To partition or not?

kazzer

Does partitioning a drive (say > 200GB) offer a good improvement in performance? Would it be a good idea to partition my drive and keep Windows/Programs/Games and Data (ie MP3 and Video) separate? Whats the best approach to take? Thanks.

SwampThing

My opinion - for what it's worth.

If you've enough data files (music, DVD's, whatever) to justify a second partiton, then it's not a bad idea. The reason being, if you later need a bigger partiton for your data, it's easier to transfer the data to a second disk, and you can still keep the same drive lettering (by simply rejigging the drive letters in the OS). You have the option then of expanding your OS disk to take up the newly freed up space on the original disk.

Personally, I don't really have that requirement so I keep everyting on a big C: partiton.

Forgot to mention - as for performance, Chances are the C partiton is going to be the first partiton on the disk (occupying the space closest to the centre of the physical disk) and will have whatever slight performance gain there is to be had from that anyway. Having your data files on a separate partiton won't really make a difference.

And some people like a partitoned disk for defragging - if you're OS is on a separate partiton, it's going to defrag much quicker than if you're to defrag the whole 200GB plus.

deckie27

I Always partition
Say 10-20 gig for OS, Apps & Games
Data on the rest of the drive
If you need to rebuild you can format C: and leave rest also if you ever need to do a system restore windows will delete all exe's put on the C: for the duration of ur restore period. ( you can turn it off on )
And OS could get very fragmented if sharing 200gig with data


My 2cent

Dec

uberpixie

always partition.

Less tears in the long run when windows goes tits up.

If you want better performance buy a 74gig raptor and run windows and all your games off it :-)

MrPinK

I always have a seperate partition just for the windows installation, usually about 5 gigs or so. 'My Documents', 'Program Files', etc. get mapped to another partition so I can throw down a fresh installation of windows any time without backing anything up.

Syth

Home directories on a serperate partition. It's good to know you can do what you like with your system files without having to worry about losing all your personal data. I have my home partition at the start of the disk, as all the partitioning software I know allow you to only change the end of the partition, not the start. Thus if you need to make that partition bigger you can.

julius

Partitioning is an excellent idea on any harddrive size if you value your data!!!

Make sure you use new partitioniing software....Norton Partitionmagic 8.05 for example as older versions have support only for lower sized partitions.
Hard drives have balooned in size over the last decade...at times faster than what partitioning software can keep up with!!!

Mutant_Fruit

What i find works best is a 10gig windows only partition, and then data/games/music/whatever on the other partition.

If windows buggers and you can't boot, you've lost nothing except a few program settings.

Zascar

Partitioning seems to be the way to go, but can anyone tell me what is the best way to partition a drive? Partition Magic, or are there any good alternatives out there?

I was thinking about doing this when I get my new PC next month to save hassle whne the computer gets bogged down. If I do a reinstall, I have hours worth of work installing little programs and chaging settings etc, so annoying. Dell laptops now come wiht a hiddden partition instead of backup CD's - I really like the idea personally. What I want to do is get my new PC, install all my programs and adjust all the settings, and then make a ghost partition, so if I need to reinstall I can just reimage the ghost and the PC will be back to the perfect state it was when I first did it. Is this difficult, can anyone point me in the right direction?