re: Large drive and Win2k issues....
Saturday, November 3, 2007 at 1:49 pm
Windows 2000 Annoyances Discussion Forum
Posted by C K
(6157 messages posted)
Always better to ask than assume, especially with computers. I started on mainframes
in the late 70's so I have been around the block a few times.
Generally, partitioning your large drive into two or three drives isn't going to
cause a speed problem that you will notice. The only time you may find a slight/moderate
impact on the system is if you were doing drive intensive operations such as audio/video
rendering from apps like adobe premiere etc. In normal everyday tasks, you won't
see any difference.
On my personal W2K machine (the one I am using now for net/email/apps and typing
this on), other than my audio/video processing machines, (which are high performance
SCSI drive systems), I have it partitioned as such:
(This is a 200 gig drive)
C: primary partition-25 gig/FAT32- all apps and system are installed here. I back
this partition up with imaging software to a second drive and to a 25 gig partition
at the end of this HDD for a fast recovery. FAT32 is my choice as it is easier to
recover and repair if corruption happens.
D: extended partition/logical drive- 150 gig for data storage. It is NTFS due to
the fact that I store 4 gig plus files here for sending out. Since this drive is
backed up to multiple media and external drives, file system isn't an issue, or other
loss in case of total physical failure.
E: in the extended partition/logical drive- 25 gig- holds the image of C for quick
restore. Again not an issue as I have a second physical drive for storing images
of the C: drive in case of total physical failure.
We usually recommend that W2K be installed on a minimum of 15-20 gig. NT needs breathing
room and performance can start to suffer when you get to approx 2/3rds full on twenty
gig partitions and less as the partition size gets smaller. I keep my system lean
(not from an OCD standpoint but close)..
It doesn't do any good to keep apps on a seperate partition/drive because if you
lose your operating system drive (C:), and can't recover it, you will have to reinstall
the system and all of your apps anyway. Moving the swap file to a different partition
on the same drive, or even a seperate physical drive on the same IDE channel will
actually slow down performance. If it's on the same physical drive, you are making
the heads move farther and if it isn't on a seperate IDE channel (IDE PATA drives,
doesn't pertian to SATA drives unless you store data there too), one drive has to
wait while the other is being accessed so you gain nothing and actually hurt your
performance. This is another reason to have more space rather than less on your
C drive, so that you can just leave the swap file on the C drive, thus not making
your drive heads move to different areas of the hard drive in many cases. This isn't
quite as big an issue with multi-platter drives as in the old days, but still follows
the same principle of switching or moving heads more than you would otherwise.
As for two 80 gig partitions, it may be over kill for your operating system partition
to be 80 gig unless you have good reason for it being that big, and also keep in
mind that the larger the partition or C drive in this case, the more file slack it
may have which can waste some space (more space with FAT than NTFS). If you need
more space for some reason on your extended partition for data storage, shrinking
an NTFS partition where WIndows is installed to, usually results in failure. Another
reason I prefer FAT32. I can resize it all day long without a failure, unless it
has file system damage to begin with. Unless you need the security options or file
size options (files greater than 4 gig) of the NTFS file system, many of us here
won't use it where the operating system is installed. Now storing data on NTFS partitions,
doesn't seem to suffer the same issues on resizing when needed, only when it comes
to partitions where Windows itself is installed. (a problem acknowledged by the
Partition Magic creators and others)..
A benefit of partitioning is that if you should have something effect your system
partition and yo have to reinstall, "normally" your data will be safe and survive.
This is of course, assuming that nothing effects that partition or the partition
table and that you don't suffer from a physical failure. Even then, recovery software
that I use can recover data and most of the time repair partitioning info to recover
from damage when it happens. Partitioning is like having more drawers in a file
cabinent for storage. Just helps keep things in better order once you get used to
having a system set up that makes sense to you, and may help in keeping data a little
safer if it's not all mixed together IMO...
Anyway, I could keep going but you might get the idea, and if you want more info
on specific questions, you can email me through the forum and I will help where I
can.. :-)
On Saturday, November 3, 2007 at 11:29 am, 2000_man wrote:
>Yeah -- I meant that SP4 was slipstreamed in -- my fault!!!
>As for partitions, I'm not sure why I don't like them to be perfectly honest with
>you....you mentioned windows being a filing cabinet of sorts and I think I feel
the
>same way -- but with a different perspective on the situation. I'm really OCD about
>how I keep my PC organized and it just always seemed neater to keep everything on
>one disk in it's own little place - I guess a partition just complicates matters
>for me. I'm faced with the dilema of what goes where....what goes on the boot drive?
>What goes on the second partition (I KNOW this sounds insane....sorry!!!).
>
>Will it, however, like you mentioned make a difference in speed to have two 80 gig
>partitions? For the sake of my OCD would it be possible to make partition just
big
>enough to run windows on (with plenty of room to stretch its legs of course) then
>have the second partition be storage - or would this be just as slow as one big
drive
>(not to mention a waste of space possibly)? Speed is more important than my system
>of organization so I can cope if it'll make a noticeable difference. I guess really
>what i'm asking here is --- what's the best way to approach this?
>
>Sorry, to sound so retarded when it comes to partitioning - but like I've said I've
>tried to avoid it up to this point.
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