Dividing a flash drive into sections. Low-level formatting and creating multiple partitions on a flash drive. Divide a flash drive into partitions using BootIT

Unzip the downloaded file to extract Bootice. To do this, you will need an archiver that supports the RAR format.

• 7-Zip is a free archiver that supports the RAR format. This archiver can be downloaded from 7-zip.org. After installing 7-Zip, right-click on the downloaded archive (RAR file) and select “7-Zip” - “Extract here”.
• The trial version of WinRAR (rarlabs.com) supports the RAR format, but works for a limited time.

Launch Bootice. It is located in the folder that was created when unpacking the archive. Most likely, Windows will ask you to confirm the launch of the program.

Select the correct flash drive. Open the Destination Disk menu and select the USB flash drive. Make sure your computer's hard drive is not selected to avoid losing any data stored on it. To select a flash drive, be guided by its capacity and the letter that identifies the flash drive.

In Bootice, click "Parts Manage". The Partition Manager window will open.

Click Re-Partitioning. The “Removable disk repartitioning” window will open.

Select the "USB-HDD Mode (Multi-Partitions)" option and click "OK". The Partition Settings window opens.

Set the size of each partition. By default, the available space will be evenly distributed across the four partitions. But you can manually set the size of each partition. If all four partitions are not needed, enter 0 as the size of the extra partition.

Give the sections labels. They will help you identify the different sections. Remember that Windows only displays one partition, so partition (volume) labels are especially helpful.

Specify the type of each section. At the bottom of the window, select "MBR" or "GPT". MBR is suitable for storing data or creating a boot partition for older systems. GPT is suitable for working with UEFI or for creating a boot partition for new systems.

• If you plan to create a GPT boot partition, check the “Create ESP partition” checkbox.

Click "OK" to start the formatting process. The system will notify you that all data stored on the flash drive will be erased. The formatting process will take some time.

Good day to all. Today I want to talk about a hot topic that concerns flash drives. Having dealt with the question of how to split a flash drive into sections, I came to the conclusion that this could be useful to many, which means I need to write about it. You can divide a flash drive into parts for different purposes. The best, in my opinion, is to use one partition for the OS or LiveCD, and the other for storing various files. The most interesting thing is that there is more than one way to divide a flash drive. For example, this can be done in the Windows 10 Creators Update, but this was not possible before. I’ll also tell you about other methods.

How to split a flash drive using Windows 10

Before describing the method, I want to say that in versions earlier than 1703 (Creators Update), you may not see the second section of the flash drive due to the characteristics of the operating system, but this is just my opinion, especially since I have this version and everything works fine on it. As other users say, there is no second partition on Windows 7, 8 and 8.1.

Go to the “This PC” folder and right-click on the flash drive. Now we will format it into the NTFS file system. If there is data on it, I recommend transferring it to a hard drive. If you don’t want to do this, you can convert the flash drive to any file system without losing data.

We launch the PowerShell console, to do this, enter the name of this tool in the search, click on it with the mouse and use run as administrator. For me, the utility is located in the Start menu if you press Win+X (or right-click on the Start menu) instead of the command line.

Enter the command to convert the flash drive:

convert E: /FS:NTFS

In this case, the letter (E:) indicates a flash drive; yours may be different. Be careful with this.

If you don’t want to bother entering commands through the command line or PowerShell, you can format the drive as standard.

When the flash drive has the NTFS file system, go to the Disk Management utility, it is located in the Win + X menu.

The required window opens, where we right-click on the USB drive and select the “Shrink volume” item.

The following window opens. There, select the required amount of space that you will take from the flash drive. Click “Compress”.

An unallocated partition appears in the Disk Management window. Click on it with the mouse and select the “Create simple volume” option.

Okay, we split the flash drive into two sections. But, as I already said, all sections will be displayed correctly in the Creators Update.

How to partition a flash drive using the command line

Other methods have arrived. Now I'll show you how to do this on the command line. True, the drive will lose the files, so they need to be transferred to another drive.

Launch an elevated command prompt and enter the following commands:

• diskpart – launch the Diskpart utility;
• list disk – display existing partitions;
• select disk 1 – select partition number 1, yours may be different;
• clean – cleaning the flash drive;
• create partition primary size=5000 – divide the flash drive into a 5 GB partition;
• create partition primary – create a primary partition;
• format fs=fat32 quick – formatting in FAT32;
• assign letter=e – assign a letter to the section.

Approximately the same can be done using third-party utilities, for example, AOMEI Partition Assistant.

How to partition a flash drive using WinSetupFromUSB?

The next method also leads to erasing files; be sure to save them to another drive. We launch the WinSetupFromUSB utility and make sure that the flash drive is selected and not another drive.

Click on the “Bootice” button, after which the following window opens.

The “Destination Disk” section must contain a flash drive, not an HDD. Now click on the “Parts Manage” item.

We get to the window where we click on the “Active” button, so the flash drive will have the opportunity to be divided into sections. Now click on the “RePartitioning” item.

Next, put a checkbox next to the “USB-HDD mode (Multi-Partitions)” section and select a flash drive from the drop-down menu. This option will allow you to reprogram the controller drivers so that the system considers it a hard drive. Now click “OK”.

Click OK.

Great, we made as many partitions as we wanted, but Windows sees only one of them, which means that in the “Partitions Management” window opposite the desired section, click the “Activate” button, after which the letter “A” will appear in the “Act” column. True, in Windows 10 all partitions will be visible without this.

To assemble a flash drive, click ReFormat USB Disk and select the same Multi-Partitions item.

For those sections where the volume was set, enter 0 and remove the marks. Click OK.

An unallocated partition will appear in the window, about which there is no information. Then click on the “Format this part” option. The usual Windows format window will open, where you do a quick format with the desired file system and label. Although in Windows 10 this action is not necessary, everything is done automatically, and also if you have the latest version of the utility.

You can make sure that the flash drive has regained its original capacity and will again be recognized as a USB drive.

Divide a flash drive into partitions using BootIT

A simple utility that allows you to transfer our flash drive first to an HDD, and then do whatever you want with it. You can download it from here.

If BootIT does not start in the usual way, then we use compatibility mode with Windows XP.

The utility is so simple that you practically don’t need to do anything. You need to select the desired device and click on the “Flip Removable Bit” button.

Then the program will tell you that the USB drive needs to be removed and then reconnected.

To make sure that the flash drive has really become a HDD, go to the Disk Management utility and right-click on the flash drive. If the “Delete Volume” option is active, then we have done everything correctly and can now divide the flash drive into partitions.

So far I have talked about the most effective methods. You can offer something of your own, and I, in turn, will try to find other ways. I hope this article will help you split your flash drive into sections.

Partitions on a flash drive are created and deleted by disk manager programs. The choice of a specific disk manager depends on its user. All modern disk managers can work with flash drives.

Access to flash drive partitions

Access to flash drive partitions in Windows OS is limited. The operating system does not “see” more than one partition on the flash drive. Working (accessible) partition of the flash drive in operating system classified as a logical drive or volume. Its main feature is the letter designation. If several partitions with letter designations are created on the flash drive, then the first of them will be selected as the logical drive. All other sections of the flash drive are empty words for Windows.

In theory, access to the desired partition of a multi-partition flash drive is realized by allocating it like a volume - assigning a letter to the accessible partition and simultaneously deleting it letter designation for all other sections. To move to the next section, the procedure is repeated - a letter is assigned to the desired section, and a letter is deleted from the previous one. Operations to reassign a letter are carried out manually, using the disk manager. The letter is chosen to be unique (unrepeatable) within the computer. If the flash drive is not bootable, first it undergoes partition deactivation.

Note Do not confuse the letter and label of a logical drive (volume).

Creating partitions on a flash drive

We will “cut” the flash drive into partitions using the BOOTICE program.
This is a free, freely distributed program.

1. Launch BOOTICE. In the main window, on the “Physical Disk” tab, in the “Destination Disk” window, select your flash drive. Let's focus on the volume of the device. If similar inscriptions “shine”, close everything, look for and disconnect unnecessary flash media and start over. This precaution will prevent the use of an accidental foreign flash drive. In our case, we use a flash drive with a capacity of 4 (3.7) GB. The media has one section, with the letter label I.

3. On the “Partition Management” tab, it is clearly visible that we are dealing with a single-partition flash drive, FAT 16 standard, with a capacity of 3.7 GB. In the same window (step 2), click the “Repartition partitions” button and call up the “Repartition partitions of a removable disk” window.

5. In the next window that opens, you can configure the parameters of future partitions - select the size and standard file system. The size is entered “by hand”, starting from the first window. The fourth value cannot be edited; it is filled in automatically. If the maximum value of the size of the entire flash drive is entered in the first window, the rest will be automatically filled with zeros. For clarity, I chose the following sizes for my partitions: 700, 800, 900, the fourth was filled automatically - 1424 GB. And, clicked “OK”. The program displayed a warning window - standard procedure before formatting any media.

7. Returning to the BOOTICE “Partition Management” tab (see article point No. 2), we see that the partitions have been created. Now we are dealing with a four-partition flash drive, FAT 16 standard, with a total capacity of 3.7 GB. Sections, accordingly, have the volume specified during repartitioning. In this case, the first section has a letter label (I) and is marked as active (this is important). This section is available at this stage. As has already been said, Windows stubbornly “does not notice” the remaining sections. You can rename an available partition directly in Windows Explorer, in the “My/This Computer” folder - right-click on the device, in the menu that opens - select “Rename”.

I’ll immediately explain for those especially gifted that, as a rule, there is nothing cool or useful from dividing a flash drive and practically cannot be! So if you don’t have a clear understanding of what tasks such an unconventional device will be used to solve, then I don’t recommend stopping at it. The point here is not even that your hands grow from one place, but the very idea of ​​​​splitting a flash drive into partitions.
However, if the main task is not to boot from such a device through BIOS, then you can chop the drive into a couple of sections. Therefore, discuss the creation CDROM partition it won’t be here, although some of the utilities shown can muddy it up. TABLE OF CONTENTS:

If you have a monolithic flash drive, then before you sew 10 times, think about whether you are afraid of losing the flash drive due to a stupid desire to pervert with it. The owners Phison-monoliths, I absolutely do not recommend doing anything with it.

BootIt v1.07

The utility is from 2004, but there are guys who spend days trying to squeeze all the juice out of it even 10 years later. The program is essentially absolutely useless; I recommend downloading it only to noble perverts and masochists. It is a type of unique utility from LexarMedia to invert removable- drive bits. If we turn to practice, then it cannot be unique, no matter how you look at it, it works, as we managed to find out with a few controllers that are almost extinct.

So here are my tests...

Compatible:
– SM3252C

Incompatible:
– SK6211BA
– SM3255AB
– AU6990
– UT165 A0A

Based on information from the Internet, maybe compatible with some old fisons, presumably level PS2232. Anything can happen in this world, compatibility may be a little wider, so I won’t mind your comments on this topic, indicating specific controllers. In order not to start a meaningless conversation, we will agree that messages are needed exclusively about those devices that the tool has approached.

The principle of working with the program is simply outrageous:
– connect the flash drive;
– launch the utility;
– select the letter of the flash drive;
– press Flip Removable Bit;
– close the program;
– reconnect the flash drive.

Well, finally we delete and forget about BootIt.

If you're interested in my subjective opinion - one flash drive = one partition.