Acronis Product Cannot Create Acronis Secure Zone

The two possible causes are: there are four primary partitions; the file system is corrupt

This article applies to:

Acronis True Image Home 2011
Acronis True Image Home 2010
Acronis True Image Home 2009
Acronis True Image 11 Home
Acronis True Image 10.0 Home
Acronis True Image 9.1
Acronis True Image Echo
Acronis Backup & Recovery 10
Acronis Backup & Recovery 11

Symptoms

Using any of the listed Acronis products, you are trying to create Acronis Secure Zone;
The product errors out with an error message similar to the following one:

Cause

There are two possible causes:

Acronis Secure Zone is created as a primary partition. There can only be four primary partitions on one disk. Hence, if there are already four primary partitions, Acronis Secure Zone cannot be created;
The file system is corrupt.

Solution

Acronis product cannot create Acronis Secure Zone on a disk with four primary partitions. You have several options to work around this:
- If you have more than one physical disk in the machine, select the disk that has less than four primary partitions to create Acronis Secure Zone on it:
- Use some disk partitioning software to convert one of the primary partitions to a logical one;
- Delete one of the primary partitions using the default Windows Disk Management snap-in:
  Deleting a primary partition using the default Windows Disk Management snap-in
  (!) If you delete a partition using the Windows Disk Management snap-in, all data on it will be lost.
  - Hit Start-Run and type in diskmgmt.msc
  - In the Disk Management window, right-click on one of the primary partitions that you are ready to delete and select Delete Volume or Delete Partition depending on your version of the operating system:
    
    Windows XP
    
    Windows Vista, Windows 7
  - Now that you have unallocated space that you have freed up by deleting the primary partition, you can create Acronis Secure Zone on the disk.
  - If you have unallocated space left after creating Acronis Secure Zone, you can create a new volume from it:
    
    In the Disk Management Window, right-click on the unallocated space and select New Simple Volume or New Partition depending on your operating system:
    
    Windows XP
    
    Windows Vista, Windows 7
    
    Follow the steps of the Disk Management wizard:
Try checking the disk for errors:
- Go to the Command Prompt (Start-Run -> cmd):
- Issue the following command:
  chkdsk DISK: /r
  
  where DISK is the letter of the partition you need to check:
  
  (!) Checking the C: drive may require you to reboot the machine.