How to partition 1TB hard disk in Windows 11, 10, 8, 7? Here comes the best way to partition a 1TB hard disk without losing data in Windows PC.
When you install the Windows operating system on a 1TB fresh hard drive, the entire hard disk will be regarded as a bunch of unallocated space and all will be used to save the OS and related files. After installation, this single system partition will also store your personal data, installed programs, etc. Why you need to partition 1TB hard disk in Windows 10? Here are some good reasons:
▸Easy to manage OS partition Partitioning 1TB large hard disk into several volumes can help keep the Windows system files separate from personal info, so it will be easy to perform operations on Windows, such as cloning Windows system partition to SSD/HDD, or reinstalling the OS without affecting installed programs and files on other partitions.
▸Better to organize different types of data Partition 1TB hard disk can set dividers between different types of data. For example, one partition for games, one partition for movies, and another one for business files, which can ensure the better data organization on a large disk.
▸Convenient to back up files If you store vital files on a separate partition, you can perform file backup more conveniently. If you like, you can clone the entire data partition to another location for an exact copy of the inside files.
▸Better to secure your files Since Windows installation is more prone to malware attack and corruption, partitioning your 1TB hard disk and putting personal data on different partitions could secure them when OS crashes. You can easily format your Windows partition and reinstall the OS without deleting data on other volumes.
▸Install multiple operating systems Partitioning 1TB hard disk into several partitions can make it possible to install another operating system on it. For example, you can create an Ext4 partition for running Linux without damaging the existing Windows system.
So, here comes the core question: how to partition 1TB hard disk in Windows 10 sensibly, including how many partitions are reasonable and how much space should be allocated to each partition. Well, below is the recommended partition number and partition size for 1TB hard disk on Windows 10. According to the file types and personal habits, a 1TB hard drive can be divided into 2-5 partitions. Here we suggest you partition it into 4 partitions:
✎Note: since the vendor’s and operating system’s capacity calculating methods are quite different (1000GB=1TB for vendors while 1024GB=1TB for computer OS), the 1TB might be equal to about 900GB in Windows operating system.
1. C volume -Windows OS and related system files (around 150GB) Based on Microsoft’s official announcement, Windows 10/8/7 minimum hard disk space requirement is 16GB (32-bit) and 20GB (64-bit). Besides, Windows OS will reserve about 7 GB of storage to facilitate proper performance and successful updates of your device. Moreover, the Hibernation files (hiberfil.sys) will take up about 8GB-32GB, the Virtual memory (pagefile) needs 12GB-40GB, temporary files need about 10GB. At last, small files on the desktop are also stored on the C drive. It is essential to remain 10%-20% free space for it to ensure the stable OS operation. So, you had better allocate about 150GB to C drive.
2. D volume-programs/applications (around 100GB) If you install too many programs on C drive, the efficiency and speed of system operation will be reduced. So it’s better to create a D volume from 1TB for the programs. Generally, 100GB is quite enough for most users.
3. E volume- personal data (around 50GB) For drive E:, you can save vital personal files, including office business files, study material, private videos or photos. Although Windows provides default libraries (Documents, Music, Pictures, and Videos) on C drive, once the system crashes, all files will get lost. So you can create a separate partition for those important personal files in view of security and convenience. And they need about 50GB.
4. F volume-entertainment (around 700GB) Nowadays, many users use the computer for entertainments such as watching movies and listening to music. That kind of files takes up lots of space as well. For example, the average size of a blu-ray film can be 25GB-40GB, so the entertainment disk has to be as large as possible. We suggest the rest space about 700GB should be all allocated to the F volume.
The above contents are only for reference. You can partition a 1TB hard drive and allocate space for each partition based on your actual needs.
To partition 1TB hard disk in Windows 10, you can use Windows native Disk Management and turn to third-party disk partition software.
Disk Management is a common method for most computer users to partition the hard disk. In Windows 10/8/7, this tool can shrink/extend/create/delete/format a volume. To partition a 1TB hard disk, do as below, please.
1. Use “Windows+R” to open “Run”, type “diskmgmt.msc” in the empty box and tap “OK” to open Disk Management.
2. You can right-click a partition that has much free space and select “Shrink Volume”.
3. Adjust the partition size and click “Shrink” to confirm.
4. Now, you will get an unallocated space. Right-click it and select “New Simple Volume”.
You should know: The unallocated space from shrinking a partition can only be used to create another new partition, but cannot be used for extending another partition since Disk Management can only extend one partition when the unallocated space is on its right adjacent side.
In consideration of the limitation of Disk Management and its potential data loss risk, we highly recommend you use AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. This software offers the best way to partition 1TB hard drive in Windows 10/8/7 (32-bit and 64-bit) without losing data. Besides, it provides many other advanced functions that Disk Management does not have, including:
❥ Move partition. It is quite useful when you want to extend a partition but the required unallocated space is not on the right side. ❥Merging partition. When you want to combine two adjacent partitions to make the fullest use of the disk space and reduce partition number on the 1TB hard disk, this is a great choice. ❥Copy partition to another hard drive, or cloning entire hard disk to another disk. ❥ Migrate Windows 11/10/8/7 partition to SSD for better performance and faster OS running.
To partition 1TB hard disk in Windows, you can use its “Allocate Free Space” or “Split Partition” features. Details are displayed as below.
Part 1. Allocate Free space
This feature will directly assign free space from one partition to another within 3 steps to make the partition size more reasonable.
1. Install and open AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. Right-click the partition which has lots of unused space and select “Allocate Free Space”. Here we choose D drive.
2. Decide how much space you want to allocate from D to C, or another partition. And click “OK”.
3. Click “Apply” in the main interface to commit the pending operation.
Part 2. Split Partition
This function can split a large partition into two smaller partitions. When your C drive is too big and other partitions just have little space, try this option.
1. Right-click the C drive and select “Split Partition”.
2. In the new window, you can specify the size of the location of the new partition, and click “OK”.
3. Click “Apply” and “Proceed” to execute the pending operation.
Of course, you can try its other features to partition 1TB hard disk in Windows 10/8/7 such as “Extend Partition Wizard”, "Resize Partition” and more.
Above is how to partition 1TB hard disk within Windows. But you might also want to know how to partition hard drive during or before installing Windows 10/8/7. For this task, you can refer to the following contents.
1. Insert the Windows installation disc and boot your computer from it.
2. At the Windows Setup screen, press Shift+F10 at the same time to open the Command Prompt Windows.
Note: If you directly click “Next”, the entire 1TB hard disk will be created as a system partition.
3. Type “Diskpart” in the window and press “Enter” to launch the Diskpart.exe tool.
4. Then execute the following commands in turn to partition hard disk during OS installation.
▶list disk
▶select disk [disk number]
▶create partition primary [size=n]
This way allows you to decide how much space to be allocated to the system partition and leaves the rest space as unallocated, with which you can create new partitions after OS installation.
If you want to partition 1TB hard disk well before installing OS, but don’t have an installation disc, AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional can satisfy your requirements since it permits you to create a bootable USB drive.
1. Connect an empty USB drive into a working Windows 10 computer. Install and run AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. Click "Tools" > “Make Bootable Media” and follow the wizard to finish the task.
2. Boot your computer without operating system from the AOMEI bootable USB drive just created. It will lead you to the main interface of this software.
3. For a new hard disk without any partitions on, you can use “Quick Partition” feature of AOMEI software. It can quickly partition a large hard disk like 1TB or 2TB into several partitions within two clicks.
Then you can download ISO files from Microsoft official site, and burn them to USB using Windows USB/DVD Download Tool from Microsoft Store, then insert it into the computer to start the OS installation process.
In this article, we’ve explained why we need to partition the hard disk, given proper advice on partition number and size for 1TB hard disk, as well as how to partition 1TB hard disk in Windows 10 via two methods. Hopefully, you can get useful information here. To partition 1TB or 2TB hard disk in Windows Server 2019/2016/2012/2008/2003, you can apply AOMEI Partition Assistant Server.