Please help me I've looked everywhere on the internet and can't find out how to fix this. I want to shrink my vista partition which should be easy, but it says because of page files and shadow copies that shrink space may be limited, I have 15 gigs free but it only would let me shrink 500 mb, and that isn't close to the amount I need. Please help if you can. Thanks in advance.

Try turning off system restore first.
That is what is used to create the restore points and shadow copies.

You can also try making the page file a bit smaller. (Not fully advised, but you might be able to get away with it. I would be carefull though.) Most fast systems with a lot of Ram should run fine with no page file in XP. I have not tested this in Vista.

you can use a software called "Acronis Disk Director Suite" on Hiren's BootCD.
to shrink the volume.
use this link : Download Hirens.BootCD.9.1.rar, upload your files and earn money.
good luck,