System Reserved partition showing with drive letter

[BO Terry]

I worked with a new client yesterday and their initial complaint was regular notifications saying their drive was almost full. The "C" drive is 1 TB and they have only used about 20%. I noticed that they have a drive "D" listed and it is the System Reserved partition (450 MB/36 MB free).

Since I've not seen this before, I wanted to be sure there were no pitfalls to hiding it. And, is hiding it going to stop the notifications. Additionally, out of curiosity, what would have been the benefit to having it show like it is now?

Assuming hiding it is the right thing to do, I planned to do this:
Disk Management > Select volume D > Right click > Change Drive Letter > Remove.

 

[MichaelBits]

Yes, it's fine to remove it.
You most likely won't be able to from the gui.

You will have to go into CMD and use Diskpart.



I used the recovery volume as an example, which has no letter actually....
Once you have the volume with the letter to be removed selected, use the command to remove the letter.
>remove letter d

 

[BO Terry]

Yes, it's fine to remove it.
You most likely won't be able to from the gui.

You will have to go into CMD and use Diskpart.

View attachment 9899

I used the recovery volume as an example, which has no letter actually....
Once you have the volume with the letter to be removed selected, use the command to remove the letter.
>remove letter d

Thanks for the info! I forgot to include an image from Disk Management originally but just added it to the post. That's part of what threw me. I don't recall seeing a recovery partition assigned a drive letter like that.

Can you think of a reason that someone would have done that?

 

[Alex Smith]

There is a known bug in upgrading to Windows 10 v1803 (April 2018 Update) and is most likely the cause here.

In case you didn't know about the issue, essentially Windows is assiging a drive letter to the WinRE Recovery Partition that is created and updated during the Windows Setup process. Typically this doesn't happen due to the GPT Attributes assigned to that type of volume, but that is some how accidentally ignored during the Windows Setup process with v1803.

Removing the assigned drive letter via DiskPart as mentioned is the correct solve as a post-upgraded Windows 10 v1803 respects the GPT Attributes of the WinRE partition.

 

[BO Terry]

There is a known bug in upgrading to Windows 10 v1803 (April 2018 Update) and is most likely the cause here.

that is some how accidentally ignored during the Windows Setup process with v1803.

Removing the assigned drive letter via DiskPart as mentioned is the correct solve as a post-upgraded Windows 10 v1803 respects the GPT Attributes of the WinRE partition.

Thanks for the info! Sounds like a good 'ole "undocumented feature". I have seen other issues with these big Windows 10 updates but this one is new to me.

 

[Alex Smith]

Thanks for the info! Sounds like a good 'ole "undocumented feature". I have seen other issues with these big Windows 10 updates but this one is new to me.

No problem. Glad to help.

True story, these "big Windows 10 updates" or "feature updates" as Microsoft calls them are actually in-place OS upgrades. The overall process, known as Windows Setup, has been around since Windows Vista and has a lot of the same benefits, shortcomings, and potential conflicts as OS upgrades in general have. Meaning most problems are caused by a conflict or compatibility issue with a 3rd party Service, Driver, or App. Sometimes it's due to outdated firmware too.

 

[Diggs]

Wow! 756 GB of "stuff"! I won't get nosey and ask what the machine is used for......

 

[Porthos]

Wow! 756 GB of "stuff"! I won't get nosey and ask what the machine is used for......

That is free space.

 

[Diggs]

That is free space.

Oops - My bad! (Maybe I'll wait for my second cup of coffee before posting in the mornings...pffft)