Secondary partition became primary

Question

I was using Windows 10 some time ago and decided to go back to 8.1 by wiping out my main partition and installing 8.1 over it. Since I wanted to backup a lot of stuff, I made a secondary NTFS partition to store some files in it, before I wiped my main partition. But, after I installed 8.1 on my main partition, the backup partition I made became a primary partition, with the System status. Now I can't delete it and merge with my main partition.

I tried using third party tools like EaseUS, also Diskpart, but nothing. Even though delete partition override didn't throw me an error, I still couldn't delete it. It's a 60GB partition.

Answer 1

System in Healthy(...) of G: probably indicated that it is the "active" partition (i.e. the bootmgr on it is used), which is why you cannot delete it.

To confirm that, you can check with detail partition in diskpart or bcdedit.

For example,

diskpart
select disk 0
select partition 2
detail partition

It should tell you Active: Yes.

bcdedit should show that device is partition=G: under the Windows Boot Manager section.

To fix that, you can use active in diskpart to mark the C: as the active one instead.

For example,

diskpart
select disk 0
select partition 1
active

You better make sure C: has a set of bootloader (bootmgr, BCD Store...) before you reboot though:

bcdboot C:\Windows /s C: /f BIOS

(https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh824874.aspx)

Once you rebooted, you should see that System in Healthy(...) of G: moved to that of C:, and you should be able to delete G: then.

P.S. The Boot shown in Healthy(...) in Disk Management merely means bootmgr booted the \Windows on that partition. It has nothing to do with the "active" partition mentioned above.

Answer 2

I assume that, by "secondary partition" you actually mean a logical partition. The term "secondary partition" doesn't clearly identify anything in particular.

It's also unclear why a change from logical to primary form would prevent you from deleting or otherwise manipulating the partition. It could be that something else is causing that particular problem. For instance, some tools won't modify a partition that's currently in use. Much more detail on the current state of your partition table, what you want to do, and what tools you're using may be required if you're to get much help.

That said, it is possible to convert from primary to logical or vice-versa, albeit with some significant caveats. My own FixParts program can do this, for instance. I've heard that some more mainstream third-party Windows tools can do the same, although I'm not familiar with the details. As it's not clear to me that the partition's status as a primary partition is the source of your problem, I do not advise you to rush out and make this change, though -- at least, not unless and until you determine that you really do need to change the partition type.