How big is ur windows partition?

Hey,
Gettin a new 60GB HDD soon
Just cant make up my mind on how big of a partition to give windows...
I was thinkin eather 3 to 5GB

BTW, can u install games on a diff partition then windows is on, or have to be on the same one?

IMO 3gb will be plenty but with a 60 gig hdd i don't think you would notice a 5 gig for your OS. Again it is completely up to you but 3 is enough

Mine is 4Gb

partitions bah. i still think their useless and their only purpose was because back in the old day when windows couldnt support large drives hence drives had to use 2 gig partitions.

I use my whole drive (cuz it's too small to be worth partitioning). for your question, yes, you can install programs on other partitions, but usually they take up a little space on the Windows partition to add some don't-know-what files to make it work.

These days, I don't see much reason to fart around with partitions. I have a 4.3GB 10k rpm SCSI for a boot drive, and a 40GB 7200 rpm as a storage disk. I'm not close to maxing out either one.

Well, partitions can exact some real speed differences if properly configured. The fastest disk is partitioned and has programs placed on the disk in a sequence.
Norton utilities is a great help here, for it allows you to put the HD virtual memory cache at the very outside edge of your HDD, were seek times are significantly faster. Then make part. for your OS, MS says about 4gigs for XPpro. This will keep the endless stream of updates under control and allows you to format w/o the CD. In order of read speed needed install games, photoshop or video programs in the next part., Make a separate partition for data only.
If you don't have Diskeeper, download it for a free trial before you start, it's available from Executive Software. Run after installing large games, and after you install two or three smaller games. This will guarantee your drive won't have to hunt and peck for that elusive uzi gif that supposed to be on the floor around the corner...too late I'm dead............. hey I thought I was going to heaven...

I see no need for more than two partitions for windows. I have a 13GB drive for XP, a 5GB drive for docs/downloads/temp stuff and the other partitions I have are for linux and its swap file.

My Windows partition is 4.5GB and that's all that this b***h needs

sniper1m, what is the endless stream of updates? is that all the updates microsoft will still have for XP?
and is there a website a can read about the sizes for the os partition?

i decided yesterday to install the os in a smaller partition, then i created a 10GB to the os and 30GB to other stuff. i know what 10GB is, but since many ppl here decided to go with even smaller partitions im interested on knowing about the benefits from reducing a bit more that 10GB.
thanks for your attention.

I have a 4gig partition for Windows thats NTFS and a 7 gig FAT32 partition. The 4gig just holds Windows and Unreal Tournament. If I were to do it again I'd make it 5gigs, I forgot about the swap file. The 7gig just has a bunch of junk that I haven't gotten around to burning to a cd yet. The rest of my drive is dedicated to FreeBSD/Linux/whatever other OS I'm playing with. Its a 18gig drive btw.

On Microsoft web site you'll find under support "The Microsoft Knowledge Base. This is where you find the stuff you seek. The only problem with this site is size and technical lanquage. The words they use seem to have been invented a week ago. As for updates, I had a friend of mine with a WinXP laptop that by default had autoupdate disabled. Since I'm broadband, I offered to run her virus scanner update, while I was online I ran XP update. 14 critical, 8 XP, and 4 driver updates downloaded. I like exploring XP and I've found plenty of problems that still need updating.

partitions

2GB for Win98se, 6GB for win2kpro, 2x 15GB partitions, one for games, the other for media files and backup of installers & drivers and other junk. Soon my WD 40Gb HDD will come back from RMA!

Partitions:

1) In FAT32, partitions reduce the cluster size on large drives, thus improving efficiency somewhat. Say you have a 1 kb file.... On a partition with less than 4 GB, the cluster size is 4 kb. You lose 3 kb to wasted space. On a partition with less than 8 GB, the cluster size is 8 kb. You lose 7 kb to wasted space. On a partition with less than 16 GB, the cluster size is 16kb, you lose 15 kb to wasted space. On apartition with less than 32 GB, the cluster size is 32 kb. You lose 31 kb. for your 1 kb file

I'm not sure but my numbers might be off a little bit. Still, the principle is the same. With many small files (such as found in operating systems) a smaller partition will store data more efficiently.

2) Putting the OS and its swap file on the outer edge of the disk will improve performance because the outer edge of the disc has faster access times. In order to keep it on the outer edge, instead of migrating all over the place because of fragmentation, you need it in its own partition.

3) Format/reinstall operation goes easier because you can back-up your stuff onto another partition, while only formatting the partition that the OS was on. Defrag goes faster if you only need to defrag the OS and not all your other files, when the OS has its own partition.

Re: partitions

Arkaine23 said:

2) Putting the OS and its swap file on the outer edge of the disk will improve performance because the outer edge of the disc has faster access times. In order to keep it on the outer edge, instead of migrating all over the place because of fragmentation, you need it in its own partition.[/B]

Click to expand...

The OS....hmmm. If you have a 40 gig disk....just how would you go about that?

The best reason to partion a drive is for safety. My situation is perfect. I was having huge problems so I move all my files I have to download or install onto my D drive and just format C, the you can move them all back when your done. It works great.

PS my C: is about 10 gigs
my D: is about 49 gigs

I used to partition drive's. But now I believe two seperate drives is a far better solution. I run a 40 gig drive for window's. And a 60 gig for storage. If your drive dies your still going to lose all the data on it, whether it's partitioned or not. If you run a seperate HD all together for data and storage, It's much safer. All though it is a bit more expensive. But HD's are cheap now anyway.

I run 2x 20gb drives. I'ce reserved 5gb for Windows, 15gb for storage, and 20gb for backups/storage. With all of the programs I need installed, I still have 1gb left. Plenty of room for me

It_The_Cow said:

I run 2x 20gb drives. I'ce reserved 5gb for Windows, 15gb for storage, and 20gb for backups/storage. With all of the programs I need installed, I still have 1gb left. Plenty of room for me

Click to expand...

1GB left total or on the windows partition?
_______________________________

I'm runnin 98se and usin a total for 3 gigs right now for windows,, so i figured that 4gigs would be perfect...
But if I went with XP, how much more space would i need?

I'm runnin 98se and usin a total for 3 gigs right now for windows,, so i figured that 4gigs would be perfect...

Click to expand...

XP will use a little under 1Gb to install itself...so whatever you think you would need for programs is up to you...I use a 5Gb partition for mine...

You guys normaly install games and programs all on the windows partition or on the data partitions to not junk up the windows partiton?
Cuz after installin and uninstallin lots of games and stuff, things get messy after a while, and you'll wana reformat/reimage alot...
Thats what I wana try to get away from, just format the windows partition and u wont have to reinstall all those lil programs and games that take forever...