Windows 10 Disk Management Tool – Format , Partition, Create System Drive

Hey! So with the latest Windows 10 operating system, there are some pretty cool and exciting features that we can explore. One of the inbuilt tools is Windows 10 Disk Management, that has got some more options to manage your system Drive.

This Disk Management tool is also a part of Windows 7, Windows 8 and some earlier versions. With time it got better and here we are with the latest Windows 10 Disk Management Utility.

If you are not familiar with Windows drive management tool then rest assured this article is just for you. And if you are already well-known with the tool then also I suggest you to continue reading this article as you might discover some cool new features.

The Disk Management Tool is a built-in tool in Windows 10. You don’t need to install it, it comes pre-installed in your Windows operating system.

This tool functions in such a way that it can help us to manage hard disk partitions without rebooting our system or without formatting it or any other interruption in most of the cases. It is quite a convenient drive management tool for Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, etc users.

Let’s talk about Windows Disk Management features and what can you do with it –

• Create, format and delete partitions
• Extend and shrink partitions
• Explore partition to view files
• Mark partition as active
• Add mirror partition
• Change a drive letter
• Free up drive space in Windows 10

Also Read: How To Clean Install Windows 10 Without Windows 10 License Key

How To Open Disk Management In Windows 10

To use Disk Management in Windows 10, you first have to know how to launch this tool.

I will point out 5 different and easy ways to open DM tool.

So let’s start…

1# From Start Menu, the easiest way to open Disk Management

• Right-click on the “Start Menu” (or press Windows + X hotkey)
• Select “Disk Management”

2# Open Disk Management from Run

• Type “run” in the search bar
• Click on “Run”

• Then type “Diskmgmt.msc” in the Run window
• Press Enter or click “OK”

3# Cortana Search Method To Open Win Disk Manager

• Directly type “Disk Management” in the search bar.
• Click on Create and format hard disk partitions.

4# Open Disk Management in Computer Management

• Right Click on “This PC” and click on “Manage“.

• Then click on Disk Management

5# Use Command Prompt (CMD) to Open Disk Management

• Type cmd in the search bar and click on Command Prompt result.

• Type diskmgmt in the Command Prompt and hit Enter.

After opening Disk Management from any of the above methods you’ll get a screen like below. You will see all the drives that are mounted on your system with lots of other information like the Volumes, Layout, Type, File System, Disk Status, Disk Capacity, Free space available on the selected partition, etc. :

Now you know how you can launch the Windows Disk Management utility, let’s learn how you can use and the operations that you can perform using this tool.

How to Use Windows Disk Management

You can use Windows Disk Management in many ways such as to extend a partition, format a partition, shrink a partition, etc.

Following are the ways you can use this tool. Let’s start, shall we?

How to format a partition with Disk Management in Windows 10

You can Erase/format an already created partition in your PC, but you should know that formatting a partition/drive will erase all the data in that drive. So if you are formatting a partition just because you are facing some issues like bad sectors, viruses in the partition you must take a backup of your data in an external disk drive.

Here’s how you can do it:

• Open Disk Management
• Right-Click on the drive, you want to Erase/Format.
• Click on Format, and wait for the format to finish.

Change the Volume Label if you want to as per your choice and click on OK to start the Format process. As you can see in the below screenshot, you can checkmark “Perform a quick format” for faster formating. I will not recommend this option if you are formatting the partition to troubleshoot an issue.

Similarly, you can also “Enable file and folder compression” , doing this will save you a lot of space on that partition. The system will compress the files and folders to reserve space whenever a new file/folder is created within the partition.

How to Change a Drive Letter and Label with Disk Management in Windows 10

You can change Drive letter and Label of any drive or partition using Disk Management utility.

Here’s how to change Drive Letter :

• Open Disk Management in Windows
• Right-Click on the drive which you desire to change the Drive Letter/Label of.
• Click on “Change Drive Letters and Paths’’

• Click on Change
• Select the new Drive Letter or Path
• Click on Yes

After Clicking on ‘Yes’ the Drive letter will get changed and you can see the New Drive Letter of your drive in ‘This PC’ and in ‘Disk Management’ window.

Now we will see how to change the Label of the Drive

• Right Click on the drive partition in disk management and click on properties

• Now go to the General tab. There you will see a disk icon, write the new label in the field next to it.

• Then at last click OK and the drive label will be changed.

How to Delete a Disk Partition with Disk Management in Windows 10

For some definite reasons, you might want to remove a drive from your computer. By doing this you can create some space to expand a current partition.

By deleting or removing a partition from the PC you will erase all the data present in it.

Deleting a drive or partition in Windows using Disk Management is very easy and here’s how you can do it:

• Open Disk Management
• Right-click on the drive you wish to delete and select Delete Volume.

• Click on Yes to confirm volume deletion.

After the drive has been removed from your Hard Disk you will see the removed partition as Unallocated or Free Space.

What you can do next is format the Unallocated space to make it a fresh partition of the system disk. Next, we will be doing just that. Unallocated drive space is of no use until it is made a part of the disk drive.

How to Create a Disk Partition with Disk Management in Windows 10

If you are having free space on your Hard Disk and it’s not allocated to any drive or partition then I have good news for you! You can create a new partition with that free and unallocated space and use it as you like using Disk Management in Windows 10.

Hers’s how you can do it with these simple steps:

• Open Disk Management
• You will see an Unallocated space in the Disk Management
• Right-Click on the unallocated space and click on the New Simple Volume

After clicking on the New Simple Volume option a wizard will open which will guide you through the process of creating a new drive or partition.

By the way, you can create a Primary or Logical Partition using this tool. System partitions are created which is used only by the operating system.

Here is the Slideshow of the Wizard:

• Click Next
• Enter the size of the new partition as per required and click Next
• Choose any drive letter as per your choice and click Next
• Then select to format the volume and click Next
• Then click Finish at last

After all the above steps the new volume will be formatted and your new drive will be ready to use. The new volume will be visible in “disk Management” and also in “This PC” or Windows 10 File Manager.

That’s it, you’ve created a new Drive in your pc. Now wasn’t that quite easy and simple?

How to Resize a Partition: Expanding and Shrinking with Computer Management in Windows 10

You can also extend and shrink the existing volume on your PC with Windows Disk Management. You don’t need to format the drive for expansion as it is not necessary.

So let’s get started with how to extend the volume space using disk management in Windows.

Here’s how you can do it:

• Open Disk Management
• Right-click on the drive you want to be extended and click on Extend Volume
• After clicking on Extend Volume a wizard will pop up which will guide you through the process. Here is a slideshow of the process that you can follow:

• Click Next in the Wizard
• Select the Size from the free unallocated space you want to use to extend your drive or volume
• Click Finish at last

After following these steps you will see the size of your drive has been increased. You can check the size of the Drive in the Disk Management or go to the properties of that particular drive in “This PC”.

Now let’s learn how to shrink the volume using the Disk Utility:

Now if you want to create a new volume or extend an already existing volume but you don’t have any free unallocated space in your PC then fear not, you can still create a new volume and extend any partition of your computer by shrinking the already existing partitions on your PC.

By shrinking the drives you can create free unallocated space and that space can be used to extend or to create a new partition as per your choice.

Here’s how to shrink a volume using Windows Disk Management:

• Open Disk Management
• Right Click on the drive you want to shrink and click on Shrink Volume

Note: Follow the slideshow above to see the Shrink Wizard process.

After clicking on Shrink Volume a window will pop up which will show you the size of the disk, the size you can shrink and the size of the disk available after shrinking that particular volume.

• Select the size you want to shrink and then click on Shrink

That’s it, the process might take some time depending upon the configuration of your computer.

After the Shrinking process has been completed you will see an unallocated free space in the Windows Disk Management and you what next you have to do with the Unallocated space, we already covered this part previously in this article.

Read: 6 Quick Ways To Open Control Panel In Windows 10 OS!

Over To You

Windows 10 Disk Management utility can do a lot of operations to your system drive. Now you know where to head to if you need to perform any operations related to Disk Management. Please be alert which partition you are going to format or else you will lose all your data which is irreversible.

What next you want to learn about Windows 10 and its utilities? Comment below and let me know, I would be happy to write a guide on the topic.

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