Re: Desperate! What's the best way to partition 160GB hard disk
- From: coolsti <cool@xxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2006 16:23:45 +0200
On Thu, 20 Jul 2006 17:33:53 +0000, spongebob wrote:
Hi all,
I have a new dell computer, 3GHz dual core intel processor, 1GB RAM,
Windows XP Professional Operating System, 160GB hard disk, etc. It
has been left untouched for half a year just because I do not know
how to partition my hard disk. The new computer comes with only 1
partition for the whole 160GB hard disk. I do not know how to
manually partition my hard disk so I plan to use PartitionMagic to
partition my hard disk. I need to know what is the best way to
partition my 160GB of hard disk like for example, the number and type
of partitions to create, what's the partition created for and how to
do it using PartitionMagic?
Currently my new computer is running Windows XP Professional operating
system. I want to use my computer mainly to surf the Internet, play
and store thousands of MP3s songs, watch and store videos, photos and
programs. In near future, I would also like to install Linux operating
system in it. Sometimes I will also be using my computer for editing
videos and photos. I will also use it to play games but not very
often. In view of what I mentioned above, how do I partition my 160GB
hard disk? How many partitions do I need, for example, is it better to
have a separate partition, each for video files, music files, and
photo files? Is it better to have a separate partition for
programs/applications or should programs and applications be stored
in same partition as my Windows XP Professional operating system? How
should I partition my hard disk so that programs and music files and
video files, etc, can open up and run efficiently and reasonably
fast? What is a swap file partition and do I need one for it? What
type of partition for each of the above-mentioned storage purpose,
such as FAT32, NTFS, etc? What do I need to do if in future I want to
add additional partitions to my hard disk - should I reserve some free
space in my hard disk for future partition needs and how do I go about
doing this..... as in extended logical partition or what...hope you
know what I mean?
Another question that is hanging in my mind for a long time and is
important to me is what is the best partition strategy for say, when
my Windows XP Professional operating system crashes and I need to
reinstall or install a new one, how should I partition my hard disk
in such a way that I can simply put in my opreating system disk into
my DVD ROM and do the job while my video, mp3, photo files and other
data files will not be lost? In other words, just simply reinstall my
operating system and all my other files are not lost or affected. Hope
you do know what I mean. This is important to me because I surf the
net often and there will often be times my computer would be infected
with trojans and viruses and spywares and times my registry or system
files could be corrupted and thus I would need to reinstall my
operating system. So I hope there could be a simple way to do this
(reinstall my operating system) and not lose my other files and data
in my hard disk. How should I partition my hard disk for my operating
system, programs/applications, video, mp3, photo, data files for this
purpose? BTW, just curious, when surfing the net and you caught a
virus or a trojan or a spyware, will that particular virus, trojan or
spyware be spread to the other partitions in the hard disk??
Lastly, I would be using PartitionMagic to do the partitioning. Is
there any drawbacks using PartitionMagic? I am new to PartitionMagic,
could someone guide me to how to use it? BTW, any idea where can I
find online resources to understand about how to partition my hard
disk in such a way that my computer can function at its optimal
efficiency and performance? I have searched Google and am overwhelmed
by the millions of topics it has found. I have read some but some of
it is not relevant to my questions or my particular usage and storage
purposes.
As you can see, I know nothing about partitioning strategies. There
are so many ways but what is best for my computer in terms of my
usage and storage purposes? I HOPE YOU CAN GIVE ME YOUR EXPERT
GUIDANCE AND ADVICE AND NOT JUST YOUR TRIAL-AND-ERROR EXPERIENCES OR
ANY WILD GUESSES AS I HAVE WASTED ENOUGH TIME SEARCHING AND TRYING
OUT. It has been half a year and nothing is done and I am tired. :(
PLEASE HELP ME OUT. PLEASE! THANK YOU.
I can see from the replies that there are a lot of different opinions out
there. Here are mine:
I am definitely against the idea of "one big partition". Our IT support at
work loves this, but I think it is a dumb idea. I like to have a number of
partitions, but at least two: one for the Windows operating system and one
for all else. Why? If anything goes wrong and I need to reinstall the
operating system, and should this result in the partition being
reformatted, then I will not lose my data on a separate partition. Also,
if for some reason I decide I would like to later to do something like
install another operating system, then I have my Windows OS on its own
partition, and I can easilly re-partition the rest of the hard disk to
make a new partion(s) for the new operating system, without affecting
Windows in any way.
Regarding putting Linux on your machine: I think some poster was of the
opinion that you needed to leave about 20 GB of your hard-disk
unpartitioned, but this is not correct. Not with today's Linux. When you
install Linux, it will look at your hard disk and ask you what you want to
do with it. If your hard disk is already partitioned, Linux will give you
the choice to re-use one or more of the already existing partitions for
Linux. You can also divide partitions into smaller partitions while
installing Linux. Of course any data you already have on those partitions
will be lost, so you must first move all data away. And you must also
understand the names of the partitions under Linux, to make sure you don't
accidentally choose the wrong partition! But otherwise it is no problem to
do this. You can install Linux after-the-fact so to speak, and as long as
you already have some partitions you can use for Linux, you do not need to
disturb your Windows installation.
As for the size of the partitions, well, this is something I am also
fighting with. I now have a new 250GB hard disk and I will probably use
something like 20GB for Windows+programs, and divide the rest into a few
large chunks.
/Steve, Denmark
.
- Follow-Ups:
- References:
- Desperate! What's the best way to partition 160GB hard disk
- From: spongebob
- Desperate! What's the best way to partition 160GB hard disk
- Prev by Date: Re: restart hooped
- Next by Date: Re: Bottlenecks
- Previous by thread: Re: Desperate! What's the best way to partition 160GB hard disk
- Next by thread: Re: Desperate! What's the best way to partition 160GB hard disk
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
Loading
