Installed SSD Now Have System Reserved Drive Too

[Nitruc]

I just installed a Samsung 840 EVO 550GB SSD and cloned my original 1TB HD to the SSD. After successfully booting from the SSD and it loading Windows 7 quick, I see now that I have an additional System Reserved drive that has been partitioned with 99.9MB in addition to my 465GB SSD and 931GB HD.

Should I remove this System Reserved drive? If so, how can I? I've formatted the original 1TB HD so I can use it for files and programs and so I can use the SSD to only run Windows, fast boot, and have my games load quicker. I'm not even sure which of the two drives this System Reserved is being partitioned from either since I didn't ever specify it to be created. Any advice is appreciated.

 

[popatim]

Leave it. It contains your boot files.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

Leave the system reserved partition alone, it's where the boot manager and recovery console live. If you mess with it you will render your system unbootable.

 

[SchizTech]

To start with the "system reserved" is a small partition Win 7 (and above) use for the boot files. What I think happened is that when you cloned the 1TB that cloned the system reserved to the SSD. With the SSD set as boot drive, it's sys reserved is used. Ordinarily that partition is hidden, but since you have a duplicate on a storage drive Windows doesn't consider the extra one a system partition which needs to be hidden.

It might be safe to delete. GO into Disk Management first (Right-click Computer in Start Menu, select Manage, go to Disk Management.) There physical drives show up in their own rows and partitions are shown within them. IF the Sys reserved on the 1TB is marked with a drive letter, delete that and the other partition on the drive, then format the entire volume.

Before this, make sure you boot from the SSD's own partition. You can test this by disconnecting the HDD and attempting a boot.

 

[SchizTech]

IF there's only one sys reserved on one drive, leave it alone. You can safely remove the drive letter in disk management but go no further

 

[Nitruc]

To start with the "system reserved" is a small partition Win 7 (and above) use for the boot files. What I think happened is that when you cloned the 1TB that cloned the system reserved to the SSD. With the SSD set as boot drive, it's sys reserved is used. Ordinarily that partition is hidden, but since you have a duplicate on a storage drive Windows doesn't consider the extra one a system partition which needs to be hidden.

It might be safe to delete. GO into Disk Management first (Right-click Computer in Start Menu, select Manage, go to Disk Management.) There physical drives show up in their own rows and partitions are shown within them. IF the Sys reserved on the 1TB is marked with a drive letter, delete that and the other partition on the drive, then format the entire volume.

Before this, make sure you boot from the SSD's own partition. You can test this by disconnecting the HDD and attempting a boot.

IF there's only one sys reserved on one drive, leave it alone. You can safely remove the drive letter in disk management but go no further

After formatting my HD, booting from the SSD, and going to Disk Management I actually still see 4 volumes:

(C) [SSD] | Status: Healthy (Boot, Page File, Crash Dump, Primary Partition) 465.66 GB
(F) [HD] | Status: Healthy (Primary Partition) 931.41 GB
Data | Status: Healthy (System, Active, Primary Partition) 100 MB
System Reserved (E) | Status: Healthy (Active, Primary Partition) 100 MB

Can I just delete the System Reserved E drive because it already has another hidden Data volume doing the same thing? Why do they all say "Primary" for Partition?

 

[SchizTech]

Is the E: on the same disk as F: or C:? Does the system boot with the 1TB HDD unplugged?

If the answers are F: and yes, it should be fine to delete E:.

 

[SchizTech]

Volumes next to each other on the same row are on the same physical drive, btw.

 

[Nitruc]

Volumes next to each other on the same row are on the same physical drive, btw.

The SSD C drive and the hidden Data drive are in a row on Disk 0. The HD F drive was in the same row as the Reserved E drive. I disconnected the HD and rebooted with no issues, so I deleted the Reserved E drive, but now when I look at the Disk 1 row there is still a 101 MB "Unallocated" space next to the 931.41 GB HD F drive... should I select the F HD and Extend to try and combine the two and get that 101 MB back into the HD?

 

[SchizTech]

If the F partition is empty, just delete it and use the full space to create a new partition.

 

[Nitruc]

If the F partition is empty, just delete it and use the full space to create a new partition.

Thanks, that did the trick.