Unusable disk partition

[Phil]

On 10/04/2014 10:03 PM, Liam Proven wrote:
>
> What is in the other 3 partitions aside from the Windows C drive?
>
> EFI diagnostics? You need those. A recovery partition? An empty
> primary data partition?
>
> If you want to keep Windows and keep it operable, you only have 1
> choice, really. You need to delete 1 of those 4 primaries and create
> an extended partition in its place. Once you have an extended
> partition, in it, you can create as many logical drives as you want,
> for Linux, for Windows or both.
>
> If there is a data partition that you can get rid of, you could move
> its contents onto the C drive, remove the data partition, make an
> extended, make a logical drive in the extended, and move the contents
> back into that. The setup will look the same at the drive-letter level
> to Windows.
>
> Then you could use some of the remaining space to make logical
> partitions for Linux, inside the extended partition.
>

Thanks everyone for the advice given.

It would seem that the Data partition is the only candidate for a Linux 
installation. I've searched the Internet for the purpose of the Data 
partition in Windows 7 but I'm still uncertain of its purpose.

The four partitions that I now have are:

BIOS-RVY   8 GB
System   100 MB
Windows  274 GB
Data     183 GB

The Data partition shows as empty under Windows 7 while Gparted shows 3 
GB used. Perhaps those 3 GBs are hidden files? If they're important 
hidden files, how do I move them to the Windows partition while I'm 
creating an extended partition?

If the Data partition is only for user data then I can safely delete the 
partition and create an extended partition in its place. Of course, I 
don't want to delete the partition without knowing it purpose. So, is it 
safe to delete the data partition or not?

-- 
Regards,
Phil