GParted is a great tool. However this may not solve your problem trying to restore an MS backup image.
I had a similar issue a few months ago using an MS backup image to restore my WIN 7 Pro 64 bit to a different disk (shuffling disks around to change Raid set-up). The restore would never let me try to partition and restore to the disk I wanted to.
1.) Initially it wanted to restore to location where it was backed up from - I removed partition. No luck.
2.) Used install CD and did a quick minimal install on target disk. MS restore liked this and restored over the newly installed image AND re-sized the partition to the size originally backed up.
Spent 2 frustrating days to learn this "quirk" in MS Backup/Restore.
BTW - disks are GPT and I am using UEFI boot. No idea if the same issue exists with MBR disks and BIOS boot.
Good luck