Partition

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Happy

Am getting a new computer on the weekend. It will have Windows XP
pre-loaded, as well as a few other basic programs.
Because it has a large hard drive, I would like to partition it.
What is the best way (safest) to partition it, and what suggestions for
partitions?
 
As stated - Partition Magic is good safe way. Do yourself a favour and
defrag the drive first - takes time, but good practice.
Len
 
The worst defragmentation of a hard drive can occur right after the OS is
installed. However, it is likely that the OS was ghosted onto the hard
drive and you should be OK. Run the disk defrag tool under
Accessories/System Tools and see how much red shows up in the drive map. In
any case, defragging the drive can't hurt anything, so go ahead.

Why do you want to partition the drive? If the file system is FAT32 then
partitions less than 40GB can make sense in terms of performance. If you
are running NTFS then there is no performance reason to partition.
Personally, I would leave it as is, especially if the OS is preinstalled and
you only have a restore cd in the event the system has to be restored.
 
Am getting a new computer on the weekend. It will have Windows XP
pre-loaded, as well as a few other basic programs.
Because it has a large hard drive, I would like to partition it.
What is the best way (safest) to partition it, and what suggestions for
partitions?
Click to expand...

I see PMagic has been suggested so you know that suggestion........

Obviously this is a proprietary machine and no mention of what kind?
One thing I would caution as to elaborate a little bit on Colin's
response......
Performance wise is correct, no real gain there. If you ever decide to
do a "Full" restore(factory shipped state) it will *WIPE* your entire
drive....this is including all partitions you have created there by
losing all your data on seperate partitions.......I've seen this happen
on Comcraps & HP's....It does not restore to the "resized"
partition.......

This is one of many of my issues with proprietary machines, the lack of
a means to store your data safely on to a separate partition. It should
be shipped that way so the restore CD only recognizes the OS sized
drive, but than again who's to estimate how much room someone needs to
install applications. Sort of a catch 22, you'll have to resize the OS
partition eventually. I'd rather do it that way than the latter....Yes
CD's are all well & great and it's a shame that most people have a
simplistic approach to saving there data, "how Windows & applications
tells them to save it."
Lose your Operating System.....lose all your data....Why? Because it's
all saved to one partition! I am definately not comfortable with saving
Data to an OS drive, or any ONE drive for that matter......That's a
personal choice though....I think an OS on one 200gig HardDrive is
ludicrous, but, than again, that a personal choice of mine.... ;0)
 
Thanks for all this info. I am assuming it is NTFS, but I didn't check. The
one I have now is, and they are replacing it. The new one is 260 Gig.
(current one is 120Gig) . I am not sure why I would want to partition. I
guess it seemed to be the thing to do!
Colin Barnhorst said:
The worst defragmentation of a hard drive can occur right after the OS is
installed. However, it is likely that the OS was ghosted onto the hard
drive and you should be OK. Run the disk defrag tool under
Accessories/System Tools and see how much red shows up in the drive map. In
any case, defragging the drive can't hurt anything, so go ahead.

Why do you want to partition the drive? If the file system is FAT32 then
partitions less than 40GB can make sense in terms of performance. If you
are running NTFS then there is no performance reason to partition.
Personally, I would leave it as is, especially if the OS is preinstalled and
you only have a restore cd in the event the system has to be restored.

--
Colin Barnhorst [MVP Windows - Virtual Machine]
Happy said:
Will I still have to defrag, if it is new? Guess it won't hurt.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Although I am not sure of the reason to partition, if a need to reinstall
the OS still wipes the whole drive, it would be nice if they sent the system
partitioned, with a method for resizing. I thought partitioning was to
either run multiple operating systems (which I don't) or to use disk space
more efficiently. (which shouldn't be a problem with NTFS)
In my case it looks like I will have one OS on a 260 Gig HD. Do you think
this will be a problem?
 
Happy

http://aumha.org/a/parts.htm

--

~~~~~~


Hope this helps.

Gerry
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Stourport, Worcs, England
Enquire, plan and execute.
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suggested solution worked for you.



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In
Happy said:
Although I am not sure of the reason to partition,
Click to expand...


A word on the terminology, if I may. To partition a drive is to
create *one* or more partitions on it. It's required, not
optional; you can't use the drive unless you (or the vendor you
buy it from) has created at least a single partition on it.

So what you're asking about is whether to have *more than one*
partition on it.

if a need to
reinstall the OS still wipes the whole drive, it would be nice
if
they sent the system partitioned, with a method for resizing. I
thought partitioning was to either run multiple operating
systems
Click to expand...


That's one common reason for having multiple partitions.

(which I don't) or to use disk space more efficiently. (which
shouldn't be a problem with NTFS)
Click to expand...


Correct. With FAT32, keeping partitions smaller saves disk space.
But in these days of very cheap large hard drives, the value of
the space you save that way is generally tiny. I think that even
with FAT32, this is no longer a good reason for having multiple
partitions, and should be overruled by other considerations.

In my case it looks like I will have one OS on a 260 Gig HD. Do
you
think this will be a problem?
Click to expand...


Most people here are much more often in favor of multiple
partitions than I am, but with a drive that big, even I would
probably have more than one partition.

One of the things you want to think about before deciding how to
partition is how (and what) you're going to backup. Make sure
that your partitioning scheme makes it easy to implement your
backup scheme.
 
It was in the old days of FAT32 once disk sizes got very large. FAT32 is
not as efficient with very large drives as is NTFS. I prefer a good folder
organization.

--
Colin Barnhorst [MVP Windows - Virtual Machine]
Happy said:
Thanks for all this info. I am assuming it is NTFS, but I didn't check.
The
one I have now is, and they are replacing it. The new one is 260 Gig.
(current one is 120Gig) . I am not sure why I would want to partition. I
guess it seemed to be the thing to do!
Colin Barnhorst said:
The worst defragmentation of a hard drive can occur right after the OS is
installed. However, it is likely that the OS was ghosted onto the hard
drive and you should be OK. Run the disk defrag tool under
Accessories/System Tools and see how much red shows up in the drive map. In
any case, defragging the drive can't hurt anything, so go ahead.

Why do you want to partition the drive? If the file system is FAT32 then
partitions less than 40GB can make sense in terms of performance. If you
are running NTFS then there is no performance reason to partition.
Personally, I would leave it as is, especially if the OS is preinstalled and
you only have a restore cd in the event the system has to be restored.

--
Colin Barnhorst [MVP Windows - Virtual Machine]
Happy said:
Will I still have to defrag, if it is new? Guess it won't hurt.
As stated - Partition Magic is good safe way. Do yourself a favour and
defrag the drive first - takes time, but good practice.
Len
Am getting a new computer on the weekend. It will have Windows XP
pre-loaded, as well as a few other basic programs.
Because it has a large hard drive, I would like to partition it.
What is the best way (safest) to partition it, and what suggestions for
partitions?
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Although I am not sure of the reason to partition, if a need to reinstall
the OS still wipes the whole drive, it would be nice if they sent the system
partitioned, with a method for resizing. I thought partitioning was to
either run multiple operating systems (which I don't) or to use disk space
more efficiently. (which shouldn't be a problem with NTFS)
In my case it looks like I will have one OS on a 260 Gig HD. Do you think
this will be a problem?
Click to expand...

Gerry Cornell posted a very informative article on partitioning,
hopefully ya read it and gives you a good idea of things. I could not of
explained it any better....

Will this be a problem??
For me, HELL yeah, maybe not for you......What I mean by this is that I
have personal preferances and would do things differently, but in the
end it won't hurt for you to keep it the way it is.
As I stated before, I'm to assume this is a proprietary machine? A
"REAL" retail bought CD of an OS will "NOT" wipe out all your
partitions, it will "ask" you where you want to install. Hence why after
I bought my first Comcrap years ago, and learned a hard lesson, I went
out and bought my own copy of windows & wiped all their garbage out
never to use a restore CD again. Don't get me wrong though, most people
won't do that, but with the proprietaries you will lose your free tech
support and all that nonsense if you do not have the original garbage
installed.....Me, I don't need the tech support so it doesn't bother me,
I'd rather build my own machines and not be a slave to pre-installs.
But, but now, I did go out and buy a HP recently, only because I could
not beat the price for what it had to offer(hardware wise)....But as
soon as it got to my house, I WIPED the drive....a 200gig(groan) put a
40gig in its place for my OS(Win2K) and broke the 200 up in to data
partitions........

I'm only going on as it appears you're wanting to learn and this is a
part of learning about other ideas so I'd figure I'd give ya a few
tidbits of my own experience.......I am not a big fan of proprietary
setups,(Gee, can ya tell) but they have gotten a little better, but yes,
BIG drives & one partition only is a big problem for me....But of course
we all use our computers differently, I have 15 HD's spread out amongst
5 computers in my house with a total over 2 tera of space, my main
machine here has a total of 6 HD's along with 4 burners, 1 cd reader, 1
DVD player, Sooooooooooo, you can see that I do a LOT of things with my
machine so in my case seperate partitions & HD's are critical for my
needs. As i mentioned, that article was very informative......
 
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