Hello Contrapositive,
Looks like you've gotten some good advice here already. However If I might,
I'd like to add some opinions of my own.
1. Dedicated partition for the swap file.
Having a dedicated partition for the swap file will most likely prevent the
swap file from getting fragmented. This is assuming that the partition is
larger than the swap file will ever want/need to be. I've read several times
that
the best location for the partition is at the most accessed area of the
least used (physical) hard drive. You would also want this to be the
fastest hard drive in your case. This would leave the heads sitting ontop
(or near) the swap partition ready to read and write at will. However, I
think Ron
is correct in saying that XP expects to find the swap file on C:\, otherwise
it will fuss at you. I've also read that you can put a small swap file on
C:\ and have a larger one on another partition if you want.
You mention you bought a new system with a SATA drive. I assume you got a
newer (faster) CPU and likely have a mainboard with a fast BUS speed. How
much RAM do you have, 1GB... 2GB...? The more RAM you have, the less XP
will need to access the swap file. (But no matter how much RAM you have, you
will always need a swap file.
My opinion is that with the system speeds of today, There is little need to
get wrapped up with the swap file issue. Now 5 years ago? It was something
to think about if you where a big gamer or something.
Here is what I might consider, Install the XP OS and the mobo drivers,
chipset drivers, intel/MS storage drivers. Get the BASE system up and
running. Don't install any hardware or software yet. Don't even get on the
internet or email. Create a fixed/permanent swap file on drive C:\ that is
sized larger than the amount of RAM you have, maybe 1.5 times
larger. Take into consideration if you plan on adding RAM in the near
future. Like JS said, a fixed size swap (page) file bigger than it will ever
need to be will prevent the page file from becoming fragmented. Although
the space dedicated might be more than is needed. You have (250GB) for your
"Drive 0", so HD space is aplenty. You likely have room in your case for
additional HD's if you need more GB later. This approach should locate your
swap file on C:\ right behind the XP OS, hopefully the OS hasn't had time to
fragment itself, or at least very much. Now go ahead and install your
hardware (printers and such) along with their associated software. Establish
your internet connection. Open your email and open your internet browser.
Obtain your OS updates and such. Doing this will locate the swap file in
it's own happy space right in the middle of all the activity and still be
near the top of the drive. I think the "basic" OS occupies ~2-4GB, but over
time may grow upwards to 8-10GB depending on how you handle "My Documents".
Locating the swap file in a separate partition on the same HD as the OS is
likely not worth the trouble.
If you want, here is a great little desktop meter that will show you your
RAM usage, Swap file usage and many other useful things.
http://www.ipi.fi/~rainy/index.php?pn=projects&project=rainmeter
My Dell Dimension 9100 has 1GB of RAM, less than 50% is used (most of the
time). I have a 1.6GB swap file on C:\ managed by XP, Rainy's Rainmeter
shows about
260-270MB utilization. Head room is a good thing.
Their desktop calendar is cool too! (see link towards the left).
As for the size of C:\, maybe add allittle? say around 25-30GB. Junk will
collect over time and the room will help defrag to run faster.
2. Installing Application's on drive C:\.
Based on my personal opinion... I install software associated with the OS or
installed hardware on drive C:\ and Personal Software on drive D:\.
My drive D:\ seldom becomes fragmented. I think most application files are
pretty much read only files, so they don't really grow much or need to move
around. The files that do read/write are likely stored in your "Local
Settings" or "My Documents" folders anyway. So maybe keeping applications
away from the OS partition will prevent the OS from skipping over to the
other side of your applications when it fragments. The OS partition is
going to fragment itself all the time. (I think it will even do it at night
when the system is turned off).
I defrag my Applications partition maybe once a year. I defrag C:\ once a
week...!
3. Use NTFS on all partitions under XP. However, you mention the
Non-essential drive for multimedia and iPod files. You could use FAT32 here
if you wanted.
4. Efficient partition size.
My opinion here is that any hard drive that is 75% full is already full.
Defrag needs alittle headspace to do it's job. So plan ahead as to your
space requirements then add 25% or more on top of that.
Here is my HD layout...
C:\ = 35GB = (XP OS + Swap file + temp files)
D:\ = 25GB = Personal Applications
E:\ = 30GB = Personal Files (incl Outlook Express Mail Store Folders)
F:\ = 40GB = Backup (daily staging area for offline backups)
G:\ = 20GB +/- = Misc Junk
If at a later time you decide to change your swap file around, I think you
can do the change and then apply an edit to the registry that tells the OS
to dump the contents of your swap file at shut down. At reboot, the swap
file will grow into your changed settings. Is that a tip that can be
downloaded from Kelly's Corner does anyone know? Of course tho, you won't
know where on the partition it locates itself until after the deed is done.
Speaking of deeds, I suppose by now you've already set up your hard drive.
I'm sure whatever you've come up with will work perfectly fine for you....
Hope this helps!
Richard In Va.
++++++++++++++++++++
for some of the ancillary functions