What are the advantages to Partitioning?

Question

Hi Ref. XP Home Edition 120 GB hard drive New Installation What are the advantages of partitioning vs running the OS in one primary partition? I have done quite a bit of research on the subject and there seems to be as many reasons for as against. My goal is to run the OS as trouble free and efficiently as possible. Thanks for your help. Message Edited by hardwire on 08-29-2005 07:46 PM

rollainm · Answer

The best answer is this: It's completely up to you. I personally would leave the boot drive alone and use an additional drive for storage; partition the second drive however you like.

gudgeon · Answer

If you create a separate partition for your data files and move "My Docs" to that partition, it means that should you have an unrecoverable Windows problem and need to reinstall your OS, your data SHOULD remain intact. I partition C: OS, D: Progs, E: Data but 2 partitions, OS & Data, are probably enough. Ensure that all programs are set to store their data files in the "My Docs" folder where possible, especially things like Outlook or Outlook Express, acoounting software, etc.

I mirror everything on my main hard drive to a second internal hard drive on a regular basis, also copy E: drive to another hard drive in a USB enclosure on a weekly basis.

shesagordie · Answer

hardwire.

As your system is NTFS, you would gain very little in having multiple partitions. Partitioning is a personal thing. There is not a right or wrong way to partition a hard drive.
Whether you install multiple, smaller partitions, or leave it as one large partition, that's entirely up to you. The following article may help you decide.

http://partition.radified.com/partitioning.htm

Bev.

hardwire · Answer

Hi Thanks to all for your help.

graffen · Answer

Don't forget that it is a great idea on an NTFS system to make the first partition ('System Partition') as a small (perhaps 1.0G) partition formatted with FAT32. (and not with NTFS)  That makes the system partition bootable by DOS, which sure is sweet in case of a total OS failure.   Personally, I prefer partitions simply because it gives me more logical control over where files are being stored, and a higher understanding when diagnosing problems.  On an 80G HD, I use: C:  1G FAT for DOS boot potential D:  1G for drivers only E:  10G for future Windows Vista install F:  10G for Win XP Home SP2 install G:  30G for my games H:  25G for everything else   Email me for a small directory printout if you wish, and you can see the outline structure that I have learned from others during the last 15 years as being highly efficient. firefighter@graffiti.net

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