you didnt say what OS, but I'll assume vista
type like so:
click start button, type "cmd", right click it form the list and select "run with administrative priviliges"..in the cmd prompt window, type the following
diskpart <enter>
select disk 0
detail disk
check the output of detail disk...use some logic to familiarise yourself with the layout, then on the diskpart prompt do
sel par 1
detail par
and do
sel par 2
detail par
check the partition type in the above output...the one you want to keep is a type 7, this is a bog standard ntfs.
if you find a type 17 (hidden ntfs) or some type of {guid} reference then you have found the hidden partition they use for recovery.
lets assume the recovery partition was partition 2...you would do like so at the diskpart prompt
sel disk 0
sel par 2
delete partition override
(this gets rid of the partition)
then to recover your space, at the diskpart prompt
sel disk 0
sel par 1
extend
and the partition 1 will be extended to the maximum size of the disk
type
exit
to leave the diskpart prompt.
you may find you have 3 or 4 partitions, use some logic.
of course, caveats apply, diskpart is immensely powerful, you can kill the whole drive if you delete the wrong thing, and then a full reinstall is your only course of action.
