Troubleshooting guide for Partition Resizer
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This document will help you to solve the most common problems you will face
when you use Partition Resizer. It is divided in two sections, which contain 
several topics on various subjects. I hope it will help you the most.

1- Before you run Partition Resizer

   1.1 Unmovable and system files
   1.2 Defragmenting your partition

2- While you run Partition Resizer

   2.1 Abnormal program interrupt
   2.2 False interrupt warning
   2.3 Error and warning messages and what you can do about them
   2.4 Cmos operation failed


1- Before you run Partition Resizer

   1.1 Unmovable and system files

These files may sometimes need special care. This is how you should handle
the most common system files:

IO.SYS:         It doesn't have a problem with resizing or moving, but you 
                should not move it with defragmentation programs, otherwise
                the system won't boot.
MSDOS.SYS:      This file can be moved or defragmented as any ordinary file.
DBLSPACE.BIN:   This file can be moved or defragmented as any ordinary file.
STACKVOL.*:     These files can be moved or defragmented as any ordinary file.
386SPART.PAR:   This file will be damaged if resized or moved. You'd better
                remove it before resizing or moving, and recreate it when
                you've finished.
MIRROR files:   These files can be moved or defragmented as any ordinary file.
                But they will be invalid when you change the partition, so
                you'll have to rerun mirror after Partition Resizer's 
                finished.

Most system files won't be damaged if they are moved. If the files have no
special position in the disk, or they are fragmented, they can be moved or
defragmented as any ordinary file.


   1.2 Defragmenting your partition

In order to use Partition Resizer to shrink a partition, you'll have to 
defragment it first. This can be done with any defragmentation program that
performs a full optimization of the drive, like DOS 6.00 or later Defrag.
You will have to move ALL the files to the beginning of the partition 
(including unmovable files). To move unmovable files, use ATTRIB to change
their attributes (-s -h -r). See the previous section for details on system
files. After you've finished with defrag, you may change the attributes back
to normal.


2- While you run Partition Resizer

   2.1 Abnormal program interrupt

If you have a power shutdown or any other abnormal termination of the program
while Partition Resizer resizes or moves a partition, then you must rerun
the program immediately after rebooting. This will continue the job from
exactly where it stopped. The program output to the screen will show that
the job started from the beginning, but nothing will be written on the disk 
until the process reaches the step at which it was interrupted. Partition 
Resizer will prompt you in this case, and you should answer yes when it asks 
you to restore the interrupted work. 

If the program hangs, and all you can do is reset your computer (most unlikely
but you never know), rerun the program, and the job will finish normally.


   2.2 False interrupt warning

There might be some cases that Partition Resizer will ask you to restore an
unfinished job, but you haven't had a program interrupt or anything like that.
In that case, Partition Resizer has found an older RESQUE.DAT file in the
current directory, which could not be deleted (for unknown reasons). You
should delete this file, but ONLY if you are sure that Partition Resizer has
finished its job successfully. 

A possible reason for this false alarm, could be that you run the program from
a partition which was resized or moved. Although you shouldn't have done this,
and although this HAS caused damage to your data (it might have damaged the
FAT or some files), you MUST NOT ALLOW THE PROGRAM TO CONTINUE THE WORK
UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. This will PERMANENTLY destroy all the data in your
partition.


   2.3 Error and warning messages and what you can do about them

Fatal error messages:

When a fatal error message appears, you will not be able to continue running
the program, unless the problem is fixed. The program will immediately exit
on a fatal message.

1:      Bad partition chain: This error will appear if your partition chain
        is invalid, meaning that some sectors in the partition do not have
        the 0xAA55 signature. This error is fatal, and the program will exit
        immediately. If you are able to access all your disk partitions, then
        try to fix this with a disk editor (see PRESIZER.DOC for more 
        details). The program has to exit, since, if the partition chain is
        really damaged, the program could hang.
2:      Sector read failed: This error will appear when Partition Resizer is
        unable to read a system sector. This can happen if Partition Resizer 
        is incompatible with the disk (I don't know if this can happen), if
        the specified sector is damaged, or if disk information is erroneous.
        The error is fatal, which means that the program will immediatelly
        exit. If you know which disk causes the problem, you should disable 
        the disk to proceed.
3:      Sector size other than 512 bytes: Partition Resizer is incompatible
        with disks having sector size other than 512 bytes. If you want to
        continue, disable this disk. This error message may sometimes be
        false, since it depends on the value found in the boot sector of
        a partition.
4:      Cannot detect any drives: If Partition Resizer cannot detect any
        hard drives through INT 0x13, it will exit. If you have a hard drive,
        then you probably need a driver to access it, which is not loaded.

Error messages:

When an error message appears, you will be able to use the program, but you
won't be able to resize or move the partitions which have the problem.

1:      DOS partition damaged or not formated: This error will appear if 
        you have any partitions that are described as DOS partitions but
        are not formatted. It means that the program failed to find the
        system signature (0xAA55) at the end of a DOS partition's boot sector.
        If you're able to access all your partitions, then just add the
        signature byte (0xAA55) to the end of the specific partition's boot
        sector. If this error appears, you will be able to run the program
        but the damaged partition will appear as incompatible (meaning that
        you will not be able to resize it or move it). 
2:      Incompatible disk found: If this error message appears, then you will
        not be able to resize or move any partitions on this disk. Partition
        Resizer will try to read the first and the last sector on every disk.
        If it fails, it means that the drive is incompatible with the standard
        INT 0x13 read routine, therefore it is not reliable to work with it.
3:      Starting / Ending cylinder / sector / head value is invalid: These 
        errors will cause the specified partition to appear as invalid. See 
        the technical details in PRESIZER.DOC for more information.


Warning messages:

These warning messages appear when the partitions on your disk have some 
erroneous or unexpected information, but it is safe to ignore them in most
cases.

1:      Bad filesystem id string / unknown filesystem type: This error will
        appear when a partition is described as a DOS partition but it doesn't
        have a valid FS signature. You may proceed if you find this warning.
2:      Filesystem id incorrect: The FS signature is different from the 
        expected. You can safely proceed if you find this warning.
3:      False sectors per track / head value in boot sector: The boot sector
        contains erroneous information for disk heads and sectors per track.
        You can ignore this message.
4:      FAT signature bad or missing: The FAT signature is bad (not 
        0x[FF]FFFFF8). You should check this error, it could mean your FAT
        is damaged. But Partition Resizer will allow you to continue, since
        its working will not be affected by this.
5:      Bad media descriptor (other than 0xF8): The media descriptor in the
        boot sector is wrong (not 0xF8). You can ignore this message.
6:      Total sectors in partition / Relative starting sector value incorrect:
        This is an automatically fixed error. It will occur if the dword
        entries for total sectors in partition or relative starting sector
        values do not match the partition starting / ending data. You can
        always ignore these warnings, since Partition Resizer won't use these
        values.
7:      Hidden sectors value incorrect: This warning means that the hidden
        sectors value in the boot sector of a FAT partition is incorrect. If
        you are able to access your partitions normally, you should ignore
        this warning.
                                                                      
All these error messages will show you some more information, which might help
you to correct the problem. The "drive" value is the number of the physical
drive (80 for C:, 81 for d: and so on). The "sector" value is the absolute 
sector number (first sector is sector 0) in the disk, where the erroneous 
information appears. The "partition#" value, will tell you which partition
of the four described in the above sector contains the error. The "FAT 
partition serial no." value is the serial number of the FAT partition that
has the error.

All info about the technical details can be found in section 3 of 
PRESIZER.DOC.

If you can't find out what's wrong or if you cannot correct the problem by
yourself, don't hesitate to send me a letter or mail.


   2.4 Cmos operation failed

If you get a message informing you that you cannot use cmos memory for the
reset protection system, you will be able to run the program normally, but
you won't be able to recover after an abnormal program interrupt. This
means that the power goes down suddenly while the program is working, or if 
it's interrupted in any other way, you will LOOSE ALL THE DATA IN THE WORKING 
PARTITION! It's up to you then whether you will use the program or not. If
you have a UPS, you won't have a problem with this.

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