Paragon Partition Manager - 15 Home User Manual

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PARAGON Software GmbH

Heinrich-von-Stephan-Str. 5c  79100 Freiburg, Germany

Tel. +49 (0) 761 59018201  Fax +49 (0) 761 59018130

Internet www.paragon-software.com  Email sales@paragon-software.com

Partition Manager™ 15 Home

User Manual

Contents

Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 5

What’s New in Partition Manager 15 ........................................................................................................... 5

Product Components ............................................................................................................. 5

Features Overview ................................................................................................................. 6

Features ..................................................................................................................................................... 6

User Friendly Fault Minimizing Interface ................................................................................................................................ 6

Backup Facilities ...................................................................................................................................................................... 6

Restore Facilities ..................................................................................................................................................................... 6

Boot Management Facilities ................................................................................................................................................... 6

Partition/Hard Disk Management Facilities ............................................................................................................................ 6

Auxiliary Facilities ................................................................................................................................................................... 7

Supported Technologies .............................................................................................................................. 7

Supported File Systems ............................................................................................................................... 8

Supported Media ........................................................................................................................................ 8

Getting Started ...................................................................................................................... 8

System Requirements ................................................................................................................................. 9

Installation ................................................................................................................................................. 9

First Start ................................................................................................................................................... 10

Building Recovery Media ............................................................................................................................ 11

Booting from the Linux/DOS Recovery Media ............................................................................................. 11

Startup .................................................................................................................................................................................. 12

Boot menu ............................................................................................................................................................................ 12

Basic Concepts ..................................................................................................................... 15

pVHD Support ............................................................................................................................................ 15

GPT versus MBR ......................................................................................................................................... 16

uEFI Boot Challenges .................................................................................................................................. 16

Apple Boot Camp ....................................................................................................................................... 16

64-bit Support ............................................................................................................................................ 17

Drive Partitioning ....................................................................................................................................... 17

Windows Components ........................................................................................................ 17

Interface Overview .................................................................................................................................... 18

General Layout ...................................................................................................................................................................... 18

Tool Button ........................................................................................................................................................................... 19

Ribbon Panel ......................................................................................................................................................................... 19

Set View Button .................................................................................................................................................................... 19

Virtual Operations Bar .......................................................................................................................................................... 19

Express Mode Button ........................................................................................................................................................... 20

Disk Map ............................................................................................................................................................................... 20

Disk and Partitions List .......................................................................................................................................................... 21

Context-sensitive Menu ........................................................................................................................................................ 22

Properties Panel .................................................................................................................................................................... 22

Status Bar .............................................................................................................................................................................. 23

Settings Overview ...................................................................................................................................... 24

General Options .................................................................................................................................................................... 24

General Copy and Backup Options ....................................................................................................................................... 25

Hot Processing Options ......................................................................................................................................................... 26

VD container options ............................................................................................................................................................ 27

Partitioning Options .............................................................................................................................................................. 27

E-Mail Options ...................................................................................................................................................................... 28

Virtual Mode Options ........................................................................................................................................................... 28

File System Conversion Options ........................................................................................................................................... 29

Log Files Options ................................................................................................................................................................... 30

Viewing Disk Properties ............................................................................................................................. 30

Data Backup and Rescue ............................................................................................................................ 31

Creating Backup Images ........................................................................................................................................................ 31

Restoring System and Data ................................................................................................................................................... 32

Boot Management ..................................................................................................................................... 33

Partition Management ............................................................................................................................... 34

Basic Partitioning Operations ............................................................................................................................................... 34

Advanced Partitioning Operations........................................................................................................................................ 44

Changing Partition Attributes ............................................................................................................................................... 56

Hard Disk Management ............................................................................................................................. 58

Updating MBR ....................................................................................................................................................................... 58

Extra Functionality ..................................................................................................................................... 58

View Partition/Hard Disk Properties ..................................................................................................................................... 59

Volume Explorer ................................................................................................................................................................... 59

Mount Partition .................................................................................................................................................................... 61

Test Surface .......................................................................................................................................................................... 62

Check File System Integrity ................................................................................................................................................... 63

Edit/View Sectors .................................................................................................................................................................. 63

Send Log Files ........................................................................................................................................................................ 65

View Logs .............................................................................................................................................................................. 65

Typical Scenarios ................................................................................................................. 66

Backup Scenarios ....................................................................................................................................... 66

New Backup Format.............................................................................................................................................................. 66

Legacy Backup Format .......................................................................................................................................................... 69

Recovery Scenarios .................................................................................................................................... 74

Fixing Windows startup ability ............................................................................................................................................. 74

Restoring a dual boot Mac from an external USB drive ....................................................................................................... 78

Copying of data from the corrupted system disk to another hard disk ............................................................................... 80

Burning of data from the corrupted system disk to CD/DVD ............................................................................................... 83

Copying of data from a backup to the corrupted system partition ...................................................................................... 85

Restoring separate files and folders from a backup ............................................................................................................. 88

Resize Scenarios ......................................................................................................................................... 90

Creating a new partition to detach operating system from the rest of data ....................................................................... 90

Increasing size of a system partition by taking unused space of an adjacent partition ....................................................... 91

Increasing size of a system partition by taking unused space from any other ..................................................................... 92

Increasing size of a system partition by taking unused space of an adjacent logical partition ............................................ 97

Separating OS from media data ............................................................................................................................................ 98

Merging a system partition with an adjacent logical partition........................................................................................... 101

Shrinking a system partition to increase size of a data partition ....................................................................................... 103

Resizing partitions of Apple Boot Camp ............................................................................................................................. 107

Creating Dual Boot Systems ..................................................................................................................... 108

Windows Vista + Windows XP ............................................................................................................................................ 108

Windows XP + Windows Vista ............................................................................................................................................ 114

Troubleshooter .................................................................................................................. 116

Glossary ............................................................................................................................. 118

Our company is constantly releasing new versions and updates to its software, that's why images shown in this manual may be different from what you see on your screen.

Introduction

Paragon Partition Manager™ 15 Home is an integrated set of powerful tools that is specially designed to tackle most of the problems you might face while using PC. A highly intelligent program engine together with built-in advanced recovery facilities make it possible to securely carry out partitioning operations of any complexity without fear to lose precious data.

In this manual you will find the answers to many of the technical questions, which might arise while using the program.

What’s New in Partition Manager 15

 Embedded Recovery Media Builder (RMB) 3.0. Instead of two utilities downloaded from Paragon's website

(BMB and RMB), the new RMB 3.0 is now embedded into the product. Combining the best of the two utilities, it can boast more options, usability, and stability:

- Prepares Linux or WinPE-based bootable environment on a USB thumb drive or in an ISO image;

- Doesn’t obligatory require Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit (ADK) or Automated Installation Kit

(WAIK) on Windows 7 and later platforms;

- Can build WinPE-based media on Windows XP, Vista, Server 2003 if there’s WAIK installed in the system;

- Allows injecting additional drivers for storage devices, network controllers, USB controllers, or system

during setup;

- Enables to set up a network connection with a pre-mounted network share during setup;

- Prepares hybrid (both, uEFI and BIOS compatible) 64-bit recovery environment on flash or in an ISO image.

 Predefined views. The Windows 8 like streamlined, tile-oriented interface has been enhanced by predefined

views, which enable to adjust the working environment to particular customer needs.

Product Components

In order to cope with different tasks, the product contains several components:

 Windows based set of utilities is the crucial part of the product. With the help of an easy to use launcher you

may find and run tasks of any complexity in the field of data and system protection, hard disk partitioning and cloning, etc.

 Linux/DOS based recovery environment is a multi-platform bootable media that enables to run utilities under

Linux or PTS DOS, and that way to get access to your hard disk for maintenance or recovery purposes. Both platforms have their strong sides, for instance Linux can boast support of FireWire (i.e. IEEE1394) or USB devices. It enables to burn CD/DVD discs. However there can be some difficulties with detecting new hardware. DOS in its turn has no problems of that kind but is limited in features. The Linux/DOS recovery environment requires no installation and can be of great help when the system fails to boot. Besides it offers a Windows XP like environment.

This feature is only available for the bootable recovery environment.

Features Overview

This chapter dwells upon key benefits and technical highlights of the product.

Features

Let us list some of the features:

User Friendly Fault Minimizing Interface

 Graphical representation of the data to gain a better understanding.  A handy Launcher to easily find and run the required tasks.  Comprehensive wizards to simplify even the most complex operations.  A context sensitive hint system for all functions of the program.  Previewing the resulting layout of hard disks before actually executing operations (so-called virtual

operations).

Backup Facilities

 Available location for backup images:

- Backup to local mounted partitions.

- Backup to an external mounted storage to provide for a higher level of data protection and system independence.

- Backup to a network drive to stand a better chance of success in case of a hard disk failure.

For PBF images:

 Back up separate partitions or entire disks.

For pVHD images:

 Backup to VD Wizard to protect separate partitions or entire hard disks.

Restore Facilities

 Restore an entire disk, separate partitions from the previously created backup image (for PBF and pVHD).

Boot Management Facilities

 Boot Manager Setup Wizard to easily manage several operating systems on one computer.

Partition/Hard Disk Management Facilities

 Basic functions for initializing, partitioning and formatting hard disks (create, format, delete). Instead of the

standard Windows disk tools, the program supports all popular file systems.

 Express Create Partition Wizard to create a new partition in the most appropriate place of a hard disk, format it

to NTFS and then make it available in the system by assigning a drive letter.

 Split Partition Wizard helps you separate OS and data or different types of data by splitting one partition to two

different partitions of the same type and file system.

This feature is only available for the bootable recovery environment.

Boot Corrector is only available for the bootable recovery environment.

 Merge Partitions Wizard to consolidate the disk space, which originally belongs to two adjacent partitions

(NTFS, FAT16/FAT32), into a single, larger partition.

 Redistribute Free Space Wizard to increase free space on one partition by up-taking the on-disk unallocated

space and the unused space of other partitions.

 Express Resize Partitions Wizard to increase free space on one partition by up-taking the unused space of an

adjacent partition of a hard disk (including partitions of Apple Boot Camp).

 NTFS hot resize upward to enlarge an NTFS partition (system, locked) without rebooting Windows and

interrupting its work.

 Convert a file system (FAT16/32, NTFS, Apple HFS) without reformatting.  Mount a partition (assign a drive letter) of any file system type to make it available for your operating system.  Modify file system parameters (make active/inactive, hide/unhide, etc.).  Install New OS Wizard to make a system ready to install a new operating system.  Undelete Partitions Wizard to recover an accidentally deleted partition.

Auxiliary Facilities

 File Transfer Wizard to make such operations as transferring of files/directories or burning of them to CD/DVD

as easy and convenient as possible. Providing access to Paragon backups as regular folders, it may also help to replace corrupted data from a previously created image in case of an operating system failure.

 Volume Explorer is a handy tool when you have different file systems on the disk, whether they contain an

operating system or just data. Volume Explorer will let you explore a file system of any type and provide access to the necessary files and directories regardless of their security attributes.

 Network Configuration Wizard to establish a network connection on a bootable recovery media either to save a

backup of a partition/hard disk or just several files on a network computer or retrieve a previously made backup from a network computer for recovery purposes.

 Boot Corrector to fix most of the system boot problems that can be a result of a human factor, program error or

a boot virus activity.

Supported Technologies

Along with using innovative technologies from outside, Paragon has developed a number of its own original technologies that make its products unique and attractive for customers:

 Paragon Hot Backup™ technology to back up locked partitions and hard disks under Windows NT+ family

operating systems providing both high operating efficiency as well as low hardware requirements.

Unfortunately, support of non-Roman characters for the HFS+ file system is unavailable at the moment. The company is about to implement it in the nearest future.

 Paragon Power Shield™ technology to provide data consistency in case of a hardware malfunction, power

outages or an operating system failure.

 Paragon UFSD™ technology to browse partitions of any file system including hidden and unmounted, modify

and copy files and folders, etc.

 Paragon Hot Resize™ technology to enlarge NTFS partitions (system, locked) without rebooting Windows and

interrupting its work.

 Paragon Smart Partition™ technology to securely perform hard disk partitioning operations of any complexity.  Paragon BTE™ technology to set tasks for execution during the system restart, thus saving from the need to use

a bootable media when modifying system partitions.

 Microsoft Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) to provide the copy/backup infrastructure for the Microsoft

Windows XP/Vista/7/Server 2003/2008 operating systems. It offers a reliable mechanism to create consistent point-in-time copies of data known as shadow copies. Developed by Microsoft in close cooperation with the leading copy/backup solution vendors on the market, it is based on a snapshot technology concept.

 GUID Partition Table (GPT). It is the next generation of a hard disk partitioning scheme developed to lift

restrictions of the old MBR. GPT disks are now supported by Windows Vista/7, Server 2008, Mac OS X and Linux.

Supported File Systems

 Full read/write access to FAT16/FAT32 partitions.  Full read/write access to NTFS (Basic Disks) under Windows, Linux and PTS DOS. Compressed NTFS files are also

supported.

 Full read/write access to Ext2FS/Ext3FS/Ext4FS partitions.  Limited read/write access to Apple HFS+ partitions.

Supported Media

 Support of both MBR and GPT hard disks (2.2TB+ disks included)  IDE, SCSI and SATA hard disks  SSD (Solid State Drive)  AFD (Advanced Format Drive)  Non-512B sector size drives  CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, DVD-R, DVD+R double layer and also Blu-ray discs  FireWire (i.e. IEEE1394), USB 1.0, USB 2.0, USB 3.0 hard disks  PC card storage devices (MBR and GPT flash memory, etc.)

Getting Started

In this chapter you will find all the information necessary to get the product ready to use.

During the installation additional free space (up to 1GB) will be required.

In case there is some previous version of the program installed on the computer, the program will offer the user to uninstall it first.

System Requirements

For the Windows installation package

 Windows XP SP3  Windows Vista  Windows 7  Windows 8  Windows 8.1

Additional requirements:

 To install and run the product the target OS should have Visual Studio C++ 2010 Runtime Library installed

(comes with the installation package – you will be prompted to install it, if it’s not been found in the system).

For the Linux bootable environment

 Intel Pentium CPU or its equivalent, with 300 MHz processor clock speed  256 MB of RAM  SVGA video adapter and monitor  Keyboard  Mouse

Additional requirements

 Network card to send/retrieve data to/from a network computer  Recordable CD/DVD drive to burn data to compact discs  External USB hard drive to store data.

Installation

Before the installation, please make sure the systems requirements are met. If everything is OK, please do the following to install the product:

1. Click on the supplied setup file to initiate the installation. First your system will be checked for the presence of

Visual Studio C++ 2010 Runtime Library and if not found, you will be prompted to install it (comes with the installation package). Click Install to continue.

Do not install the program on network drives. Do not use Terminal Server sessions to install and run the program. In both cases, the program functionality will be limited.

The program provides wide opportunities in the field of hard disk structure modification, so just to be on the safe side, please make a backup of your data before carrying out any operation.

2. The Welcome page will inform that the application is being installed. Click Next to continue.

3. Please Read Paragon License Agreement carefully and then select the appropriate option to accept. Otherwise

you won’t be able to proceed with the installation. By clicking the Print button, the license agreement may also be printed out.

4. Provide your product key and serial number.

5. On the Customer Information page you are to provide the standard customer information, i.e. a user name and

an organization. Besides you need to decide whether to make the program available for all users of this computer (if several) or only for the current one.

6. On the next page, click Change to install the utility to a different location (by default C:\Program Files\Paragon

Software\Paragon Partition Manager 15 Home Edition\). Otherwise click Next to continue.

7. On the Ready to Install the Program page click Install to start the installation or Back to return to any of the

previous pages and modify the installation settings.

8. The Final page reports the end of the setup process. Click Finish to complete the wizard.

First Start

To start Paragon Partition Manager 15 under Windows, please click the Windows Start button and then select Programs > Paragon Partition Manager™ 15 > Paragon Partition Manager™.

To know more on how to handle the product’s interface and accomplish typical operations, please consult the Windows Components chapter.

The first component that will be displayed is called the Express Launcher. Thanks to a well thought-out categorization and hint system, it provides quick and easy access to wizards and utilities that we consider worth using on a regular basis. With its help you can also start up the traditional launcher, the help system or go to the program’s home page.

Building Recovery Media

Linux-based recovery environments should be prepared on-site with Paragon’s Recovery Media Builder. To know more on the subject, please consult documentation that comes with this utility.

Booting from the Linux/DOS Recovery Media

The Linux/DOS recovery environment can be used to boot your computer into Linux or PTS DOS to get access to your hard disk for maintenance or recovery purposes. It also has the PTS DOS safe mode, which may help in a number of nonstandard situations such as interfering hardware settings or serious problems on the hardware level. In this case, only basic files and drivers (such as hard disk drivers, a monitor driver, and a keyboard driver) will be loaded.

Please use Recovery Media Builder to prepare Paragon's recovery environments on CD/DVD, flash, or in an ISO-image.

To automatically boot from the recovery media please make sure the on-board BIOS is set up to boot from CD/USB first.

By default the Normal Mode will be automatically initiated after a 10 second idle period.

Startup

To start working with the Linux/DOS recovery environment, please take the following steps:

1. Start up the computer from our Linux/DOS recovery media.

2. Launch a boot mode you need (Normal, Safe, Low-Graphics Safe) in the Boot menu.

3. Click on the required operation to start. Hints on the selected at the moment item will help you make the right

choice.

4. Consult the help system by pressing ALT+F1 to know more on the subject.

Boot menu

32-bit environment

 Normal Mode. Boot into the Linux normal mode. This mode uses the full set of drivers (recommended);  Safe Mode. Boot into the PTS DOS mode. This mode can be used as an alternative of the Linux normal mode if it

fails to work properly;

 Low-Graphics Safe Mode. Boot into the PTS DOS safe mode. In this case, only the minimal set of drivers will be

included, like hard disk, monitor, and keyboard drivers. This mode has simple graphics and a simple menu;

 Floppy Disk. Reboot the computer from a system floppy disk;  Hard Disk 0. Boot from the primary hard disk;  Find OS(s) on your hard disks. The program will scan hard disks of your computer to find any bootable operating

system.

While working with the recovery environment you might experience some inconvenience caused by possible video artifacts. It is just a result of changing video modes and in no way will affect the program functionality. If this is the case, please wait a bit and everything will be OK.

64-bit environment

fails to work properly;

 Reboot. Restart the computer.  Power off. Shut down the computer.

Normal Mode

When the Normal mode is selected, the Linux launch menu appears:

If you are going to use network resources, first launch the Network Configuration Wizard to establish a network connection.

 Partition Manager (enables to run wizards and dialogs, to specify program settings, to visualize the operating

environment and the hard disk configuration);

 Express Resize Wizard (enables to increase free space on one partition by up-taking the unused space of an

adjacent partition);

 Restore from VD Wizard (allows restoring hard disks and partitions);  File Transfer Wizard (allows coping files/folders to another disk or a partition as well as recording them to

CD/DVD);

 Boot Corrector (helps to correct the Windows System Registry without Windows being loaded);  Network Configurator (enables to establish a network connection under Linux);

 Log Saver (helps to collect and send the necessary log files to the Technical Support);  Eject CD/DVD;  Reboot the computer;  Power off the computer.

To move within the menu, please use the arrow keys of the computer keyboard.

Safe Mode

When the Safe mode is selected, the PTS DOS launch menu appears. It has nearly the same functionality as for the Normal mode except for the Network Configurator and Log Saver commands. Besides due to certain limitations of the PTS DOS environment, there is no possibility to burn CD/DVD discs.

This feature is only available for the bootable recovery environment.

Low Graphics Safe Mode

When the Low Graphics mode is selected, the PTS DOS launch menu appears. It has the same functionality and looks similar to the Safe mode but graphically simpler.

Basic Concepts

This chapter explains terms and ideas that show how the program works. To understand these helps to obtain a general notion of the operation performance and makes it easier for the user to operate the program.

pVHD Support

Paragon introduces a pVHD (Paragon Virtual Hard Drive) format – a special VHD, optimized for storing backups of virtual and physical machines. It’s very efficient in handling incremental chains, data de-duplication and synchronization. pVHD

allows obtaining backups that are up to four times smaller than original backup objects.

In the current version of the product backup images can be made either in the old PBF or the new pVHD. Please note that the pVHD support has a promotional goal. In future releases pVHD will gradually take the primary role.

Below is the list of wizards that allow working with pVHD:

 Backup to VD Wizard (Windows);  Restore from VD Wizard (Linux).

What you get by using pVHD:

 Incremental imaging works much faster and rock-stable in comparison with the old PBF;  Only pVHD images can be used to do immediate virtualization;  With the new backup technology, available for customers as a new backup image format pVHD, Paragon has

also achieved easy support of any virtual containers (VMDK, VHD, etc.).

It is strongly recommended not to modify the hard disk configuration with Windows Disk Manager. Otherwise it may lead to unexpected consequences, right up to BSOD and inability to boot in Windows XP/Vista. Please use our program to correctly update both MBR and GPT.

GPT versus MBR

GUID Partition Table (GPT) is the next generation of a hard disk partitioning scheme developed to lift restrictions of the old MBR. Being a part of the Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) standard proposed by Intel to replace the outdated PC BIOS, it offers a number of crucial benefits:

 Up to 128 primary partitions for the Windows implementation (only 4 in MBR);  The maximum allowed partition size is 18 exabytes (only 2 terabytes in MBR);  More reliable thanks to replication and cyclic redundancy check (CRC) protection of the partition table;  A well defined and fully self-identifying partition format (data critical to the platform operation is located in

partitions, but not in un-partitioned or hidden sectors as this is the case with MBR)

uEFI Boot Challenges

Introduced back in 2005 by Intel to lift restrictions of the old MBR (Master Boot Record) and PC BIOS (Basic Input/Output System), uEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) is now a recommended platform for new 64-bit Windows 8 computers. And the reason is easy to catch – besides other unique features impossible for the traditional tandem of BIOS+MBR, only a uEFI-based platform enables to accommodate Windows OS on a partition larger than

2.2TB.

Despite all uEFI advantages however, it has one quite naughty issue: a pretty standard operation with a bootable device

for instance involving its connection to another SATA port results in unbootable Windows. You’ll get the same result if

trying to boot from a cloned system hard disk or from a restored hard disk. All these problems originate from the way uEFI+GPT bundle is organized.

Microsoft provides how-to guides to tackle this type of problems, but they demand a great deal of experience from the user, involving the use of the cmd, diskpart and bcdedit tools.

Paragon has a better way! Introducing an elegant technology, realized at the user side as one simple option, you can define a system GPT volume you’re willing to boot from.

Below is a list of wizards where the uEFI switch boot device option can be found:

 Restore Wizard;  Boot Corrector.

Apple Boot Camp

Boot Camp is a special utility to help you set up a dual boot system (Mac OS X and 32-bit Windows XP/Vista) on Intelbased Macs. It enables to securely re-partition your hard disk (resize an existing HFS+ partition to create a separate partition for Windows) and then launch the installation process. With Boot Camp all the necessary drivers will be at your disposal. Moreover after Windows has been installed it will serve as a boot manager to choose what operating system to start up.

64-bit Support

The bulk of software today is written for a 32-bit processor. It can meet the requirements of almost any end user. However that is not the case when dealing with servers processing large amounts of data with complex calculations of very large numbers. That is where 64-bit architecture comes into play.

It can boast improved scalability for business applications that enables to support more customer databases and more simultaneous users on each server. Besides a 64-bit kernel can access more system resources, such as memory allocation per user. A 64-bit processor can handle over 4 billion times more memory addresses than a 32-bit processor. With these resources, even a very large database can be cached in memory.

Although many business applications run without problems on 32-bit systems, others have grown so complex that they use up the 4 GB memory limitation of a 32-bit address space. With this large amount of data, fewer memory resources are available to meet memory needs. On a 64-bit server, most queries are able to perform in the buffers available to the database.

Some 32-bit applications make the transition to the 64-bit environment seamlessly others do not. For instance, systemlevel utilities and programs that provide direct hardware access are likely to fail. Our program offers a full-fledged support of the 64-bit architecture providing fault-tolerant work for such system dependent modules as Hot Processing.

Drive Partitioning

As you probably know a hard drive is to be split into one or more partitions, since it cannot hold data until it is carved up and space is set aside for an operating system. Until recently most PCs used to have just one partition, which filled the entire hard disk and contained an OS. The situation has changed however, thanks to new cost-effective high capacity hard drives, thus opening up numerous possibilities for PC users, such as editing video, archiving music, backing up CD images, etc. Huge increase in space is great, but it poses a number of problems, most important of which are effective data organization and speed.

Large drives are always going to take longer to search than smaller volumes, and an operating system is going to have its work cut out both finding and organizing files. It is for this reason that many people decide to invest in multiple hard drives, but there is an easy solution – drive partitioning. Partitioning lets you divide a single physical drive into a number of logical drives, each of which servers as a container with its own drive letter and volume label, thus enabling the operating system to process data more efficiently. Besides partitioning makes it possible to organize data so that it is easy to find and manage. You can set aside, for instance, 40 GB of a 160 GB hard drive for the OS, 70 GB for storing video and another 50 GB for your favorite music collections to provide transparent data storage.

It is also worth mentioning to that with a hard drive properly partitioned, such routine operations as files defragmentation or consistency check will not be that annoying and time-consuming any more.

By detaching the OS from the rest of the data you can tackle one more crucial issue – in case of a system malfunction, you can get the system back on track in minutes by recovering it from a backup image located on the other partition of the hard drive.

But that is not all drive partitioning may be used for. If you are willing to play games in Windows while browsing the Internet in Linux, 100-percent sure that no virus will attack your PC, drive partitioning is a necessity. In order to run several OSs on a single hard drive you are to create a corresponding number of partitions to effectively delineate the boundaries of each OS.

Windows Components

In the given section you can find all the information necessary to successfully work with the Windows version of the product.

1. Tool Button

2. Ribbon Panel

3. Set View Button

4. Virtual Operations Bar

Interface Overview

This chapter introduces the graphical interface of the program. The design of the interface precludes any mistake being made on the part of the user. Most operations are performed through the system of wizards. Buttons and menus are accompanied by easy understandable icons. Nevertheless, any problems that might occur while managing the program can be tackled by reading this very chapter.

General Layout

When you start the program, the first component that is displayed is called the Launcher. It enables to run wizards and dialogs, to specify program settings, to visualize the operating environment and the hard disk configuration.

The Launcher’s window can be conditionally subdivided into several sections that differ in their purpose and functionality:

5. Express Mode Button

6. Disk Map

7. Disk and Partitions List

8. Context-sensitive Menu

9. Properties Panel

10. Status Bar

If you’d like to hide all ribbon tabs, click on the arrow button at the right top corner of the program window.

A number of panels offer similar functionality with a synchronized layout. The program enables to conceal some of them to simplify the interface management.

Tool Button

By clicking on this button the user can:

 Launch auxiliary wizards,  Get access to the program settings,  Collect and send a log files package to the Support Team,  Go to Paragon’s website to download a free update, register the product, visit Paragon’s Knowledge Base, etc.

Ribbon Panel

An area across the top of the program’s window is called the Ribbon Panel. It makes almost all the product capabilities

available to the user in a single place. A Ribbon Tab is an area on the panel that contains buttons organized in groups by functionality. Each button corresponds to a certain program wizard or dialog.

Set View Button

You can adjust the working environment by choosing one of two predefined views: general and legacy. This division is quite logical, allowing the user to filter out legacy wizards and dialogs that have to do with the old PBF backup format. Please note that the legacy mode is not active by default.

Virtual Operations Bar

The program supports previewing the resulting layout of hard disks before actually executing operations (so-called virtual mode of execution). In fact, when the virtual mode is enabled, the program does not accomplish operations immediately, but places them on the List of Pending Operations for later execution.

The Virtual Operations Bar enables to manage pending operations.

BUTTON

FUNCTIONALITY

Cancel the last virtual operation on the List of Pending Operations

Cancel the last undo virtual operation on the List of Pending Operations

Display the List of Pending Operations

Launch the real execution of virtual operations

Cancel all virtual operations on the List of Pending Operations Generate a script out of all pending operations

Schedule pending operations

Virtual mode is an effective way of protection from any troubles, since no operations will be executed until clicking the Apply button for confirmation, thus giving a second chance to weigh all pros and cons of this or that particular operation. The program politely reminds the user that there are unsaved changes by showing the following window:

Express Mode Button

By clicking on this button the user can switch to the express mode of operation at any time.

Disk Map

As the name infers, the Disk Map displays the layout of physical and logical disks. Physical disks are represented with rectangle bars that contain small-sized bars. These small-sized bars represent logical disks. Their color depends on the file system of the appropriate partition. By looking at the size of the bar’s shaded area it is possible to estimate the used disk space. For the selected at the moment object there’s the possibility to call a context-sensitive popup menu with available operations.

Large-sized bars display the following information about physical disks:

 Type (basic or dynamic MBR/GPT),  Manufacturer,  Model.

Small-sized bars display the following information about logical disks and blocks of free space:

 Volume label (if exists),

Since the Disk Map and the Disk and Partitions List have the same purpose, the user is allowed to extend only one at the moment by using a corresponding arrow button.

 Drive letter,  Total size,  File system.

The Disk Map is synchronized with the Context-sensitive Menu and the Properties Panel. Thus by selecting a disk on the map, the two will automatically display detailed information on it. To know more on the subject, please consult the

Viewing Disk Properties chapter.

Disk and Partitions List

The Disk and Partitions List is another helpful tool that helps to get a clear-cut picture on the current state of the system hard disks and partitions. All objects (disks, partitions, or blocks of free space) on the list are sorted according to their starting position. For every item there is the possibility to call a context-sensitive popup menu with available operations.

The Disk and Partitions List provides detailed information on all hard disks and partitions found in the system including the following properties:

- Name,

- Volume label (if exists),

- Drive letter,

- File system type,

- Volume size,

- Amount of used and unused (free) space,

- Active/Inactive attribute,

Since the Disk Map and the Disk and Partitions List have the same purpose, the user is allowed to extend only one at the moment by using a corresponding arrow button.

- Hidden/Unhidden attribute.

The Disk and Partitions List is synchronized with the Context-sensitive Menu and the Properties Panel. Thus by selecting a disk on the list, the two will automatically display detailed information on it. To know more on the subject, please consult the Viewing Disk Properties chapter.

Context-sensitive Menu

The Context-sensitive Menu shows a list of operations available for an object (disk, partition, or block of free space) selected either on the Disk Map or the Disk and Partitions List. If you click a corresponding record the appropriate wizard or dialog will be started. All default values for the operation parameters will correspond to the object’s settings. If there too many items on the list, type in the first word of the required command in the Search commands field to filter the list.

Properties Panel

The Properties Panel provides information on the object (disk, partition, or block of free space) selected either on the

Disk Map or the Disk and Partitions List.

The Properties Panel helps to obtain the following data:

For a hard disk

 Model,  Serial number,  Type of hard disk (basic or dynamic MBR/GPT),  Total size (in GB),  Information on geometry of the disk (amount of sectors per track, heads and cylinders).

For a partition

 Drive letter assigned to the disk,  Volume label (if exists),  Type of the logical disk,  File system,  Root entries,  Serial number,  NTFS version,  Partition ID,  Total size, used space and free space (in GB), etc.

Besides you can modify practically any partition property by clicking on the required value.

For a block of free space

 Total size (in GB).

Status Bar

This is the bottom part of the main window. The Status Bar displays menu hints, for each item the cursor points to.

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To get a detailed description to any setting, control, or field of the program just click the hint button and then the object you need.

Settings Overview

To call the Settings dialog, please click Tool Button, then select Settings. All the settings are grouped into several sections, which functions are described in the following paragraphs. The list of sections is placed on the left side of the dialog. By selecting a section from the list, you can open a set of options.

General Options

This section contains a set of general options that will be taken into account during any operation carried out with the program:

 Partition Alignment mode. There are three options you can choose from:

- Legacy. DOS and Windows OSes before Vista required that partitions had to be aligned to the “disk cylinder”

or 63 sectors to address and access sectors correctly. It was OK, until 4K hard drives came into scene. When partitions are aligned this way on this type of disk, each logical cluster is linked to two physical 4K clusters, thus resulting in a double read-write operation.

- Vista. Since Windows Vista, operating systems do not use the archaic CHS (cylinder/head/sector) addressing

scheme, but the Logical Block Addressing (LBA), where sectors are addressed continuously over the whole disk drive. It is optimal for both, 512B and new 4K disk drivers.

- Inheritance. Select the option to disable automatic alignment of partitions.

 Check FS integrity policy. Accomplishment of any data-sensitive operation (resize, move, merge, redistribute,

change cluster size, etc.) is potential with data loss. To minimize this risk, it’s recommended to check integrity of your file system before this type of operations, despite the fact that it’s quite time consuming. We offer you several options to let you choose, which is best for you:

- Always. Maximum protection, but minimal performance. The file system integrity will be checked each time

it’s necessary to guarantee the maximum protection for the on-disk data.

- Once. Standard protection with acceptable performance. The file system integrity will be checked for each

volume only once just before accomplishing data-sensitive operations.

- Never. No protection, but maximum performance. If you’re not 100% sure your disk is rock solid, please do

not use this option.

 Data Loss Protection mode. To guarantee safety for your information when a data-sensitive operation has been

abruptly interrupted as a result of a computer reset, or a power outage, there are several techniques, that correspond to the options below:

- Do not protect. No protection, but maximum performance. If you’re not 100% sure you’re completely safe

from a power outage, or an accidental reset of your computer, please do not use this option.

- Reset. Standard protection with acceptable performance. Maintaining a special journal, our program

enables to automatically complete a data-sensitive operation interrupted by an accidental reset of your computer from our bootable recovery media, thus reviving the corrupted partition.

- Power loss. Maximum protection, but minimal performance. Besides journaling, our program will also

disable cache of your disk when accomplishing data-sensitive operations to avoid data loss even in case of a power outage.

General Copy and Backup Options

This section contains a set of options that will be taken into account during copy and backup operations:

 HDD raw processing. Mark the checkbox to copy/back up a hard disk in the sector-by-sector mode, thus

ignoring its information structure (e.g. unallocated space or unused sectors of existing partitions will be processed as well). This can help to avoid problems with hidden data created by certain applications or the system administrator. However, it will take more time to accomplish the operation.

 Partition raw processing. Mark the checkbox to copy a partition in the sector-by-sector mode to successfully

process unknown file systems. However it is not recommended to enable this option when working with supported file systems as it takes more time to accomplish the operation.

 Skip OS auxiliary files. Mark the checkbox to skip OS auxiliary files (like pagefile.sys, hiberfil.sys, etc.), thus

reducing the operation time and the resulted size of the backup image.

 Automatic BCD Update. Unmark the checkbox to suppress automatic update of BCD (Boot Configuration Data)

after copy/restore operations.

Hot Processing Options

In this section you may configure the hot processing mode:

 Enable hot processing. Mark the checkbox to enable the so called hot data processing mode that is specially

designed to process data without restarting your operating system.

 Hot processing technology. From the pull-down list you can select the required hot processing technology.  Always use hot processing. Select the option to process partitions without making them locked. Thus you will

be able to keep working with them as usual.

 Use hot processing only when partition is locked. Select the option to use the hot processing only when

partitions are locked and cannot be processed without restarting the computer. Please keep in mind, that once you start any operation on a partition in this mode, it will automatically be locked by the program, thus you won't be able to keep working with it as usual.

 Hot processing temporary drive. Here you can select a disk drive that will be used to store the temporary hot

backup data (by default – C:).

 Attempts to start VSS. Here you can set how many attempts to start Microsoft VSS the program is to do before

automatically rebooting the system and accomplishing the operation in a special boot-up mode.

 Timeout between attempts (in seconds). Here you can set a time period between different attempts to start

Microsoft VSS.

 Switch between hot processing technologies. Mark the checkbox to automatically switch between Paragon Hot

Processing and Microsoft VSS if one of them is unavailable at the moment.

VD container options

This section contains options that will be taken into account when creating virtual containers:

 Unknown partitions policy. Here you can define behavior for processing unknown or unformatted partitions

(skip from backup, process in the sector-by-sector mode, or ask the user each time this type of partition has been found).

 Virtual container type. By default the program is configured to back up to pVHD (Paragon Virtual Hard Drive).

Use this option to switch the resulted virtual container to VHD, VHDX, or VMDK. Please note that the use of pVHD enables to get full backup images several times smaller than the original objects, while incremental updates – dozens of times smaller when comparing to VHD, VHDX or VMDK, which have some fixed size of blocks, not dynamic. Besides encryption and password protection are only available for pVHD. However, if

you’re having a VMware or Microsoft hypervisor at your disposal and are planning to do instant virtualization,

please make sure the used backup format matches your hypervisor.

Partitioning Options

This section contains a set of options that will be taken into account during partitioning operations:

 Request confirmation before partition deletion. Mark the checkbox to activate an additional security

mechanism. Thus when going to delete a partition you will be automatically requested to enter its label.

 Request confirmation when converting FAT16 to FAT32. Mark the checkbox to automatically request

confirmation before converting FAT16 to FAT32. There are a number of situations when this kind of conversion is the only way out to accomplish the operation. For instance, you are going to migrate your system to a larger hard disk with the proportional resize of existing partitions, what is very convenient. As a result you can get original FAT16 partitions go beyond the 4GB limit. Thus without conversion to FAT32, this operation will in no way be possible to accomplish. The same goes for any copy hard disk/partition or restore hard disk/partition operation involving an extra upsizing.

E-Mail Options

This section contains a set of options that will be taken into account during the Send log files and Send e-mail notification operations:

 Outgoing mail server (SMTP). To send messages by using the built-in mail client, it is necessary to have access to

a computer running an SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) server. All outgoing messages are first sent to the SMTP server, which in its turn delivers them to the required recipients. The address may be represented as a traditional Internet host name (e.g.: mail.com) or as an IP numeric address (e.g. xxx.xxx.xxx.xx).

 User e-mail address. Specify an e-mail address that has been assigned by the Internet Service Provider or

organization's e-mail administrator.

 My outgoing server requires authentication. Activate the option to allow the program to make authentication

on the server before sending messages.

- User name. Enter the name that will be used to log in to the e-mail account.

- Password. Enter the password that will be used to access the mail server.

When you’re ready with the settings, click on the Send test e-mail button to check if everything is OK.

Virtual Mode Options

In this section you may configure the virtual mode:

We strongly recommend you to enable this mode.

An incorrectly chosen time zone might lead to inability to launch certain software.

An incorrectly chosen codepage will certainly result in corruption of non-English file names.

 Allow virtual mode. Mark the checkbox to enable the virtual mode. It is an effective way of protection from any

troubles, since no operation will be executed until confirmation, thus giving you a second chance to weigh all pros and cons of this or that particular operation.

 Close progress dialog automatically. Mark the checkbox to automatically close the progress dialog after

accomplishing operations.

File System Conversion Options

This section contains a set of options that will be taken into account when converting FAT and NTFS file systems. By default, the program takes locale (regional) settings from the system. Problems might occur however because of different standards for file names and file time stamps (Created, Modified and Last Access Time) of NTFS and FATxx file systems.

To tackle problems of that kind you can manually set:

 Time zone to use during the convert operation. NTFS keeps file timestamps in GMT (Greenwich Mean Time)

while FAT uses a fixed local date and time. The program takes proper account of these differences and enables to adjust timestamp values.

 Language for file names to use during the convert operation. NTFS stores file names in Unicode while

FAT/FAT32 uses ANSI to save short file names (also called the DOS aliases). The codepage information is required for the correct conversion of non-English file names from Unicode to ANSI and vice versa.

We strongly recommend you not to choose the Minimal option, as in case of having

problems with the program, our Support Team won’t be able to study operation logs, thus

help you out.

 Request confirmation of settings before NTFS < - > FAT/FAT32 conversion. Mark the checkbox to automatically

display the local settings dialog to check and modify (if necessary) the default parameters before launching the convert file system operation.

Log Files Options

In this section you can set up the program logging engine:

 Logs directory to specify location of program log files. By default, all logs are placed to: C:\Program

Files\Paragon Software\product’s name\program\

 Write logs in Bluescreen to enable the program logging in a special boot-up mode  Stubact log file truncation to specify a storage life span for the stubact.log file:

- Infinite not to empty the file ever;

- Minimal to have the file emptied all the time;

- Custom to set a certain storage life span for the file. Please note, once the defined period has been

expired, the file will be emptied.

Viewing Disk Properties

The Disk Map and the Disk and Partitions List are the main tools to get information on the properties of hard disks and partitions available in the system. To know more on the subject, please consult the corresponding chapters of the

Interface Overview chapter.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

Data Backup and Rescue

In this chapter you will find all the information necessary to establish a reliable data protection system.

Creating Backup Images

Depending on a type of information you need to protect and the way this information should be processed, the program offers a number of handy backup wizards. To make your job with the program as easy and convenient as possible, all backup wizards share similar work algorithm. By going through steps of the wizard, you configure all the necessary settings to launch the backup operation. To minimize the possibility of making any mistake, the wizard provides auxiliary information on every single option. Moreover you can get an in-depth description to any setting, control, or field of the wizard just by clicking the hint button and then the object you need.

Simple Backup Wizard Startup

 In the Main Menu: select Wizards > Simple Backup

Simple Backup Wizard Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the backup operation:

 The object to back up. You can back up either an entire disk or separate partitions of the disk (primary,

extended or logical). In case of backing up an entire disk, you’ve got the possibility to include into the image

such disk elements as the Master Boot Record (MBR) and the first track of the hard disk. This can be very helpful for serious disk recovery procedures.

 Name and location of the resulted image. Provide a file name for the new image and its exact location. The

program automatically offers an easy to understand name containing the date and the time of the archive creation, which can anyway be modified.

The program automatically calculates size of the future archive and informs the user about space available on the selected destination.

 Archive Comment. You can add some additional description to the archive that will later help to distinguish it

from the others.

Result

After the backup operation is completed you receive an image of the selected object. This image is placed into the specified destination, its features defined by the wizard.

Available operation scenarios:

 Backing up a hard disk or partition to a network drive  Backing up a dual boot Mac to an external USB drive

Restoring System and Data

The program includes a convenient and reliable restore wizard. With its help you can restore all types of backup images created with the program. It provides easy to understand instructions to configure and perform all the necessary settings. Moreover you can get an in-depth description to any setting, control, or field of the wizard just by clicking the hint button and then the object you need.

This feature is only available for the bootable recovery environment.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

Available operation scenarios:

 Restoring a dual boot Mac from an external USB drive  Restoring separate files and folders from a backup

Boot Management

Our program enables to easily manage several operating systems on one computer with the help of the Boot Manager Setup Wizard. Among the key features of the wizard the following should be mentioned:

 Up to 16 operating systems on one PC;  Secure adding/removing of the Boot Manager startup record to/from the MBR;  Auto Boot option to automatically start up the previously chosen OS after a certain time period;  Hiding of any primary partition except selected at the moment.

Startup

 Click Tool Button, then select Setup Boot Manager…

Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the operation:

 Boot menu options. In this section you can switch between the following modes:

- Normal mode. Choose this mode to display the boot menu every time the computer starts up and define a timeout on the expiry of which the program will automatically select the previously chosen item of the menu.

- Hidden mode. Choose this mode not to display the boot menu until pressing a hot key. For this mode you should define a hot key used to enable the Boot Manager and a time period in seconds the startup message will be displayed.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

 Deactivating/Configuring the Boot Manager. These two options will only be available once the wizard has been

completed and launched again. Select the Deactivate option to remove the Boot Manager from the MBR (Master Boot Record) or Configure to modify the previously set parameters of the startup process.

Result

After the Boot Manager Setup Wizard is completed the program updates the original record in the MBR to get control of the booting process and to be able to display the boot menu.

Available operation scenarios:

 Creating Dual Boot Systems

Partition Management

In this chapter you will find all the information necessary to carry out partitioning operations supported by the program.

Basic Partitioning Operations

Here you can learn how to accomplish basic partitioning operations (create, format, delete).

Creating Partitions

The program provides the ability to create a new partition within a block of un-partitioned space.

Restrictions

1. Do not use the Create Partition function in order to undelete the last deleted partition.

2. The program allows creating new partitions only within blocks of un-partitioned space. It cannot convert a free

space on an existing partition to a new partition.

3. The program cannot create new partitions on Dynamic Disks.

Express Create Partition Wizard Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Express Create.

Create Partition Wizard Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Create Partition.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

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The number of available methods depends on your disk layout.

To learn more on the way the wizard works, please click the corresponding link on the first page of the wizard.

Dialog Startup

1. Select a block of free space on the Disk Map;

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Create Partition.

Express Create Partition Wizard Setup

Thanks to a highly intelligent work algorithm, the wizard requires minimal involvement in the operation, thus you only need to choose a method you find the most suitable to create the partition (if several available), which actually differ in the amount of space to allocate. For easy perception, you can see the resulted disk layout on the disk map by selecting this or that mode.

Create Partition Wizard Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the operation:

 Partition destination. Select a hard disk (if the computer has several hard disks) and then choose position for

the future partition on the disk: at the end (preferable), at the beginning or somewhere in the middle between other partitions.

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By default, the program allows you to create a new partition only as the last primary or as the last logical drive within the extended partition. However, by activating the advance mode on the first page of the wizard you can remove this restriction that in its turn might result in some boot problems.

 Partition size. There is no restriction on size of the future partition, merely depending on space available on the

hard disk.

If there is not enough free space in one block, the wizard enables to redistribute free space, joining all free space blocks together into one united block and moving partitions when necessary. If the total amount of free space is still not enough, it is possible to split a fragment of space from one of the existing partitions, thus resizing it.

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If a partition to resize is locked and cannot be processed, the wizard makes the system reboot to create the partition and then automatically boots the system again. (The rebooting mechanism is different for different versions of Windows.)

You can also choose whether the future partition will be primary or logical by marking the appropriate checkbox.

 Partition properties. On the next page of the wizard you can set a number of additional parameters:

- Partition type. From the pull-down list select a file system the newly created partition will be formatted to, otherwise the partition will remain unformatted (so that it will not be ready to use).

- Volume label. Enter a label for the selected partition in this textual field. It is an irrelevant parameter usually used for drive identification.

- Surface test level. Define the level of the surface check to make the program find bad and unstable sectors and mark them unusable in the file system metadata.

Dialog Setup

Initially the program suggests some consistent values for all parameters. In most cases, you can just press the Yes button to confirm the operation.

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Partition size and position may also be defined by using the drag-and-drop technique. To do that, just carry out the required operation on the Disk Map. The virtual operations are to be available.

 Define whether the partition will be Primary, Extended or Logical. You can choose the desired partition type

from the pull-down list. As a matter of fact, the available alternatives fundamentally depend on the selected block of free space - within the Logical free space, only Logical partitions can be created; Within the Primary free space, both Primary partitions or the Extended Partition can be created.

 Partition Size. Define the size (in Mb) of the new partition.  Free space before. Define the position (in Mb) of the new partition relative to the beginning of the block of free

space.

 Free space after. Define the amount of trailing free space (in Mb) at the end of the new partition.

 File system for new partition. From the pull-down list select a file system the newly created partition will be

formatted to, otherwise the partition will remain unformatted (so that it will not be ready to use).

 Volume label. Enter a label for the selected partition in this textual field. It is an irrelevant parameter usually

used for drive identification.

 Drive letter assignment. The pull-down list contains vacant drive letters that can be associated with the newly

formatted partition.

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Number of available options depends on the selected file system type.

In addition, there is the possibility to make further detailed settings (although the default values will do in most cases). To activate the advance mode, you need to click the More options button at the foot of the dialog page. Depending on the chosen file system, the following options become available:

 Use OS built-in routine. Mark the option to restrict the available values according to the used OS.  The amount of sectors per cluster. Define the Cluster Size for the formatted partition with this spinner control.

Result

After the operation is completed you receive a fully functional partition.

Available operation scenarios:

 Creating a new partition to detach operating system from the rest of data

Formatting Partitions

Any partition should contain some file system to be used for keeping data. The process of installing a file system is commonly known as formatting. A huge variety of file systems have been developed these days.

Supported File Systems

The program provides the ability to format partitions of the following file systems:

- FAT12 & FAT16

- FAT32

- HFS+

- NTFS

- Ext2

- Ext3

- Ext4

- Linux Swap v. 2

Wizard Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Format Partition.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

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As a result of this operation contents of the selected partition will be lost.

Dialog Startup

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map;

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Format Partition.

Wizard Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the operation:

 Partition to format. Select a hard disk (if the computer has several hard disks) and then the required partition to

format.

 Partition properties. On the next page of the wizard you can set the following partition parameters:

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Number of available options depends on the selected file system type.

- Partition type. From the pull-down list select the desired file system type. In fact, the program displays only those file systems that can correctly be placed to the selected partition, taking its capacity into account.

- Volume label. Enter a label for the selected partition in this textual field. It is an irrelevant parameter usually used for drive identification.

- Drive letter assignment. The pull-down list contains vacant drive letters that can be associated with the newly formatted partition.

In addition, there is the possibility to make further detailed settings (although the default values will do in most cases). To activate the advance mode, you need to mark the appropriate option at the foot of the page. When it is marked, the next page enables to define:

 Use OS built-in routine. Mark the checkbox to restrict the available values according to the used OS.  The amount of sectors per cluster. Define the Cluster Size for the formatted partition with this spinner control.

Dialog Setup

Initially the program suggests some consistent values for all parameters. In most cases, you can just press the Format button to confirm the operation.

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Number of available options depends on the selected file system type.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

 File system. From the pull-down list select the desired file system type. In fact, the program displays only those

file systems that can correctly be placed to the selected partition, taking its capacity into account.

 Volume label. Enter a label for the selected partition in this textual field. It is an irrelevant parameter usually

used for drive identification.

Result

After the operation is completed you receive a fully functional partition formatted to the specified file system.

Deleting Partitions

Wizard Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Delete Partition.

Dialog Startup

In order to start the operation you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map;

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Create Delete Partition.

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As a result of this operation contents of the selected partition will be lost.

Wizard Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the operation:

 Partition to delete. Select a hard disk (if the computer has several hard disks) and then the required partition to

delete.

 Merge free blocks. As a result of the operation you may get several blocks of the unallocated space on the hard

disk. So choose whether to merge them all and place at the beginning of the disk or at the end by selecting the required operation from the pull-down list.

Dialog Setup

Initially the program suggests you just to remove references to the selected partition from the Partition Table.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

 Enter the volume label to confirm deleting. To confirm deletion of the selected partition, enter its Volume

Label. The current volume label is displayed above.

 Do not ask volume label next time. Mark the option to inhibit confirmation next time you start the dialog.

Result

By default, the operation takes only a fraction of a second. However, the program waits until Windows completes the modification of the disk layout.

Advanced Partitioning Operations

Here you can learn how to accomplish advanced partitioning operations.

Merging Partitions

The Merge Partitions Wizard enables to consolidate the disk space, which originally belongs to two adjacent partitions (or additionally separated by free blocks), into a single, larger partition. The order, in which two partitions have been chosen, is important since all contents of the second selected partition will be placed in a folder on the resulted joined partition.

The program provides the ability to merge only NTFS, FAT16 or FAT32 partitions.

Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Merge Partitions.

Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the operation:

 Adjacent partitions to merge. Click on the left partition of the pair of partitions you need to merge, as the right

one will be selected automatically. During the operation all contents of the right partition will be placed in a folder on the resulted joined partition. By default, the program offers an easy-to-understand folder name, which can be customized however.

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If a system partition is the right one of the selected pair, Windows OS will become unbootable after the merge operation is over.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

Result

After the operation is completed the disk space of the two adjacent partitions will be consolidated.

Redistributing Unused Space between Partitions

Express Resize Partitions Wizard

The Express Resize Partitions Wizard enables to easily increase free space on one partition by up-taking the unused space of an adjacent partition of your hard disk.

Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Express Resize Partitions.

Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the operation:

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

 Adjacent partitions to resize. Click on the left partition of the pair of partitions you need to redistribute the

unused space between, as the right one will be selected automatically.

 Resulted size of partitions. Redistribute the unused space between the partitions with the slider or manually by

entering the required value.

Result

After the operation is completed the unused space between the specified partitions will be redistributed according to your needs.

Available operation scenarios:

 Increasing size of a system partition by taking unused space of an adjacent logical partition  Resizing partitions of Apple Boot Camp

Redistribute Free Space Wizard

The Redistribute Free Space Wizard helps to increase free space on one partition by up-taking the on-disk unallocated space and the unused space of other partitions. By default, the wizard adds to the target partition all existing blocks of the free space. Besides you can specify partitions to act as a space donor. The wizard will automatically recalculate positions of the partitions and move their contents to new locations.

Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Redistribute Free Space.

Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the operation:

 Partition to enlarge. Select a partition, the size of which will be increased at the expense of other partitions.

Blocks of the free space (if any) will be automatically added to the target partition.

 Partition to donate. Choose any partition(s) (not only adjacent) to donate free space.

 Partition size. By default, the program leaves 50% of the unused space on a partition and removes another 50%

to add it to the target partition. However, the size to take can be customized by moving the slider or by manually entering the exact value.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

Result

After the operation is completed free space of the specified partition will be increased by up-taking the on-disk unallocated space and the unused space of other partitions.

Undeleting Partitions

When simply deleting a partition (without additional wiping) disk management software only removes references to it in the Partition Table, thus leaving the possibility to recover it later.

The program enables to find and recover these partitions. A restored partition will be fully functional, as long as other partitions were not created, moved or exceeded the disk space occupied by that partition. That is why the program offers this function only for blocks of free space.

The operation can be accomplished with the Undelete Partition Wizard.

Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Undelete Partitions.

Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the undelete partition operation:

 Free blocks to scan for lost partitions. Choose a free block from a tree-like list of available hard disks.

To know more on the available search methods, please use the context sensitive hint system.

 Search method. By default, the wizard selects the fastest search method for your operating system. In most

cases that will do to find any accidentally deleted partition. However if you're under Windows XP for instance (the Conventional Search option is selected), but the deleted partition you're looking for has been created with the Disk Management utility under Vista, the wizard won't be able to find this partition, unless you manually select the appropriate option (Quick Search for Partitions Created by Vista or Later OS). Moreover if the wizard still fails to find the partition you need, you can select the Thorough Search option to scan every single sector in the specified search area to get the most accurate results.

 File system filter. By default, the wizard will search for all known file systems. However, by clicking on the

appropriate option on the second page of the wizard, you can specify only those file systems you need.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

 A partition to undelete (if several). By default, the program searches records of any deleted partition ever

existed on the selected block of free space. So you can get several partitions to choose from.

Most likely the required partition will be found first. If so, you may abort the search operation by pressing the Stop search button.

Result

After the operation is completed you receive a fully functional partition.

Installing a New Operating System

Getting your computer ready to install a new operating system, especially when it is going to be an additional OS in the system, is a rather complicated task that implies quite a number of operations, from allocating space to create a new partition (resize, redistribution of free space) to formatting of the newly created partition to a particular file system and checking its surface for bad sectors to avoid possible data loss. Operating systems today are being supplied with basic tools of partitioning that only enable to create a partition (in case there is enough unallocated space on the disk) and then format it to the specified file system type. Our program offers a handy Install New OS Wizard to easily carry out all the necessary operations to install a new operating system.

Startup

 Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Install New OS Wizard.

Setup

The wizard offers the following steps to accomplish the operation:

 Partition to install a new operating system. The program offers two ways of installing a new OS, i.e. to create a

new primary partition for it or use an existing one.



Only primary partitions can be used to install an operating system. 

To avoid any possible problems, the new partition will in no way be created as the first partition of the disk which already contains at least one partition.

- In case the first option has been marked, the wizard enables to specify:

A hard disk (if several) where a new partition will be created. Thanks to an advanced program engine it is possible to use unallocated space of the disk (if any) and unused space of existing partitions to create a new partition;

And its size. If there are blocks of the free space on the disk, the wizard will merge them all and allocate the resulted space for a new partition in the first place. If not, it will take 50% of the unused space of an adjacent partition. However, the size to take can be customized by moving the slider.



Your computer may fail if any other OS has already been installed on the selected partition.

- In case the second option has been marked, the wizard enables to choose an existing primary partition to install a new operating system.

 Partition properties.

- Partition type. From the pull-down list select the desired file system type. In fact, the program displays only file systems that can be correctly placed to the selected partition, taking its capacity into account.

- Drive letter assignment. The pull-down list contains vacant drive letters that can be associated with the newly formatted partition.

- Surface test level. Define the level of the surface check to make the program find bad and unstable sectors and mark them unusable in the file system metadata.

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The program will update your MBR, so most likely you won’t be able to start up any of the

previously installed operating systems. Please launch the Boot Manager Setup Wizard after the installation has been completed to fix this issue.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

 OS Label. Enter a label for the selected partition in the textual field. It will later be used for the drive

identification.

Result

As the final step the wizard will offer you to insert a distributive CD/DVD of the new operating system and restart the computer to launch the installation procedure.

Available operation scenarios:

 Creating Dual Boot Systems

Moving/Resizing Partition

The Move/Resize Partition function allows you to resize or change location of any partition without destroying its data.

In order to move/resize a partition you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Move/Resize Partition…

3. Define parameters of the operation.

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Partition size and position may also be defined by using the drag-and-drop technique. To do that, just carry out the required operation on the Disk Map. The virtual operations are to be available.

When resizing a FAT16 partition beyond the 2GB limit (maximum file system size), the partition will automatically be converted to FAT32.

The program enables to enlarge NTFS partitions (system, locked) without rebooting Windows and interrupting its work, providing 100 percent guarantee that your data is kept intact.

 Volume size. Define size (in Mb) of the modified partition.  Free space before. Define the partition position (in Mb) relative to the beginning of the available range of

disk space.

 Free space after. Define the amount of trailing free space (in Mb) at the end of the available range of disk

space.

 Sector to sector move. Mark the checkbox to move the partition in the sector-by-sector mode to process its

unused space as well. This can help to avoid problems with hidden data created by certain applications or the system administrator. However, it will take more time to accomplish the operation.

4. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Available operation scenarios:

 Increasing size of a system partition by taking unused space from any other  Shrinking a system partition to increase size of a data partition

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

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The cluster size value is expressed in sectors per cluster. To get it in Kbytes, please divide it into half.

You may only decrease the current cluster size.

Converting File System

With our program you can change type of the used file system without destroying its data. While performing the operation, it first checks the current file system for consistency and then verifies whether the on-partition data meet the requirements of the desired file system or not. After having passed the testing, the program re-organizes the file system metadata and user files.

The program enables to convert the following file system types:

- FAT16/32 <> NTFS

- NTFS <> HFS

In order to convert a file system you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Convert file system…

3. Initially the program suggests some consistent values for all parameters. In most cases, you can just press the

Convert button to confirm the operation.

 New file system. From the pull-down list choose a file system you would like to convert to. Actually the

program only displays variants available for the operation, taking into account the current parameters of the selected partition and limitations of the used file system.

 New cluster size. Define the cluster size for the partition. This parameter can have a profound effect on the

overall performance. In a nutshell, larger clusters waste more space, but generally provide for slightly better performance, because of less fragmentation. So be particularly careful with it.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.



The Make Primary > Logical option is only available when the selected partition is adjacent to the extended partition and vice versa.

The Make Primary > Logical option of the system partition will result in inability to boot the operating system.

 Surface test level. Define the level of the surface check to make the program find bad and unstable sectors

and mark them unusable in the file system metadata.

4. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Making Logical/Primary

The program allows you to include a primary partition in the extended partition, or exclude a logical partition from the extended partition, without partition duplication.

In order to change a partition type you should take the following steps:

1. Select a primary or logical partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Make Partition Logical/Primary.

3. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Changing Partition Attributes

This chapter explains how you can change partition attributes (Active flag, Hidden flag, Volume Label, etc.).

Mark Partition Active/Inactive

The program enables to set an active/inactive flag for primary partitions of a hard disk. By default, an operating system will boot only if its partition is active or bootable.

In order to mark a partition active/inactive you should take the following steps:

1. Select a primary partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Mark Partition as

Active/Inactive.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

There can only be one active partition on a hard disk, otherwise your operating system will fail to boot.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

It is strongly recommended not to hide the system partition. Otherwise your operating system will fail to boot.

3. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Hide/Unhide Partition

The program allows you to hide/unhide primary and logical partitions. By default, an operating system does not mount hidden partitions, thus preventing access to their contents.

In order to hide/unhide a partition you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Hide/Unhide Partition.

3. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Set Label of a Partition

The Partition Label is a small textual field (up to 11 characters) that is located in the partition's boot sector. It is detectable by any partitioning tool and is used for notification purposes only.

In order to change a partition label you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Change Volume Label.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

3. Enter a label for the selected partition.

4. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Hard Disk Management

In this chapter you will find all the information necessary to carry hard disk operations supported by the program.

Updating MBR

The program enables to overwrite the current bootable code in the MBR (Master Boot Record) by the standard bootstrap code. This can help to repair a corrupted bootable code of a hard disk resulted from a boot virus attack or a malfunction of boot management software.

In order to update MBR of a hard disk you should take the following steps:

1. Select a hard disk on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Update MBR.

3. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Extra Functionality

This chapter describes the supplementary functionality available in the program.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

View Partition/Hard Disk Properties

The program enables to obtain in-depth information on the properties of hard disks and partitions. Besides the general information, such as capacity, used space or file system type it provides the possibility to get info on hard disk geometry, cluster size, exact partition location, etc.

To get properties on a partition/hard disk, please do the following:

1. Choose a partition/hard disk on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Properties…

In the opened dialog information will be grouped according to its properties, thus by clicking tabs you can get information you need.

Volume Explorer

Volume Explorer is a special tool to browse and export contents of the local mounted/unmounted volumes formatted to FAT16, FAT32, NTFS, Ext2FS, Ext3FS, Ext4FS, reFS file systems. Besides it enables to access Paragon backups as regular folders to explorer their contents or to retrieve certain files.

Click the Volume Explorer tab on the Ribbon Panel to open it:

Call a context menu for the selected file/folder by the right mouse click to export it to some other location (local or network drive, etc.).

The current version of the program does not enable to access pVHD images and file archives with Volume Explorer.

Available operation scenarios:

 Restoring separate files and folders from a backup

Mount Partition

The program enables to assign or remove drive letters of existing formatted partitions.

Assign Drive Letter

In order to mount a partition you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Assign Drive Letter…

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

Modifying drive letter of the system partition will result in inability to boot the operating system.

After having processed partitions with installed software, some programs may not run properly.

3. Specify a drive letter for the selected partition. Initially the program suggests some consistent value for this

parameter. So you may just press the Yes button to confirm the operation.

However you can manually define the required letter by selecting it from the pull-down list of available drive letters.

4. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Remove Drive Letter

In order to un-mount a partition you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Remove Drive Letter.

3. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Test Surface

The program enables to test surface of existing partitions and blocks of free space for bad or unstable sectors. If found any it automatically marks them unusable in the file system metadata, thus minimizing the risk of data loss.

In order to start the surface test you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition or a block of free space on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Test Surface…

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

3. From the pull-down list choose the level of the surface check.

4. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Check File System Integrity

The program allows you to check integrity of a file system. It can be used to detect possible file system errors before performing any operation on a partition.

To start the system integrity check you should take the following steps:

1. Select a partition on the Disk Map.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Check File System Integrity

3. The operation will be performed immediately after confirmation.

Edit/View Sectors

With the built-in Edit/View Sectors tool the program enables to view/edit sectors on existing partitions/hard disks providing the possibility to directly access and modify sectors, save and restore sectors from specified files, navigate through the system metadata, etc.

In order to edit/view sectors of a hard disk/partition you should take the following steps:

1. Select a hard disk/partition on the Disk Map.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

Careless use of the Edit Sectors function may result in the irreversible data corruption.

2. Call a context menu for the selected object by the right mouse click, then select Edit/View Sectors.

Log files do not contain any confidential information on the operating system settings or the user documents.

The Send Log Files function is only available when outgoing mail server (SMTP) and the user e-mail address are properly set. To learn more about it please consult the Settings

Overview chapter.

Send Log Files

The program enables to simplify the procedure of sending support requests to the Paragon Support Team. In case of having difficulties with handling the program, you, with the help of this very function, can address the company support engineers and provide them with all the information they need such as the disk layout, performed operations, etc. in order to tackle the encountered problem. Information of that kind is stored in Log files.

In order to send log files to the Paragon Support Team you should take the following steps:

1. Click Tool Button, then select Send Log Files;

2. Provide a customer name and a product serial number;

3. Give a detailed description on the encountered problem.

By clicking the Send button the built-in mail client will generate a template request with attached compressed log files and then send it to the Paragon Support Team.

View Logs

With a handy dialog you can study logs on any operation carried by the program. To make this job as easy as possible, all the information is structurally divided, besides there is the possibility to see the disk layout before and after an operation, what is very convenient.

In order to view logs on carried out operations, click Tool Button, then select View Log Files.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

Typical Scenarios

This chapter lists a number of the most frequently used scenarios that may be accomplished with the program. You can find here useful recommendations and descriptions of operations.

Backup Scenarios

New Backup Format

Backing up a hard disk or partition to a network drive

To back up an entire hard disk or a separate partition and then place the resulted image to a network share, please do the following:

1. Click the Backup & Restore tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Backup to VD.

You’ve got the option to modify the default backup settings by marking the appropriate checkbox on this page.

2. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

3. Select partitions or entire hard disks you’d like to back up by using Shift or Ctrl to select several objects at once.

Click Next to proceed.

4. Specify location of the resulted pVHD in the ‘Backup destination’ section. If you’d like to save it locally, either

enter a full path to the target folder in the corresponding field or use the Browse button to find it.

If you’re going to save the backup image on a network share, or a physical partition (a partition that doesn’t

have a drive letter in the system), click on the Browse button. In the opened dialog you can see several options:

- Select Disk Drives to use a local disk as backup destination;

- Select Partitions to use a physical partition as backup destination;

- Click on the Map Network Drive icon to map a network share to use it as backup destination (our case).

5. To map a network share, please do the following:

- Click the standard browse button [...] to browse for the required network share or manually enter a path to

it;

- Define a letter from the pull-down list of available drive letters;

- Mark the checkbox to make this connection permanent. Otherwise it will only be available for the current

Windows session;

- Specify a user name and password to access the selected network share if necessary.

This operation can also be accomplished with our recovery media.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

 Click OK when ready.

6. Edit the default archive name and description in the ‘Archive details’ section if necessary. Click Next to proceed.

7. Click Finish to complete the wizard, then apply the pending changes.

Legacy Backup Format

Backing up a hard disk or partition to a network drive

To back up an entire hard disk or a separate partition and then place the resulted image to a network share, please do the following:

1. Enabled the Legacy features view.

2. Click the Backup & Restore tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Simple Backup.

3. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

4. On the next page, mark the appropriate option opposite a hard disk’s name or a partition’s name depending on

the chosen task.

5. Map a network disk to place your backup image to:

- Call the Map Network Drive dialog by clicking the appropriate button;

- Click the standard browse button [...] to browse for the required network share or manually enter a path to

it;

- Define a letter from the pull-down list of available drive letters;

- Mark the checkbox to make this connection permanent. Otherwise it will only be available for the current

Windows session;

- Click the Connect as user button at the foot of the dialog page to specify a user name and password to

access the selected network share if necessary.

6. Edit the archive name if necessary.

Please take into account values of the parameters Estimated archive size and Space available on backup destination - if the archive size exceeds the available space, another network drive needs to be selected.

Please use Recovery Media Builder to prepare Paragon's recovery environments on CD/DVD, flash, or in an ISO-image.

To automatically boot from the recovery media please make sure the on-board BIOS is set up to boot from CD/USB first.

7. Add comments to your backup describing its contents.

8. On the Backup Summary page review all parameters of the operation and modify them if necessary. Click the

Next button to start the backup process.

Backing up a dual boot Mac to an external USB drive

To back up a dual boot Mac (Mac OS X and Windows XP/Vista/7/8) and then place the resulted image to an external USB drive, please do the following:

1. Start up the computer from our Linux/DOS recovery media.

2. Connect an external USB drive to the computer.

3. Restart the computer. It will be automatically started up into the Linux recovery environment (Normal Mode),

since it’s the only mode that provides support for Mac computers.

4. In the Linux launch menu select Partition Manager.

5. Launch the Backup Wizard by selecting in the Main Menu of the program: Wizards > Backup Wizard.

6. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

7. On the What to back up page, select your Mac hard disk.

8. On the Backup Destination page, select the Save data to any local drive or a network share option.

9. Select an external USB drive as a backup destination.

Please take into account values of the parameters Estimated archive size and Space available on backup destination - if the archive size exceeds the available space, another drive needs to be selected.

This operation can also be accomplished under Windows.

10. Edit the archive name if necessary.

11. Add comments to your backup describing its contents.

12. On the Backup Summary page review all parameters of the operation and modify them if necessary. Click the

Next button to start the backup process.

Please use Recovery Media Builder to prepare Paragon's recovery environments on CD/DVD, flash, or in an ISO-image.

To automatically boot from the recovery media please make sure the on-board BIOS is set up to boot from CD/USB first.

By default the Normal Mode will be automatically initiated after a 10 second idle period.

Recovery Scenarios

Fixing Windows startup ability

Let’s assume that due to an unknown reason your Windows fails to complete the startup procedure. At first everything

seems quite OK, you can see the standard startup messages on the screen, but at some moment it hangs up.

To fix your Windows startup ability, please do the following:

1. Start up the computer from our Linux/DOS recovery media.

2. In the boot menu select Normal Mode to use the Linux recovery environment (more preferable) or Safe Mode

to use the PTS DOS recovery environment (in case you’ve got problems with Linux). Moreover you’ve got the

option to boot into the Low-Graphics Safe Mode (PTS DOS safe mode) to cope with a serious hardware incompatibility. In this case, only the minimal set of drivers will be included, like hard disk, monitor, and keyboard drivers. This mode has simple graphics and a simple menu.

3. In the Linux launch menu select Boot Corrector. You can find it in PTS DOS as well.

4. On the Wizard's Welcome page, select the Search for Windows installations to correct option.

5. On the next page choose the required Windows installation from the list of found installations (if several), then

select the Edit the Boot.ini file option. If you’re not sure which installation you need, please use the Properties button to get more info on the selected item.

6. Examine the file – maybe that’s where the problem is. If it contains a mistake, correct it by using the appropriate

buttons.

7. If the Boot.ini file does not contain any mistake, please return to the Correct Windows Installations page to

correct drive letters in the Windows System Registry.

8. On the next page choose a hard disk from the pull-down list (if several), then the required partition. If you’re not

sure which installation you need, please use the Properties button to get more info on the selected item.

9. Click the Edit Letters button to correct an existing drive letter or assign a new one in the Windows System

Registry.

10. Once you’ve assigned the appropriate drive letter, close the dialog, then click the Apply button.

11. Confirm the operation.

12. After the operation is completed click the Report button to see a well informative summary page. The program

also enables to store the resulted report. To do that, just press the Save button and choose the exact location in the opened dialog.

13. Click the Finish button to close Boot Corrector.

14. Reboot the computer.

Please use Recovery Media Builder to prepare Paragon's recovery environments on CD/DVD, flash, or in an ISO-image.

To automatically boot from the recovery media please make sure the on-board BIOS is set up to boot from CD/USB first.

By default the Normal Mode will be automatically initiated after a 10 second idle period.

Restoring a dual boot Mac from an external USB drive

Let’s assume that your Mac fails to boot because of a hard disk malfunction. But you’ve got a backup of your hard disk

on an external USB drive. Just replace the failed disk with a new one and carry out a bare metal restore.

To restore a dual boot Mac from a backup image located on an external USB drive, please do the following:

1. Start up the computer from our Linux/DOS recovery media.

2. Connect an external USB drive to the computer.

3. Restart the computer.

4. In the boot menu select Normal Mode to use the Linux recovery environment, since it’s the only mode that

enables to work with USB devices.

5. In the Linux launch menu select the Simple Restore Wizard.

6. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

7. On the What to Restore page, click the standard browse button [...] to find the required archive. When done,

double click on it to select.

All contents on disk selected for restoring purposes will be deleted during the operation.

8. On the Image Properties page, make sure that you select the correct image by viewing the provided information

about the archive.

9. On the next page specify a hard disk to restore the image to.

10. On the Restore Summary page you can see your hard disk layout before and after the operation. Click the Next

button to initiate the restore process.

Please use Recovery Media Builder to prepare Paragon's recovery environments on CD/DVD, flash, or in an ISO-image.

To automatically boot from the recovery media please make sure the on-board BIOS is set

11. In the Progress window you can see in real-time a detailed report on all actions carried out by the program.

12. After completing the operation close the wizard, and then reboot the computer.

Copying of data from the corrupted system disk to another hard disk

To retrieve valuable information from your hard disk and copy it to another hard disk when the system fails to boot, please do the following:

1. Connect the second hard disk to the computer.

2. Start up the computer from our Linux/DOS recovery media.

up to boot from CD/USB first.

By default the Normal Mode will be automatically initiated after a 10 second idle period.

3. In the boot menu select Normal Mode to use the Linux recovery environment (more preferable) or Safe Mode

to use the PTS DOS recovery environment (in case you’ve got problems with Linux). Moreover you’ve got the

4. In the Linux launch menu select the File Transfer Wizard. You can find the same wizard in PTS DOS as well.

5. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

6. Select a disk where the files you need are stored from the pull-down list in the right pane of the page.

7. Select files you want to copy and place them to Clipboard by pressing the left arrow-button.

Click the Calc button to estimate the resulted data size.

8. On the Select Destination Type, choose the way the data will be stored. Select the Save data to any local drive

or a network share item.

9. On the Select Destination Path page, select a hard disk to copy the data to by pressing the standard browse

button [...].

10. On the Transfer Summary page check all parameters of the operation. Click the Next button to accomplish the

operation.

11. In the Progress window you can see in real-time a detailed report on all actions carried out by the program.

12. After the operation is completed, close the wizard by pressing the appropriate button.

13. Turn off the computer.

This operation can also be accomplished with our recovery media.

Please use Recovery Media Builder to prepare Paragon's recovery environments on CD/DVD, flash, or in an ISO-image.

To automatically boot from the recovery media please make sure the on-board BIOS is set up to boot from CD/USB first.

By default the Normal Mode will be automatically initiated after a 10 second idle period.

Burning of data from the corrupted system disk to CD/DVD

To retrieve valuable information from your hard disk and burn it to CD/DVD when the system fails to boot, please do the following:

1. Start up the computer from our Linux/DOS recovery media.

2. In the boot menu select Normal Mode to use the Linux recovery environment, since it’s the only mode that

enables to burn CD/DVD discs.

3. In the Linux launch menu select the File Transfer Wizard. You can find the same wizard in PTS DOS as well.

4. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

5. Select a disk where the files you need are stored from the pull-down list in the right pane of the page.

6. Select files you want to copy and place them to Clipboard by pressing the left arrow-button.

Click the Calc button to estimate the resulted data size.

7. On the Select Destination Type, choose the way the data will be stored. Select the Burn data to CD/DVD item.

8. On the Choose a Recorder page, select a recorder from the list of available devices and then set a volume label

by entering it in the appropriate field.

9. On the Transfer Summary page check all parameters of the operation. Click the Next button to accomplish the

operation.

10. In the Progress window you can see in real-time a detailed report on all actions carried out by the program.

This operation can also be accomplished with our recovery media.

Please use Recovery Media Builder to prepare Paragon's recovery environments on CD/DVD, flash, or in an ISO-image.

To automatically boot from the recovery media please make sure the on-board BIOS is set up to boot from CD/USB first.

By default the Normal Mode will be automatically initiated after a 10 second idle period.

11. After the operation is completed, close the wizard by pressing the appropriate button.

12. Turn off the computer.

Copying of data from a backup to the corrupted system partition

The system fails to boot since some files are damaged. If you have a backup of the system partition, you can recopy these files to make the system be operable again:

1. Start up the computer from our Linux/DOS recovery media.

2. In the boot menu select Normal Mode to use the Linux recovery environment (more preferable) or Safe Mode

to use the PTS DOS recovery environment (in case you’ve got problems with Linux). Moreover you’ve got the option to boot into the Low-Graphics Safe Mode (PTS DOS safe mode) to cope with a serious hardware incompatibility. In this case, only the minimal set of drivers will be included, like hard disk, monitor, and keyboard drivers. This mode has simple graphics and a simple menu.

3. In the Linux launch menu select the File Transfer Wizard. You can find the same wizard in PTS DOS as well.

4. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

5. Select a disk where the system backup is stored from the pull-down list in the right pane of the page.

6. Double click on the required backup to open.

7. Select files you want to copy and place them to Clipboard by pressing the left arrow-button.

Click the Calc button to estimate the resulted data size.

8. On the Select Destination Type, choose the way the data will be stored. Select the Save data to any local drive

or a network share item.

9. On the Select Destination Path page, select your system disk to copy the data to by pressing the standard

browse button [...].

10. On the Transfer Summary page check all parameters of the operation. Click the Next button to accomplish the

operation.

11. In the Progress window you can see in real-time a detailed report on all actions carried out by the program.

This operation can also be accomplished with our recovery media.

12. After the operation is completed, close the wizard by pressing the appropriate button.

13. Turn off the computer.

Restoring separate files and folders from a backup

The program provides a very convenient option to access backup archives and restore only data you need (the so called selective restore functionality).

Volume Explorer

To restore separate files and folders from a backup image with Volume Explorer, please do the following:

1. Click the Volume Explorer tab on the Ribbon Panel;

2. Browse for the required archive and then open it by double click of the left mouse button.

3. Call a context menu (right click of the mouse button) for a file/folder you need and then select the Export item.

4. Select a place on the disk where the file/folder will be extracted to.

The current version of the program does not enable to access pVHD images and file archives with Volume Explorer.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

5. Click the OK button to accomplish the operation.

Resize Scenarios

Creating a new partition to detach operating system from the rest of data

Let’s assume that you’re a rank and file user who is most likely to have only one hard disk with only one partition (the

only partition is always system). To secure yourself against a system malfunction or a virus attack you’ve got nothing to do, but make a backup of the whole partition, which besides the operating system itself contains all your family photos, favorite films and music, program distributives, whatever. As a result you’ll get a very huge backup image. You can easily tackle this issue however by detaching your operating system from the rest of data.

To create a new partition on your hard disk, please do the following:

1. Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Express Create.

2. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

3. Choose a method you find the most suitable to create the partition. The wizard is especially designed to

minimize your participation in finding an appropriate place for it and its resulted size. The only thing you’re to

do is to choose between several modes. The most relevant thing here is the amount of space that will be allocated for that partition. For easy perception, you can see the resulted disk layout on the disk map by selecting this or that mode.

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The number of available methods depends on your disk layout.

To learn more on the way the wizard works, please click the corresponding link on the first page of the wizard.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

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If you’ve got more than two partitions on your hard disk and a partition you need to increase is surrounded by other partitions, you’ve got the choice to choose which partition

will act as a space donor. Just click on the left partition of the pair, as the right one will be selected automatically.

4. That’s basically it. By clicking the Next button the wizard will start modifying your disk layout. If you’ve got to do

with the system partition resize, like we do in our case, you will be asked to restart your computer in a special boot-up mode to accomplish the operation. So click the appropriate button to agree.

5. In the Progress window you can see in real-time a detailed report on all actions carried out at the moment.

After completing the operation your computer will be automatically restarted back to Windows where you can see the newly created NTFS partition. Now you’ve got a place to keep your stuff apart from Windows.

Increasing size of a system partition by taking unused space of an adjacent partition

Let’s assume you’ve got several partitions on your hard disk. After installing a number of resource-consuming applications and system updates your system partition has started to suffer from the lack of free space. But an adjacent partition has a plenty of redundant space. That’s just enough to make your system partition suffer no more.

To increase size of a system partition by taking unused space from an adjacent partition, please do the following:

1. Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Express Resize.

2. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

3. Click on your system partition. By doing that, the wizard will automatically select an adjacent partition as well.

This partition will later act as a space donor.

4. Increase size of the system partition with the slider or manually by entering the required value. Please note,

when you change size of one partition the size of the other will be changed as well, thus redistributing the unused space between the partitions.

5. On the next page of the wizard you need to confirm the operation by selecting the appropriate option.

6. That’s basically it. By clicking the Next button the wizard will start modifying your disk layout. If you’ve got to do

with the system partition resize, like we do in our case, you will be asked to restart your computer in a special boot-up mode to accomplish the operation. So click the appropriate button to agree.

7. In the Progress window you can see in real-time a detailed report on all actions carried out at the moment.

After completing the operation your computer will be automatically restarted back to Windows where you can see that your system partition is bigger now.

Increasing size of a system partition by taking unused space from any other

Let’s assume you’ve got several partitions on your hard disk. After installing a number of resource-consuming applications and system updates your system partition has started to suffer from the lack of free space. But one of your partitions has a plenty of redundant space. That’s just enough to make your system partition suffer no more.

To increase size of a system partition by taking unused space from any other on-disk partition, please do the following:

1. In the main window select the required hard disk (if several) on the Disk Map.

2. Choose a space donor partition and then call a context menu for it (right click of the mouse button) to launch

the Move/Resize dialog.

3. In the opened dialog shift the edge of the partition to the right by the drag-and-drop technique. While doing

this, free space from the partition will be released (displayed in aqua-green). You can also do it manually by entering the exact size of free space. Click the Yes button to continue.

4. Now you’ve got a block of free space to add to the system partition. You cannot do it directly however, but by

carrying out a number of extra move/resize operations.

5. Since the block of free space is within the extended partition, you need to take it out first. The program enables

to resize the extended partition only when there’s a block of free space adjoining its borders. In our case it’s

between two logical disks. So we need to move it. To do that, please select the first logical partition and then call a context menu for it (right click of the mouse button) to launch the Move/Resize dialog.

6. At first shift the right edge of the partition to the right, then do the same with the left edge. Make sure the

partition size has been left unchanged.

Call a context menu for the extended partition (with the blue border), not the logical one.

7. Now you can resize the extended partition to take the block of free space out of it. Call the context menu for it

(right click of the mouse button) to launch the Move/Resize dialog.

8. In the opened dialog shift the edge of the extended partition to the right.

9. The block of free space has been released.

10. Finally increase size of the system partition. Call a context menu for it (right click of the mouse button) to launch

the Move/Resize dialog.

11. In the opened dialog shift the edge of the partition to the right, thus increasing its size.

There are other ways to start up this function, please consult the Interface Overview chapter to know more on the subject.

12. Apply all introduced changes. By default, our program works in the virtual mode of execution, so you have to

confirm all operations to let the program accomplish them. To do that, just click the Apply button on the Virtual Operations Bar.

13. The program will require the system restart to accomplish the operation in a special boot-up mode. Click the

appropriate button to agree.

Increasing size of a system partition by taking unused space of an adjacent logical partition

Let’s assume you’ve got several partitions on your hard disk. After installing a number of resource-consuming applications and system updates your system partition has started to suffer from the lack of free space. But an adjacent logical partition has a plenty of redundant space. That’s just enough to make your system partition suffer no more.

To increase size of a system partition by taking unused space from an adjacent partition, please do the following:

1. Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Redistribute Free Space.

2. On the Wizard's Welcome page, click the Next button.

3. Select a volume you want to expand, i.e. the system one.

4. Select a volume to take the space from, i.e. the logical one.

5. On the next page of the wizard you can specify size of the resulted system volume. Drag the slider or type in the

exact value to set the volume size.

6. Apply all introduced changes. By default, our program works in the virtual mode of execution, so you have to

confirm all operations to let the program accomplish them. To do that, just click the Apply button on the Virtual Operations Bar.

Separating OS from media data

Let’s assume you’ve got one partition available on the hard disk, like other people who purchase a computer with a preinstalled operating system. So besides OS, it holds all your documents, favorite music, movies and family photos. This type of configuration is certainly not optimal for effective data organization and safety. First, it negatively affects the system: huge amount of data aggravated by its inevitable excessive fragmentation causes poor performance in file search/access and read/write operations. Second, it’s inconvenient for the user: system files and folders piled up with

If the wizard cannot work with the selected partition, you’ll get a corresponding notification – click on the “More Info…” link to see the details.

media and documents besides obvious difficulties in transparent organization become a naughty problem in case of a system malfunction.

Split Partition Wizard can help you detach the operating system and data or different types of data by splitting one partition to two different partitions of the same type and file system – you just select a partition, then files and folders you’d like to move to the new partition, finally redistribute free space between the two partitions if necessary, and here you are!

Before you start, please take into account the cases when the split operation is impossible to perform:

 Partition's type is not supported (you have selected a non-standard primary or logical partition);  The selected partition is located on a dynamic disk;  You've already got 4 primary partitions on a Basic MBR disk;  You've already got 3 primary partitions on a Hybrid (Retained) GPT+MBR disk;  There's not enough free space on the selected partition (free up to 50 MB);  The selected partition has an unsupported file system (currently only NTFS and FAT file systems are

available for splitting).

To detach OS from media files, please do the following:

1. Click the Partitioning tab on the Ribbon Panel, then select Split Partition Wizard.

2. The first page of the wizard informs the user on the upcoming operation. Please read all notes carefully before

you proceed. Once you’re done with that, click Next to continue.

3. Select a volume you want to split up.

4. When selecting a system partition (just our case), the wizard notifies that this type of operation may cause

inability of the operating system to start up if moving system files/folders to the new partition. So please take it seriously. If you’re sure, confirm the operation.

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5. Mark checkboxes next to files/folders you’d like to move to the new partition. Please don’t touch system

files/folders like “Windows”, “Users”, “Program Files”, config.sys, etc. By clicking the Next button, the wizard starts calculating the amount of data to move, which may take some time.

6. Redistribute free space between the partitions by moving the slider or manually by entering the required value

for the new partition in the corresponding field. Then choose a drive letter for this partition from the pull-down list that contains vacant letters if necessary (by default, the wizard selects the first vacant one).

Paragon Partition Manager - 15 Home User Manual

Specifications and Main Features

Frequently Asked Questions

User Manual