I want to convert a vfat partition into an ext4 partition.
This is on my wife's machine and she deleted the Windoze partition as she now prefers Linux.
Here is the (edited) output from fdisk -l:-

/dev/sda2 514048 4708351 2097152 83 Linux
/dev/sda3 4708352 6805503 1048576 82 Linux swap
/dev/sda4 52693200 234436544 90871672+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda5 59006800 234227699 87610446 83 Linux

I want to change /dev/sda4 to 83 to free up space for Linux without losing
the partitions in this 'extended' partition!
Any help would be very welcome.
ps: I'm new to this forum and this is my first post.
Thanks in advance.

Welcome to LinuxQuetions.
In a nutshell an extended partition is a container (does not contain user data) for logical partitions (i.e. IDs >5) and can not be modified as such. Since I assume that sda1 was the deleted windows partition, it can be recreated and used as additional space.

1 members found this post helpful.

This is a classic example of someone demanding an answer to fit some preconceived (incorrect) supposed solution.
Describe your requirements properly, and probably we can help.

Don't ever give "edited" information. Let others be the judge of what is relevant/useful.

Moved: This thread is more suitable in <Linux-General> and has been moved accordingly to help your thread/question get the exposure it deserves. Not a Hardware issue!

1 members found this post helpful.

Thanks for all your help everyone. I have never used Windows thus my confusion. The Windows partition was created by my wife who found it a very silly system which was always going wrong!

You could possibly create sda1 and start shuffling data from sda2>sda1 and so on.
http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/ubu...n-another.html
http://gparted.sourceforge.net/features.php

I don't think you can "convert" the partition. I think it will have to be reformatted.

Try looking at the partition using GParted.

That might give you some leads.