How to partition a hard drive easily on Windows or Mac？

I. What is a hard disk partition?

A hard disk partition is equivalent to a container that can store files. If there is no partition, the hard disk will not be able to save data, and users will not be able to view and access the target hard disk in Windows File Explorer or Mac Finder.

In the Windows system, the disk partition style determines the number of partitions that can be created in a hard disk. If the disk partition style is MBR (Master Boot Record), the hard disk can only create up to 4 primary partitions, and if the partition style is GPT ( GUID partition table), you can create an unlimited number of primary partitions. Hard disk partitions usually contain partition information such as drive letter, size, and file system (NTFS/exFAT/FAT32).

In the Mac system, if the hard disk uses the APFS file system, Apple officials do not recommend partitioning the hard disk, but create multiple APFS volumes instead. APFS is the default file system format for Mac computers. It has features such as strong encryption, space sharing, disk snapshots, and fast directory size statistics. If you are running a Mac that uses the HFS+ file system (prior to macOS Catalina), you will need to partition the disk.

In addition, if you want to install the Windows system on the Mac device, you also need to partition the disk, but in this case you need to use the “Boot Conversion Assistant” (that is, Boot Camp) to create a partition, do not use the “Disk Utility” to remove the ” Instead of partitions created by Boot Camp Assistant, use Boot Camp Assistant to remove partitions from your Mac. How to open Boot Camp Assistant: Open (Finder) > (Applications) > (Utilities) > (Boot Camp Assistant), and then follow the corresponding instructions to create partitions and install Windows.

II. How to partition the hard disk?

1. How to partition the hard disk on Windows

In Windows, you can use Disk Management to partition the hard disk, and the operation steps are very simple.

Step 1: Press the (Windows+X) keys on the keyboard at the same time. Then in the pop-up list, select the (Disk Management) option.

Step 2: Then find the target hard disk, right-click the unallocated space on the disk, select the (New Simple Volume) option, and then click (Next).

Step 3: Next, set the size of the partition. If you only want to create a partition for the hard disk, then in the “Specify Volume Size” interface, please set the size of the simple volume to the maximum amount of disk space. If you need to create multiple partitions, you can set the size of the simple volume (that is, the partition) as needed. Then click (Next).

Step 4: Then assign a drive letter to the partition, and click (Next).

Step 5: In the “Format Partition” page, you can set the file system (NTFS, exFAT, FAT32), unit size, volume label and other parameters. Please refer to: Features and differences of NTFS, exFAT, FAT32 to choose the appropriate file system. After the setting is complete, click the (Next) > (Finish) button to complete the creation of the partition. You can then access and use the partition normally in File Explorer.

2. How to Partition the Hard Disk on Mac

Step 1: Open (Finder) > (Applications) > (Utilities) > (Disk Utility), select the corresponding disk, and then click the (Partition) option of Disk Utility. If your disk is an APFS file system, the pop-up The window will suggest you to add a volume, if your situation is suitable for adding a volume, click (Add Volume) for follow-up operations. Click the (Partition) button here.

Step 2: Then you can see the total capacity of the disk, click (+) to add a new partition, then set the name, format and size of the partition on the right, confirm the partition information, click (Apply) in the lower right corner, and wait for the partition to be created Just finish.

If after partitioning the hard disk, you find a partition that does not need to be created, you can also choose to delete the partition. It is not difficult to delete the disk partition, the steps are as follows:

Step 1: Open (Finder) > (Applications) > (Utilities) > (Disk Utility), select the corresponding disk, then click the (Partition) option of Disk Utility, and then click the (Partition) button.

Step 2: After that, you can view all partitions contained in the disk in the pie chart, select the disk partition to be deleted, click (-) and then click (Apply) in the lower right corner to delete the partition. If there are no partitions that can be deleted, the (-) button is dimmed and cannot be clicked.

III. How to recover data after hard disk partition is accidentally deleted/lost?

1. Preparations for recovering hard disk partition data

① After accidentally deleting or erasing the disk partition, you should suspend the use of computer equipment to download files and other operations to avoid new data being stored and overwriting deleted/lost file data. When no new data is stored and old data is not due to other reasons In case of damage, the deleted old data may still be recovered.

②Choose a suitable data recovery software. Some data recovery software cannot recover deleted partition data, so you need to choose a software with partition recovery function, Renee Undeleter has partition recovery function, and supports use on Mac system and Windows system.

③For the Mac system, you need to close SIP in advance before you can use data recovery software to recover internal disk data. If you need to recover external hard disk data, you don’t need to close SIP. Apple introduced System Integrity Protection Mode (i.e. SIP technology) in Mac OS X El Capitan and newer versions as a security feature, many applications (including data recovery software) will be blocked, so you may not be able to scan when using Renee Undeleter Mac built-in disks can only scan external disks. It is recommended that you close SIP before the data recovery operation, wait for the data recovery, and then restart SIP. You can click here to learn how to turn off and restart SIP protection on Mac computers.

2. Use Renee Undeleter to restore partition data

Renee Undeleter is a software specially used to restore various data files. When you accidentally delete important files by mistake, empty the recycle bin, or format the disk/memory card/U disk, etc., you can use this tool Get lost data back. The software covers four functional modules, including file recovery, formatting recovery, partition recovery and image creation, which can help you solve many data loss problems in an all-round way.

The following takes the Mac version of Renee Undeleter as an example to introduce the partition recovery steps. The partition recovery steps on the Windows system are similar to those on the Mac, and the operation is also very simple. Even a computer novice can quickly grasp the method and operate it easily. Specific steps are as follows:

Step 1: Download, install and run the Renee Undeleter application on a Mac computer, and select the (Partition Recovery) option on the main interface.

Note: To avoid data overwriting, please do not install the Renee Undeleter application on the disk where the data is lost. If the hard disk you need to recover data from belongs to the internal hard disk and is the only hard disk in the Mac computer, please download the software and move (or use copy and paste) to an external U disk or mobile hard disk, if the hard disk you need to recover data belongs to If you have an external hard drive, you can download and install the application to the internal hard drive of your Mac computer.

Step 2: Next select the hard disk device from which you want to recover partition data. After the selection is complete, click (Next).

Note: The built-in disk of the Mac is not shown here because the SIP protection on the Mac computer is turned on and needs to be turned off before it can be displayed and scanned. And the Renee Undeleter application cannot scan the disk where this application is installed.

Step 3: Select (Default Settings) > (Next) in Advanced Settings. Of course, if you remember the file type you want to recover, you can also choose it in (Custom Settings), which can save some hard disk scanning time.

Step 4: The application will first scan the disk and pop up a partition list for you to choose. If you remember the name of the deleted partition and other information, please select the corresponding partition and click the (OK) button to start scanning the partition. If you do not choose, you can also wait for the program to scan all partitions, but this process will take more time, but more data will be scanned.

Step 5: Then wait for the scan, the scan time will depend on the size of the hard disk partition. During the scanning process, you can double-click to preview the file. If the file is damaged, the program will also give a corresponding prompt.

Step 6: Wait for the scan to end, select the files to be recovered from the scan results, and click the (Recover) button to save the files to other disks.