Actually, Windows XP will perform best when one partition
is used.
"When performing a clean install, Microsoft recommends that
NTFS be used and that the system be installed in a single partition
on each disk. Under Windows XP, big partitions are better managed
than in previous versions of Windows. Forcing installed software
into several partitions on the disk necessitates longer seeks when
running the system and software."
Benchmarking on Windows XP
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hwdev/platform/performance/benchmark.mspx
NTFS Preinstallation and Windows XP
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hwdev/tech/storage/ntfs-preinstall.mspx
--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User
Be Smart! Protect your PC!
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
| 2) Defrag Nay...
| The item on "[Is] Defragging Pointless?" (
|
http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2004/2004-01-22.htm#3 )
| brought some interesting mail on both sides of the issue:
|
| Fred, I wasn't sure from the item in the latest LangaList
| as to whether you had looked at the PC World item about
| defragmenting your hard drive or not. If not, you should
| take a look - they mentioned the conventional wisdom that
| you gave for why defragmenting will increase performance,
| but when they ran actual tests on the matter, they found
| no significant increase in performance.
|
| Also, on the issue of partitioning, they were right there
| with you, that partitioning made a great deal of sense.
|
| If you haven't already, the article is worth a look - go
| to
|
http://www.pcworld.com/howto/article/0,aid,113743,00.asp
| for the start of the main article, and the page with the
| tests on defragging
| is found at
|
http://www.pcworld.com/howto/article/1,aid,113743,pg,8,00.
| asp
| ---Tim Fitzpatrick
|
| Thanks, Tim. I did see the piece, but either they
| mismeasured, or their definition of what constitutes
| a "significant" change differs from mine.
|
| I can see how that might happen. For example, if you
| compare the performance of a fragmented drive to a
| defragged one over the course of a full day, the
| defragged drive's time savings might not seem to add up
| to all that much (maybe a couple minutes). One could
| argue that that isn't a "significant" improvement. But to
| me, having a PC that feels snappier, more responsive and
| less "in the way" all day long, is indeed significant.
| I'll take a defragged drive any day.
|
| And sometimes, the defrag differences are actually quite
| dramatic. See next item.
|
| Click to email this item to a friend
|
http://langa.com/sendit.htm
|
| return to top of page
|
| 3) ...and Yea
| Sometimes, defragging makes a *huge* difference:
|
| Hi Fred. On the article in the newsletter on defragging (
|
http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2004/2004-01-22.htm#3 ),
| I completely agree that PC World are dead wrong. I use
| chat programs a fair bit as well as surfing the net and
| in the past have noticed that my internet connection
| (dial-up) would progressively deteriorate until it became
| unstable. Once I had defragged though I would be back at
| full speed both on chat programs and normal surfing.
|
| And this degradation used to occur once my defragged
| level went below 97%. Since then I have regularly
| defragged at least once a week and have found not only
| does my internet connection work better but both games
| and applications I use as well ---Robert Mitchell,
| Queensland, Australia
|
| You're probably seeing fragmentation problems with the
| internet cache, Robert. By default, Internet Explorer
| sets aside a huge cache for itself. That alone can cause
| performance issues, but if that huge cache ends up
| scattered all over a fragmented drive, your PC will
| thrash itself senseless trying to manage the cache as you
| surf.
|
| The solution is twofold. First, defragging will help, as
| you've seen, because the cache will be all in one easy-to-
| access piece. But you also can reduce the raw size of the
| cache: In IE, go to Tools/Internet options and in
| the "Temporary Internet Files" area use the Settings
| button to make the cache something reasonable. (Other
| browsers have similar settings.) For dial up systems, 20
| or 25MB is usually enough cache. For always-on, high-
| speed connections, 10MB or so is all you need.
|
| Keeping the cache reasonably sized, and then keeping it
| contiguous (defragged), should eliminate virtually all
| cache-related performance problems
|
