Mounted Volume within a drive? 2

[CathodeRay]

I apologize for asking perhaps an obvious question...

We have just inherited a server that has drives C: and D:. WITHIN drive D: there is another drive, called abcdrive, that is defined as a "mounted volume."

Drive D: itself has about 15gb free... abcdrive (which is WITHIN drive D has about 50gb free. (?)

Its Properties say that it's a Mounted Volume, Location is Drive D:\, and its Target is 123_drive.

I am confused as to exactly where this abcdrive is... and what to make of it. Its icon is a picture of a little disk drive, just like D:, and it's shared.

Can someone please educate me regarding this "drive" definition?

 

[porkchopexpress]

With NTFS you can mount a drive as a folder instead of using a drive letter it's called a mounted drive or junction point. If you look under disk management it should tell you which physical drive or partition it is.

http://technet2.microsoft.com/Windo...5e37-48c8-b280-56c4c50c91f81033.mspx?mfr=true

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/205524

 

[Markus0815]

When creating new partions/volumes on harddisks you have the option to assign a drive letter, thereby getting an extra drive to the existing C: and D: drives, or alternatively, you may mount the partition/volume as a NTFS folder within your folder structure on existring frives.

In your case abcdrive is simply a ´link´ to an 'external' partition called 123_drive.

Try to open Disk Management which shows the physical drives and partitions (drive letter assigned or mounted).

/Markus

 

[CathodeRay]

Thanks, porkchopexpress, for the explanation and the links.

Thanks, Markus0815, for a very clear explanation.

Follow-up question: Under Disk Management, if I right-click on the partition called 123_drive, and choose to "Extend volume," does that mean I can add space to it (without losing any data), and that space would be taken away from drive D:?

I currently have about 50GB of space I don't need on D: that I could use on 123_drive...

 

[Markus0815]

Like a drive letter assigned volume you also can extend the mapped volume with addtional disk space. But, you have to extend with additional and unconfigured disk space, you cannot take an existing partition to extend with.

To use the empty space from the D: drive you first have to reconfigure the partition using for example Symantec Volume Manager, Acronis Disk Director or other partition software to decrease the D: partition and thereby freeing space which then can be used to extend the 123_drive volume.

The extension process should be without any data loss, but as with all Windows operations I recommend to have a backup ready, just in case....

 

[CathodeRay]

Markus0815: Excellent answer. Thank you VERY much.