Merging partitions?

unsure

Any help and advice appreciated.

My acer laptop's hard disk is divided intoa C drive, which is full to bursting, and a D drive (acerdata) which is all but empty. I've moved some stuff from C to D with limited effect (on the advice of kind MSEr's a few weeks back) and it's now becoming a hassle to locate everything quickly when I need it!

I don't need these separate partitions and believe it is possible to merge them to make one drive with twice the capacity (which would keep me going for another couple of years!). The help files have been less than helpful in clarifying if and how I can do this ...so I have a few questions for any technically competent MSEr's who might be able to spare a little time to help:

1. Is the above correct?
2. If so, is it something that is simple and safe for a techno-incompetent to attempt/achieve?
3. If so, can any body please tell me how to go about it?!

Many thanks

seedyh

Try this, works quite nicely and free!
http://www.partitionwizard.com/free-partition-manager.html

Obviously back up first.. you never know.

TonyMMM

Assuming your C drive is full of the usual stuff (pics & music etc.) I would start by shifting your "My Documents" folder over to the D drive (Windows can do this automatically for you) - that should move a big chunk across and free up space on the C drive.

Uninstall any programs you don't use and then run the "Disk Cleanup" tool on the C drive to tidy up what's left.

unsure

Thanks SeedyH I'll investigate further.
TonyMMM I have already done most of that but am now finding that I have two places to go looking for things, which is a bit of a hassle. Since I don't need the partitions and can't see any advantage, one larger capacity drive would suit me better...unless I'm missing something(which is perfectly possible).

JasX

yes you should be able to use some freeware partitioning software to delete the non-system partition and extend the C paartition to fill the entire physical disk space.

is relatively safe but not 'risk free' so you should make sure all your data is backed up somewhere else and you have your restore CDs to hand incase you need to completly rebuild the machine after re-partitioning the drives.

Will stress repartitioning the drives is 'fairly safe' and you'll probably have no troubles at all -just best to plan foor the worst case outcome while hoping for the best

Lil306

EASEUS partition manager is great for this kind of stuff