Cannot extend volume (span to different disk). Tired through GUI and diskpart cmd

D

dalearyous

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jun 21, 2008
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i am trying to extend or span a volume onto another disk. in disk management the extend option is grayed out and diskpart gives this error if i do it from command line: "the specified disks do not belong to the same pack."

how can i fix this?
extend.png


as you can see from the picture it is grayed out. however, i can extend volume E without issues.

*edit*
i converted Disk 1 to dynamic and tried again and got this error: "The volume requires contiguous disk extents."

anyway around this?
 
I'm pretty sure that system/boot volumes require contiguous space.

In Server 2003, you can't even extend in a system/boot volume into contiguous space online. You have to take the machine down to do it. What OS is this?
 
its a VM running windows small business 2011.

i think i am also limited because its an MBR and cannot exceed 2TB. as i understand it, converting from MBR to GPT will result in data loss because it is primary boot volume.
 
You can use a 3rd party disk partitioning tool that boots before windows to change the root volume (C) space.

MBR supports 2 TB anything over that you need to use GPT.
 
Can I convert c: to GPT and not lose data or boot capability outside of windows?
 
You need EFI to boot to a GPT partition, and I don't think there's any way to convert a system installed as BIOS over to EFI without a full reinstall. Either way you can't make C: part of a dynamic partition that spans multiple disks, C: has to be on a single drive.
 
ok, so there is a folder on C: that contains a majority of the data. if i were to temporarily move that, then shrink the c: volume could i use the rest of the free space to span onto another disk?
 
Theoretically, though I personally haven't and haven't really heard of anyone else having much luck shrinking a drive that had been filled then emptied, unmovable bits tend to get stuck in random spots and it will only let you shrink down until it hits the first unmovable block. Might need to use 3rd party defrag programs with the virtual disk mounted on a different host so the OS doesn't lock that stuff. Might be able to leave stuff where it is and use symlinks to other drives.
 
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