disk-management-windows

Disk Management is an administrative tool for managing the volumes on your hard drive. It’s a pretty useful tool in-built into Windows that renders a third-party disk manager software unnecessary. Well, at least for most common purposes. It’s not very feature-rich but will get all the basic operations done smoothly.

So, if you wish to work on your hard drive volumes – create new drives, format, shrink or expand existing ones – Disk Management is the tool you need. Here is how to access it.

Accessing Disk Management in Windows 7

Follow the steps listed below:

  1. Click on “Start” and go to “Control Panel.”
    control-panel
  2. Go to “System and Security > Administrative Tools.” In case you have the icons view and not the category view, go straight to “Administrative Tools.”
    system-security
    administrative-tools
  3. Open “Computer Management.”
    computer-management
  4. Click on “Disk Management” in the column on the left side, located under Storage. Disk Management loads in the wide middle section.
    choose-disk-mangementAll the hard drives on your computer, internal and external, are listed here.

Accessing Disk Management in Windows 8

“Right click in the bottom left corner” of your Windows 8 desktop and a menu pops up with multiple options (Windows Key + X).
control-panel-menuThere are two ways to get to Disk Management from here:

  1. Go straight to “Disk Management option” from the menu. (Shown in above image)
  2. Go to the Control Panel and “follow steps 2, 3 and 4” detailed above.

Shortcut to Access Disk Management

If going all the way through Control Panel is hassle, just call up the “Run” prompt (Windows Key + R) and type “diskmgmt.msc.”

run-prompt
The Disk Management interface pops up.

disk-management

Now, feel free to tinker around with your hard drive volumes. Just be sure not to format anything without creating a backup first.