After running "" to start this software, the partition information of the hard disk will be automatically read and the hard disk partition status will be displayed in the form of a graph on the screen. Figure 1 is the partition information structure diagram obtained by Disk Genius detecting the author's hard disk. The bar chart on the left shows the location and size of each partition on the hard disk, and the bottom partition is the first partition. Through the colors of each part of the bar chart and whether it has a grid, the type of partition can be judged. The gray-colored part is free space (not any partition), the partition without a grid is the main partition, and the grid is an extended partition, and the extended partition is further divided into logical partitions (logical disks D, E, F...). The right side of the screen displays the types and specific parameters of each partition in the form of a table, including the partition's boot flag, system flag, partition start and end cylinder number, sector number, and magnetic head number. If you don't know much about the meaning of these parameters, you can refer to the content of "About Partition Table" in the help file.
There is a dynamic connection between the bar chart and the parameter table indicating their correspondence. You can select a partition by clicking the mouse in the bar chart or table, or you can select the current partition by moving the cursor keys on the keyboard. Use the "TAB" or "SHIFT-TAB" keys to choose between a bar chart and a table. When you select a FAT or FAT32 partition, some information about this partition will be displayed in the window at the bottom of the table: the total number of sectors of the partition, the total number of clusters and the size of the cluster, the two FAT tables, the root directory, the starting cylinder number of the data area, the head number, and the sector number.
Special reminder: Items 0 to 3 of the partition parameter table correspond to four table entries of the main partition table of the hard disk, while items 4, 5, 6... correspond to logical disks D, E, F... respectively. When the hard disk has only one DOS primary partition and an extended partition (hard disks partitioned with FDISK are generally like this), "item 0" represents the partition information of the main partition (logical disk C), "item 1" represents the information of the extended partition, and "item 2 and 3" are all zero, which does not correspond to any partition, so it cannot be selected. The author once found a post on a website forum about DISKMAN questions, asking if there is a way to delete the "item 2 and 3" in the partition parameter table with zeros. This is of course impossible. The poster obviously lacks understanding of hard disk partition knowledge. If you want to truly understand the significance of each item in the partition parameter table, you must understand the structure of the hard disk partition bracelet. It is recommended that interested friends find more relevant information.
3. Instructions for use
1. Backup and restore partition table:
After starting this software, press F9, or select the "Backup Partition Table" item under the "Tools" menu, enter the file name in the pop-up dialog box (save on disk A by default) to back up the current partition table. Press F10, or select the "Restore Partition Table" item under the "Tools" menu, and then enter the file name (read from disk A by default). This software will read the specified partition table backup file and update the screen display. After you confirm that it is correct, you can restore the backup partition table to the hard disk.
2. Create a partition:
The hard disk space (i.e., free space) that has not been partitioned is displayed in gray in the partition structure diagram, and a new partition can only be created in the free space of the hard disk.
To create a primary partition, first select the gray area in the partition structure diagram and press the ENTER key; then enter the partition size according to the prompt and select the partition type (to create a non-DOS partition, you must also set the system flag according to the prompt. If you create a Linux partition, the system flag is "83"). With this software, you can create up to four DOS primary partitions. If the user does not set the startup partition before saving, the first primary partition will be automatically activated.
To create an extended partition, first select the gray area in the partition structure diagram, press F5, and then enter the partition size in the pop-up prompt box before confirming. After the extended partition is established, it must be further divided into multiple logical partitions (logical disks) before it can be used. The method is: after selecting the newly established extended partition (green area), press the ENTER key, and the subsequent operations are the same as when establishing the main partition.
Tip: When there is an extended partition on the hard disk, you cannot create an extended partition. If you want to divide a free space adjacent to the extended partition into an extended partition (that is, expand the scope of the "extended partition", you can only delete the existing extended partition first and then rebuild it.
3. Activate partition, delete partition, and hide partition:
Select the main partition to be activated, press F7 to set it as the active partition, and the system name of the active partition will be displayed in red.
Select a partition, press F4 to hide the partition, press F4 again to restore; press Delete or F6 to delete the selected partition.
Tip: If you delete the main partition, the space where it is located is converted into a free space (turned into a gray area); if you delete a logical partition (such as D, E... disk), the space where it is located does not become a free space, but is converted into an unused extended partition (turned into a green area.
4. Resize the partition
This software can directly adjust the size of the FAT16 or FAT32 partition without damaging any data. The method is: select the partition to be adjusted, select the "Resize Partition" command under the "Partition" menu, and then follow the prompts. It is recommended to run the "Disk Scanner" of the WINDOWS system before adjustment to check for hard disk errors and correct them, and back up important files. You cannot force interrupt or shut down (restart) during the adjustment process. Otherwise, all data on the adjusted partition will be lost.
However, the author found that Disk Genius' partition adjustment operation actually only adjusts the number of ending cylinders, heads, and sectors of the partition within the possible range (i.e., areas without data), and cannot really move the starting position of the partition. So this function doesn't seem to be of much use.
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