume or a Partition

Creating a volume or partition is a fairly easy process. To create the new volume or partition, you right-click on the unformatted free space and start the wizard.

Exercise 2 walks you through the New Volume Wizard for creating a new volume.

Now that you know how to create a new volume or partition, let's take a look at how to convert a basic disk to dynamic or GPT.

2.1.5. Upgrading a Basic Disk to a Dynamic or GPT Disk

When you install a fresh installation of Windows 7, your drives are configured as bask disks. To take advantage of the features offered by Windows 7 dynamic or GPT disks, you must upgrade your basic disks to either dynamic or GPT disks.

Any basic partition can be converted to a dynamic disk but only unformatted free space can be converted to a GPT disk. Exercise 3 walks you through how to convert a drive to a GPT.

Another type of conversion that you may need to perform is converting a basic disk to a dynamic disk. Complete Exercise 4 to convert a basic disk to a dynamic disk.

As you are configuring the volumes or partitions on the hard drive, another thing that you may need to configure is the drive letter and paths.

2.1.6. Changing the Drive Letter and Path

There may be times when you need to change drive letters and paths when you add new equipment. Let's suppose you have a hard drive with two partitions: drive C: assigned as your first partition and drive D: assigned as your second partition. Your DVD is assigned the drive letter E:. You add a new hard drive and partition it as a new volume. By default, the new partition is assigned as drive F:. If you want your logical drives to be listed before the DVD drive, you can use the Disk Management utility's Change Drive Letter And Paths option to rearrange your drive letters.

When you need to reassign drive letters, right-click the volume for which you want to change the drive letter and choose Change Drive Letter And Paths. This brings up the dialog box shown in Figure 11, Click the Change button to access the Change Drive Letter Or Path dialog box (Figure 12). Use the drop-down list next to the Assign The Following Drive Letter option to select the drive letter you want to assign to the volume.

Figure 11. The dialog box for changing a drive letter or path

Figure 12. Editing the drive letter

In Exercise 5, you will edit the drive letter of the partition you created.

Another task that you may need to perform is deleting a partition or volume that you have created. The next section looks at these tasks.

2.1.7. Deleting Partitions and Volumes

When configuring your hard disks, there may be a time that you want to reconfigure your drive by deleting the partitions or volumes on the hard drive. You may also want to delete a volume so that you can extend another volume. These are tasks that can be configured in Disk Management.

When deleting a volume or partition, you will see a warning that all the data on the partition or volume will be lost. You have to click Yes to confirm that you want to delete the volume or partition. This confirmation is important because once you delete a partition or volume, it's gone for good.

In the Exercise 6, you will delete a partition that you have created. Make sure that if you delete a partition or volume, it is an empty partition or volume or back up all the data before the deletion.

You may be worried about your users removing devices from their Windows 7 machines. Microsoft has helped you in this situation. You can use removable device policies to help restrict your users from removing their hardware. Removable device policies can be created through the use of a group policy object (GPO) on the server. GPOs are policies that are set on a computer or user and allow you to manipulate the Windows 7 environment.