Free to resize partition on Windows Server 2000/2003/2008

Are you seeking free software to resize partition on server 2003 or server 2000/2008? We know there are many people seeking solutions to extend drive for better computer performance. There are many free programs to resize partition in Windows 2000/XP/Vista. Is there any free program which can expand the server partitions without system reinstallation and data loss? The truth is there is no free partition software to work on Windows Server Operating Systems. Here we will teach you how to resize partition in Windows Server OS without partition software and keep your system and data intact.

To resizing boot partition, read this tutorial: resize server boot partition

Free ways to extend server partitions (not boot partition)

Free Tip One-diskpart command

You can use diskpart command to resize your partition and it is totally free. This is a disk partitioning function built-in Windows. It is on the conditions that there is unallocated space just next to the partition which you wish to extend. You can follow the tutorial: How to extend partition with diskpart command

However diskpart command does not work on boot drive. For resizing system partition, you can resize partition in DOS with free desktop partition software, or you have to try a shareware. If so, we recommend you to read the tutorial: How to resize boot partition in Windows Server OS

Free Tip Two-resize server partition in DOS with free partition software

This is pretty tricky since the free partition software are for Windows desktop computers, however we can make it true to resize partition on Windows Server Operating Systems with the desktop platform developed free disk partitioning programs. That is to use the freeware in DOS. You can burn the .iso file to cd and boot from the cd. There are actually many dos version free partition tools like Gparted, Partition Logic, Ranish Partition Manager etc. They all can resize the boot partition without data loss.

The only disadvantage is you have to turn your server down. If you cannot afford to down your server, then you need a server partition software. Recommended tutorial: How to resize server partition with Partition Wizard Server

Free Tip Three-resize partition on external hard drive

As the title tells that you can use your hard disk as an external one connected to another desktop computer with desktop free partition software installed. Then you can resize any partition as you want. All the free partition software can recognize the external hard drive and it is the same operations to resize partition as a non external hard drive.

I am afraid it also got the same disadvantage as tip two. You have to afford to have the server down, or you should choose a server partition software. Recommended tutorial: How to resize server partition with Partition Wizard Server

Free Tip Four- RAID

The last free tip we offer is combined with RAID. As we know there is hardware RAID, ie raid card constructed raid array and software raid, ie Windows offered function constructed RAID. Be clear of what kind of RAID you use.

For Windows built-in function constructed RAID, then you will definitely have dynamic disk. You can build raid arrays like spanned volume, stripped volume, raid 5 array with unallocated space. That means you should have some unallocated space on your drive. It is very complicated if you built RAID on dynamic disk since there is no partition software on the earth which could resize dynamic disk.

For RAID card constructed RAID array, you can add new disk to your computer, and then build RAID 0 to 0+1 as you wish. If you want to add space to the existing partition, then you need a server partition software to add the unallocated space.

Recommended tutorial for add space to RAID: How to resize partition RAID 5