How do you arrange your partitions/drives?

[Kevinck]

Just wanted some people to throw around ideas as to what's the best way to set up your drives and partitions. I know that 'best' is subjective but I've managed to argue both sides of this argument to myself without either winning. I also know this is all nitpicky details for my computer which really doesn't have all that much of a daily workload but I like thinking about it occationally.
Dealing with Windows XP, a fast 160GB and a slightly slower 120GB.

I have the 160 divided into a 60GB C: and 100GB D:. The 120 is E:. OS, applications and all games are installed on C.

Here's my assumptions. Does anyone want to agree/disagree?

- It's nice to have your OS on a smallish partition in the case you want to format/reinstall you don't have to wipe or backup a very large drive.

- Page file should be on E since it is best to have it on a totally separate physical harddrive than your OS. Even though the 120GB drive is slightly slower than the 160.

- It's better to do torrents, video editing/re-encoding, on a separate drive from both the OS or the page file to avoid fragmentation and the constant access conflicts.

It's that last one that I can't decide on a solution. Is it better to do all the hard work/downloading on the E drive where the page file resides or on the D partition which is part of the same physical drive as the OS?

Any other thoughts welcome.

[Happy13178]

Just wanted some people to throw around ideas as to what's the best way to set up your drives and partitions. I know that 'best' is subjective but I've managed to argue both sides of this argument to myself without either winning. I also know this is all nitpicky details for my computer which really doesn't have all that much of a daily workload but I like thinking about it occationally.
Dealing with Windows XP, a fast 160GB and a slightly slower 120GB.

I have the 160 divided into a 60GB C: and 100GB D:. The 120 is E:. OS, applications and all games are installed on C.

Here's my assumptions. Does anyone want to agree/disagree?

- It's nice to have your OS on a smallish partition in the case you want to format/reinstall you don't have to wipe or backup a very large drive.

- Page file should be on E since it is best to have it on a totally separate physical harddrive than your OS. Even though the 120GB drive is slightly slower than the 160.

- It's better to do torrents, video editing/re-encoding, on a separate drive from both the OS or the page file to avoid fragmentation and the constant access conflicts.

It's that last one that I can't decide on a solution. Is it better to do all the hard work/downloading on the E drive where the page file resides or on the D partition which is part of the same physical drive as the OS?

Any other thoughts welcome.

I'm a little confused as to why you would put the page file on a seperate drive from your OS drive...the OS accesses the page file a lot, and I would think its slower to make it go through the mobo interface to access it rather than have it on the same drive, especially with IDE as opposed to SATA.

Video editing, etc can probably use the e: drive as a scratch drive for slightly better performance, but downloading onto your OS drive probably wouldn't make much difference, as a lot of download programs use the OS drive anyways for temp files. All you'd be doing is downloading to c: and saving to e:.

As far as having the OS on a seperate partition, not sure how this would impact performance in the slightest. I agree its easier to format only one partition, but this is kind of a minor point anyways. I use smaller hard drives, not smaller partitions, for OS installs...fewer platters means greater MTBF.

What do you mean by access conflicts?

[itsmypostoffice]

although everyone has their fav setup, you're on the right track. you should create a separate OS partition, but with faster drives & larger cache you don't have to create a page file on another partition (defraging MFT & secondary partitions regularly and you won't see a decrease in access time).

tips: [update your BIOS, update XP, check your IDE/Sata connections]

Aa. install OS on you Fastest HDD, format NTFS
Ab. update XP, increase your MFT ceiling, defrag & run BootVis
Ac. create a Restore Point

B. Use Acronis Disk Director or similar partition tool

160GB: 20GB OS / 40GB Programs / 100GB Video Preview Library
120GB: 60GB Scratch Disk / 60GB BT (you should purchase a separate HDD for BT)

--> after formating you won't retain actual size so this is a guideline

--> if you're editing intensively then you should use a dedicated drive. same reasoning with BT'ing since both applications really taxes your HDD health (file allocation, fragmentation, heat...)

if you're defraging & scanning your HDDs for malware regularly you should be fine. keep an eye on your HDD temperatures and listen for odd grinding/clicking noises. buy a backup HDD for your videos & encoding if you can afford it (external is great). try to utilize an older/discarded ~20GB for BT so if it fails, you won't suffer downtime or lose valuable data. good luck!

[itsmypostoffice]

I'm a little confused as to why you would put the page file on a seperate drive from your OS drive...the OS accesses the page file a lot, and I would think its slower to make it go through the mobo interface to access it rather than have it on the same drive, especially with IDE as opposed to SATA.

separating the MFT was a useful trick for Win98. it also allowed admins to flush/defrag the paging file before shutting down. nowadays, xp handles all that in the background (or just use a tweaking utility). i agree with you, dedication a whole drive for video editing is a great idea if Kevinck can afford it. i'm more concerned he's BT'ing / encoding & backing up on the same drive.

perhaps download to an older 20GB drive, transfer that to your scratch disk for editing/encoding. back it up or store it on his 160GB -- not the best solution but he has to prepare for HDD failure (we all do). even better, if you have an old PII or PIII lying around then use that for BT'ing. transfer files over your network to your 120GB scratch disk and encode/edit. when you're happy with results you can store on 160GB for your friends to watch or prepare to backup to DVD+/-R. there are limitless configs but always consider backups; defrag your drives and keep them cool and you should be ok.

[haveblue]

My setup is more simplistic.

OS on a 200gb sata, only the one full partition, no page file (C:\)
- Defrags daily at 9:00am while I'm at work (gets turned off at night)

All files are on a 250gb ATA in my server, mounted as X:\
- Defrags nightly at 3:00am, and has a second disk for web server files which defrags at 7:30am

That way, apps store all my temp files on the local disk for faster access, but all my music and video and everything important is on the server so I can format the desktop at will without losing any data.

[kevin_Lee]

250GB Sata ==>C: 30 GB study and files; D: 50GB Sys only; E:70GB game; F:100GB Video and downloads

300GB ATA133 external HD ==> ISO, Music and Video only

[prying eyes]

Page file can be on a separate Harddisk, not on a different partition of the same harddisk. The only thing is that, the HDD on which page is residing should be faster, otherwise, u r obviously losing out. In your case, u will be losing out , as the second harddisk is slower. This is proven, do a google search.

2. Keeping OS on a small sized partition (I would go with a 15-20GB) helps faster data access and also re-installing/formatting easier. The point is only keep OS there. Move your temp folder (right click my computer, properties, advanced, environment variables and change the path of both temp n tmp), and my documents (right click my docs, properties-->move) into the second harddisk. Normally a lot of ppl save all/some of their data/pics on my docs and once there is some problem and needs a format, poof all their data is gone.

3. I would also have the second 120 GB drive partitoned into 2 or 3, one for BT, another for video/audios n games installation and the third for temp, n my docs. I even move the "temporary internet folder" of IE to another disk.

3. if ur temp file is in the second disk, the it may be better to do the video encoding in ur 100gb faster partition.

4. Download a HDD utility (like HD Tune) and make sure of each partitions speed. This way u can be sure about HDD speed.

5. For page file defragging, u can download pagedefrag (http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/PageDefrag.html) and do it.

6. Running Bootvis can lead to major problems later, so I would'nt advice it, as xp automatically does the same optimisation every three days. I personally have experienced it..
read these
http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/winxp/t1075157049
http://groups.google.com/groups?q=+%22trace.log%22+group:microsoft.public.w indowsxp.*
http://www.techimo.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=7403&highlight=trace

Just wanted some people to throw around ideas as to what's the best way to set up your drives and partitions. I know that 'best' is subjective but I've managed to argue both sides of this argument to myself without either winning. I also know this is all nitpicky details for my computer which really doesn't have all that much of a daily workload but I like thinking about it occationally.
Dealing with Windows XP, a fast 160GB and a slightly slower 120GB.

I have the 160 divided into a 60GB C: and 100GB D:. The 120 is E:. OS, applications and all games are installed on C.

Any other thoughts welcome.

[cmge]

74gb Raptor => 20gb OS + 54gb Programs

[chicken_little]

I read somewhere that partitioning actually decreases performance. Not sure how valid that is. For my next pc I'm going to have 3 physical hard drives with no partitioning.

- C: for o/s and programs
- D: for files
- E: for torrents and video editing/re-encoding

[happyplato]

My current configure:
C:\ OS and Programs
D:\ Games
E:\ Data/Download/Video/Music/etc

[1madman1]

In Windows I organize my drive letters like this:
C:\ 295GB OS/Apps (NTFS)
T:\ 5GB Swap/Temp (FAT32 because its faster)
Z:\ 250GB Downloads/Docs/Media (mounted share from file server)

[Firestorm ZERO]

my setup
C:\ - WD Raptor - OS+apps+games+page file
D:\ - 500GB - downloads
E:\ - 500GB - downloads
F:\ - 500GB - downloads
G:\ - 500GB - downloads
H:\ - 500GB - downloads
I:\ - 500GB - downloads

:lol:

[ngp]

My setup:

C drive - O/S
D drive - data
E drive - contains ghost images of partition C, right after O/S activation.

On C drive, I have the O/S and games, nothing much.
I also have VMWare installed, images on D drive. I share out the D drive to my VMWare session to access data. The VMWare sessions are non-persistent, when they get spyware on them, I just shut it down and restart, no more spyware. Office applications are installed in the VMWare session as well. My VMWare sessions are also backed up, so if I lose them, I don't care, I'll be back up in 10 min.

BTW, I don't surf the internet on my host O/S for obvious reasons.

[Codegen]

40GB

~37GB Useable

C: (USed to be D:, backup) 4.85GB
D: (OS) 22.7GB
E: (Backup #2, long story) 800MB
F: Celeron 466 Disk images: 8.83GB

[tjuzer]

2. Keeping OS on a small sized partition (I would go with a 15-20GB) helps faster data access and also re-installing/formatting easier. The point is only keep OS there. Move your temp folder (right click my computer, properties, advanced, environment variables and change the path of both temp n tmp), and my documents (right click my docs, properties-->move) into the second harddisk. Normally a lot of ppl save all/some of their data/pics on my docs and once there is some problem and needs a format, poof all their data is gone.

What path you chose for new drive? Say %USERPROFILE%\Local Settings\Temp right now.

[RastaManMax]

My setup:

120GB: 20GB C:/ for all games + apps;100GB Downloads
60GB: 60GB Downloads

This setup has been working great for some time now. I think that partitioning might be responsible for decreasing the speed of my 120GB drive because it's actually benching slightly slower than the 60GB drive.

LEMAR

[akito925]

My setup is more simplistic.

OS on a 200gb sata, only the one full partition, no page file (C:\)
- Defrags daily at 9:00am while I'm at work (gets turned off at night)

All files are on a 250gb ATA in my server, mounted as X:\
- Defrags nightly at 3:00am, and has a second disk for web server files which defrags at 7:30am

That way, apps store all my temp files on the local disk for faster access, but all my music and video and everything important is on the server so I can format the desktop at will without losing any data.

I have almost the same setup also.

desktop computer
80 gig c: 20gig, 10 gigs e:, f:50 gigs for mp3s, music videos
250+250 in raid 0 for all my games especially "Wow"

my crappy p3 server for bt downloads left on 24/7, won't slow down main computers. 320 gig sata stroage space.