[SOLVED] HELP! I can't upgrade the SSD in my laptop

HELP!!! Hey, y'all. I have an XPS 13 9380 and I bought it configured with the 256GB and I am looking to upgrade it. As a result, I got myself a 1 TB Samsung 970 EVO. Using TODO EaseUS backup software and an external HDD to house the cloned drive, I managed to clone my current 256GB drive onto my new 1TB drive. The computer boots as normal using the 970 EVO, however, the challenge comes when I need to expand the main C partition such that I can have more storage. Seeing that the unallocated 600ish GB of storage is not adjacent to the C partition and is separated by the Dell build-in recovery and data partitions, I am not able to merge the partitions or expand the existing C partition. In fact, when the 1TB drive is being booted off of, the option to expand the C partition is completely greyed out. When I boot off of an external HDD and keep the 1TB SSD plugged in, I am able to press the button to expand the C partition, however the partition on the 1 TB SSD is then changed to N. I assume this is because of the fact that it is an exact clone of the HDD that is being booted off of so there can not be two C partitions. If I attempt to expand the N partition, I get a popup that says there is not enough space to expand the partition. After this failed, I attempted to boot on 1 TB after having it plugged in as the secondary drive and the computer wouldn't boot. Attached is a screenshot of the partition structure of the factory drive. Could anyone help me set things up in a way such that I can clone this factory drive over to the 1 TB one and expand the C main partition such that I can enjoy the extra storage of a larger drive?
 
Solution
Show us a screencap of your Disk Management window.

Delete the Dell Recovery thing, or use its functionality to create a USB.
Copy the contents of the Data partition to elsewhere.

Now that there is nothing in those partitions that you need, DELETE.
You should be able to Extend the C into that newly blank space.

USAFRet

Titan
Moderator
Show us a screencap of your Disk Management window.

Delete the Dell Recovery thing, or use its functionality to create a USB.
Copy the contents of the Data partition to elsewhere.

Now that there is nothing in those partitions that you need, DELETE.
You should be able to Extend the C into that newly blank space.
 
Solution
Show us a screencap of your Disk Management window.

Delete the Dell Recovery thing, or use its functionality to create a USB.
Copy the contents of the Data partition to elsewhere.

Now that there is nothing in those partitions that you need, DELETE.
You should be able to Extend the C into that newly blank space.


Also, it does not have the option to delete the non C partitions. Is there any way at all that I could position the unallocated space adjacent to the C partition and not have to delete the OEM partitions?
 

USAFRet

Titan
Moderator
Also, it does not have the option to delete the non C partitions. Is there any way at all that I could position the unallocated space adjacent to the C partition and not have to delete the OEM partitions?
Not in Disk Management. That is less than full featured.
Maybe possibly with a 3rd party partition tool.

Ultimate fallback...wipe and reinstall Win 10 on that drive.
PITA, but that DOES work.
 
Not in Disk Management. That is less than full featured.
Maybe possibly with a 3rd party partition tool.

Ultimate fallback...wipe and reinstall Win 10 on that drive.
PITA, but that DOES work.
I installed EaseUS partition master and now it allows me the option to delete the extra partitions. Attached is a screenshot of EaseUS partition master and all the partitions on the drive. Is it ok to delete everything that is not the C partition in terms of functionality? I have other ways of recovering my data if something were to happen. Is the built in Dell recovery all I would be losing? Or would I be losing the ability to automatically update my drivers or anything else important?
 
Image and DELLSUPPORT are the only things you might delete.

Remove others, and you may lose the actual booting up.
If I can't delete the windows recovery environment partition, then I still couldn't merge the unallocated space and the partition C. A tech support technician had told me that the RE partition is not essential assuming you already have a backup and a seperate computer.