partitioning programs

[shankle]

I know I posted my praise of System Commander by Avonquest before on this site but am now reversing my praise.
I recently had to restore my HD and when it came back up the mouse in System
Commander would not work. I managed to find the spot for the settings of the
mouse and it was disabled. I did not disable it. I then uninstalled System Commander
and tried to reinstall it but it failed. I then restored the HD using Acronis TI and
the mouse in System Commander worked again.
Support from Avonquest is Terrible and a backup copy that won't reinstall the
program makes you want to get another vendor.
So I need another program that will let multiple OS be installed, resize partitions,
move partitions, delete partitions and has a Boot Manager.
I know about Partition Magic and generally try to stay away from Norton products.
Anything else out there that you have experience with.
Your suggestions would be most appreciated.

[shankle]

Since I posted the above message, I heard of a program called "gparted".
I read the docs on it and it seems to do what I want but I could fine no
reference of how it handles the Booting process. From what I gather it
will work for Windows OS as it handles NTFS.

[BogdanOntanu]

gparted is the GPL / Linux partition manager.

I had mixed results with it. Sometimes it works perfectly and sometimes it fails miserably.
The reason for this being the fact that it assumes a lot about your intentions and about your hardware.

Gparted is the Graphical interface version of PARTED ie the text version of the partitioner.
Parted alone works a little bit better than when mixed with "G" but of course the interface is more "spartan".

It does boot as a mini Linux OS and it runs inside this mini Linux. Hence it does depend on how much you PC is compatible with Linux but it is able to handle NTFS and Windows partitions or so I have heard (I do no recall testing it with NTFS).

About booting or boot managers I guess that LILO or GRUB are standard those days in Linux/Unix world.

[shankle]

Thanks for answering.
I'm running strictly a Windows Vista computer.
From your description I can't tell whether to go with "Parted" or "GParted".
I haven't so far found any others. I am also worried about your comment
that GParted failed miserably. 99% of the time the program would be used
to point to partition A or B. Rarely would I need to move, resize, create
or delete a partition.

[shankle]

Since my last message I might have found two other programs that
might work.
1: Paragon Partition Manager - 8.5 is supposed to be free but I think
    there are strings to that
2: Easus partition manager personal
Will keep looking......

[Vortex]

Paragon Partition Manager seems to be a nice tool. It can create also a boot disc.

[sinsi]

I found "Paragon Partition Manager 8" on a magazine disc, all it wanted was my email address and everytiing worked.
As far as an actual 'boot manager' goes, the one with 'Partition Magic' used to let me boot lots of OS's and keep them hidden from each other.
I think it was called 'Boot Magic' (I used to actually *own* Partition Magic, and it was *magic*)

Now there's a good project - a boot manager. Any takers? Imagine how much code would fit on the first cylinder...

[Vortex]

Free Partitioning Software (Partition Editors, Managers, and Recovery Tools

[shankle]

I'm giving up.. I'm going to stay with System Commander.
Reason being, Yes I have found a free partition manager that
will probably work but the hitch is they do not contain code
for dual+ booting. My whole purpose for wanting such a
partition manager is so that I can boot from one partition
to another on the fly. I can find no free dual booting programs.
Sc has a booting function included so I would be biting my
own foot to change.

[FORTRANS]

Hi,

   I've used Boot Manager with OS/2 and Windows.
It came with OS/2 and olser versions of Partition Magic.
Had up to five OS on the menu.

   Another one that has been recomended was AirBoot
by Kiewitz.  And there is a "PC Tech Journal dual-boot
code" on Hobbes.

http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/

Steve

[Tedd]

Grub is a free multi-boot program - although it's a little Unix-centric, but once set up it's fine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_GRUB





Or, if I get chance, I may be tempted to write a simple one (literally: select the partition to boot from, and it boots from it.)

[shankle]

Hi Tedd,
If you write one Please let me know.
Until then I'm going to stick with System Commander.
Thanks,
JPS

[vanjast]

I got this Acer Travelmate laptop for my kid's school work and then forgot the admin password  :( which is only resetable via an little Acer utility. I contact the local dealer and international Acer and they point blank refused to help over the net. A local phone call didn't help either.
I gave them 3 types of proof of ownership, but they wanted $$$$$$$ for this simple exercise. I was fuming and sent them (USA Acer) a nice email explaining that I was not really happy about this, and that I was not your usual 'ignorant' client.

No reply!! ... My next email to them ( and local office) were pictures of a stripped Acer laptop with wires and switch connected to the motherboard's password reset pcb tracks, also explaining that these pics were now world-wide. Still no reply.. but i was laughing.

I digress, but to recover that hdisk and my other laptops disks I used this http://www.hiren.info/ stuff, which I found usefull. It takes a bit of time to work through each utility, but eventually you can work out which works best for each situation - You might find this lot useful
:bg