3 question about hard disk

my first question is
!). if i convert my NTFS partition to FAT is it possible to lose of data ?
2).My friend merged 2 NTFS partitions and he got the problem that he couldn't delete the useless System Volume Information file of the old drive, since all its contents are moved to a folder via Partition Magic. How can he delete this file using only Windows? Or is there a tool where I can manipulate the partition table? Don't say things like use knoppix, since we don't have knoppix in hand...
3).My same friend's computer has such a protection so that he can't use 10 GB of his HDD space. When thinking, 10 GB is a lot of space, but this space is used by a recovery tool that's special for his computer, so even if you uninstall this tool, you don't get this space and it becomes useless. By using PM8, we didn't see this space as unallocated, too. Since this computer is a laptop, he is unable to access HDD info via BIOS. Do you have any idea how such a protection works?

Plese help me and feel free to replay

I can answer qurestion 1
Yes there is a posiblility that you could loose information

hi

for question #1:

well if you are formatting your drive from FAT to NTFS, all data on that drive would be disintegrated, however if you wish to convert the file system from a FAT system to an NTFS one you could do so via the command line. Use this syntax: CONVERT [volume] /FS:NTFS

[volume] refers to the drive to be converted followed by a colon.

Ex.

CONVERT C: /FS:NTFS

this command would convert your file system from FAT to NTFS without the fear of losing data. this may require a restart before the changes would take effect.

for question #2.
try this link

support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=...P&NoWebContent=1

for question #3.
try and go to the Disk Management console of Windows and try to check if you can allocate the 10G of space to be use.

you can access Disk Management console via right clicking "My Computer>>Manage" then click "Disk Management" there you would be able to see all drives in your system.


hope this helps...

That recovery partition will not show as unallocated, it should be a formatted partition

Check for the model ofthe laptop.. tons of people will have recovered that space.

If you want to delete the useless directories.. you will need to do it offline.. have you tried making that hard disk a secondary in another system and then deleting it ?