What happens if I delete all partitions?

Why Do You Need To Delete Partitions On Disk?

In the following cases, you need to delete partitions:

• You do not need these partitions anymore.

• You do not want all the data on these partitions forever.

• You want some unallocated space to extend another partition.

Once, one of my neighbors asked me to help with his computer and I am always invited to solve PC problems by my neighbors and friends since I was engaged in this software company and I am happy that I can help as he can makes use of our partition manager.

Actually, he wants to extend his c partition but he does not have an unallocated space on his computer and he does not want to merge any other partition to c except f, but partition f is not adjacent to c. Still, if he can merge f with c, he does not need the data on it any more. In such case, just as I told him, he should delete f partition first to get an unallocated space. Then, he can enlarge c partition with the unallocated space. Like this, he gets all he intended. It is easy and not difficult as what he expected.

If you have several partitions on a disk and you don't need them anymore, however, you don't want to delete those partitions one by one; in this case, "Delete All Partitions" will help you format hard drive and remove all partitions once and for all. This function applies in all Windows OSes (Operating System), all editions (both 32 and 64 bit), such as Windows 7/8/10, Windows Server systems (including Server 2012 R2 and 2008 R2) and Windows SBS (Small Business Server). After that, your disk will become blank and you can make full use of this disk by re-partition it. Then, how to delete partitions hard disk? Please look the below.

How To Delete Partitions on Hard Drive?

Before you do

• If the disk from which you are going to delete all partitions contains some important data, please create a backup for those data and save the image file on another drive before you delete all partitions for the data will be formatted.

• If there are other applications running on the partition which you are going to perform, AOMEI Partition Assistant will notice you to close those applications or to execute this operation under PreOS Mode. Therefore, in order to avoid the dilemma, you can close these applications before deletion.

To Delete All Partitions

Step 1: Select the disk that you want to clear in main window; right click it and select "Delete All Partitions" to open related dialog.

Step 2: Select delete method in the following dialog, and there are two options:

• Option One: Just delete all partitions on a hard disk. (The data which has been deleted is recoverable if you choose option one in this situation)

• Option Two: Delete all partitions and wipe all data on the hard drive. If you choose this one, even data recovery software may not recover data on these partitions. Therefore, think twice before you decide to do this operation. Or, you can just make a backup of these data before deletion as mentioned above.

Step 3: Click "Apply" and then "Proceed" to execute the operation if you have confirmed the operation in the pop-up window. Then, several minutes later, all the partitions on the disk will be deleted forever.

Notes:

• Please do not delete all partitions on a system disk, because Windows needs these information to start correctly and doing that will make your computer unbootable the next time when you start it.

• If you delete a primary partition, the empty space you get is called unallocated disk space. If you delete a logical partition via Disk Management , the empty space is called free space, then you will need to delete the free space again to have it as unallocated space. You can now use the empty space to create additional volumes.

• If you are not tired with repeated operations and are willing to delete the partitions one by one, obviously you have another way to delete those partitions with AOMEI partition manager. Yes! Delete them one after another by repeatedly choose “Delete Partition”! There is also another method - merge these partitions and delete them all. You may not merge all the partitions into one, but it can still decrease the time you click “Delete Partition”. Any, nomatter what way you choose, you can get what you want. Still, “Delete All Partitions” is the easiest and fastest one.

How to Securely Clear Data on Solid State Drive in Windows 7?

Solid State Drives (SSDs) are now very popular nowadays and are widely applied to computers as the replacement for traditional hard drives. In case you need to clear SSD, you can try the newly developed feature, “Secure Erase SSD”, on AOMEI Partition Assistant. Now, I’ll show you the detailed steps of using this feature.

To Clear SSD Disk:

Step 1: Connect the SSD from which partitions will be deleted to a PC.

Step 2: Launch AOMEI Partition Assistant, right click the SSD and choose “SSD Secure Erase" and a notice will come out afterwards.

Step 3: Choose the SSD and here takes my SanDisk SSD as an example and it is Disk 1 with 32GB storage.

Step 4: In general, SSD erasing will encounter a frozen state which is a protection for SSD. Do a Hot Swap to release it.

Step 5: Hot Swap makes disk erasing workable. Now, it's the erasing process.

*How to Perform a Hot Swap?

1. Open computer case cover or back cover or hard shell on laptop.

2. Find the selected SSD and unplug the power cable off SSD.

3. Unplug SSD's SATA cable.

4. Reconnect the SATA cable to the SATA or IDE port.

5. Reconnect the power cable to the power port.

When the erasing process completes, AOMEI Partition Assistant will prompt a window saying that it has erased the SSD successfully. Next, I would get unallocated space on that SSD. You will see there is more than one way to delete all partitions on a disk on the purpose of clearing it. AOMEI Partition Assistant has different strategies for different types of disk. So great, right? Another feature of this program called “Wipe Hard Drive” is worth a shot.

Is it okay to delete all partitions?

Is it OK to delete all partitions when reinstalling Windows?

Does deleting partitions wipe data?

What will happen if I delete the system partition?