Shrink a Winclone Image
Overview
If you want to restore a Winclone image onto a partition that is smaller than the file system that was used to make the Winclone image, you need to restore theWincloneimage to a sparse bundle image, shrink the file system, then create a new Winclone image of the sparse image. You can then restore this new image to a partition that is smaller than the original file system.
The example below shows a Winclone image with a file system that is 70.47 GB. However, the files on the file system are only using about 30 GB (we will see how this size is revealed after shrinking the file system as described below). Since the file system on the Winclone image is over 70 GB and the space available on the Boot Camp partition is only 41.46 GB, we will need to shrink the file system size on the Winclone image before it will restore to Boot Camp. Since the used space on the image is ony 30GB, it will easily fit on the Boot Camp partition after the file system is shrunk down.
If this is all a bit confusing at this point, please understand that the size of a Winclone imageas displayed in Wincloneis not the size of the Winclone file, it is the size of the file system, so if you use the Finder to click on the Winclone image and select Get Info, this Winclone image size will be much smaller than the size showing in the Winclone app.
The file system size is generally identical to the partition size in Boot Camp, but it is not required. In the example below, the Boot Camp partition is 41.46 GB, which represents all available space, including free space. If the used space only amounts to 15GB (for example), then we can reasonably assume that shrinking the file system of the 41GB Boot Camp partition will result in a file system of around 15GB. The shrinking process removes free space and contains only the used space. So with our shrunken Boot Camp partition, the partition size stays at 41GB and the file system is around 15GB
We are not going to shrink the file system of the Boot Camp partition in this tutorial, the description above is just for illustrative purposes. We are going to shrink the file system size of a Winclone image file, which is a slightly different process but this concept remains the same. We will be restoring the Winclone image to a disk image, which is a sort of “virtual hard drive”.
With the image restored to the disk image, we can manipulate it as though it were an actual Boot Camp partition, including shrinking the file system size. Once the file system size is shrunk down to as small as possible, we can create a new Winclone image that can then be restored to a much smaller destination Boot Camp partition.
Create a Disk Image
Open Disk Utility in the Utilities folder.
Create a blank disk image
Under the File menu, select New Image -> Blank Image
Image Options
Give the image a name and the location to save it. You must select the Image Format first, and set it to sparse bundle disk image. Sparse bundle disk images grow as data is saved to them, so they do not require much space when you first create them, and will only grow to the size of the used space in the Winclone image (not the partition size).
- Select the image format of Sparse Bundle Disk Image
- Select a GUID Partition map. Winclone expects any disk that it restores to have a GUID partition map.
- Set the format to MS-DOS (FAT). Winclone will not see images formatted as HFS+, so you must format as MS-DOS (FAT).
- The Name field can be left as Untitled andwill inheritthe original volumename when the file system is restored.
- The size needs to be greater than the size of the Windows file system (this is the value that shows up under the name of the image in Winclone). In this example, the created disk image size is 75GB in order to be larger than the Winclone image (shown above), which is 70.47GB in size. Make sure to set the size as the last step before clicking “Save”
Click Saveto create the image and mount it.
Restore the image using Winclone
Once the disk image is created, it will be available as a destination for restoration. The displayed size may be slightly different than than set when creating the disk image. Restore the Winclone image in Sources to the disk imageinDestinations.
Shrink the Sparse Disk Image
You can now shrink the file system that is on the sparse disk image. Simply select the disk image, click the gear in the bottom left corner of the window an select “Shrink Windows (NTFS) Filesystem”.
After Shrinking
After shrinking is complete, the file system size will be updated. You can now create a Winclone image of the sparse bundle image. In our example, the file system was shrunk down to 29.47GB, which will now fit on our destination Boot Camp partition.
Imaging or Restoring the Shrunk Disk Image File System
Now that the file system has been shrunk down to a smaller size, create a new Winclone image. Alternatively, you may skip the image creation process and select Boot Camp as the destination and do a disk image-to-Boot Camp direct restore. Having a WInclone image is good for safety purposes, so you can do both if you wish.
Restore Smaller Image to the Boot Camp Partition
The new Winclone image is identical to the original Winclone image except the file system is now small enough to be restored to the Boot Camp that was previously too small for the original Winclone image. When the smaller Winclone image is restored to the Boot Camp partition, the file system will expand to fill all the available space on the destination Boot Camp partition.
