120GB Partition Recommendations??

[XprincoX]

Well finally got my WD 120gb SE from dell, so early christmas present for me So now i'm debating on how to distribute all this space. I'm thinking about 3 partitions. 20/40/60. 20 for OS/progs, 40 for games, 60 for mp3s, backup etc. Anyone have any recommendations? Will installing my programs on a different partition cause any problems? TIA

 

[FTC]

Hi,

No, installing proggies on different partitions does NOT cause problems... regarding the size of your partitions, it's only you who know how many games or mp3s you gave and at what ratio you increase those, but if you can allow for that, half of the space for mp3, temp data and backups... makes perfect sense to me (specially if you start editing video or ripping divx or these kind of activities which require huge amounts of space).
Best suggestion is : grab a copy of Partition Magic or similar program and do not worry about partition sizes... you will be able to change them later if needed so.


Regards
FTC

 

[flyingember]

the only reason to partition is to have windows seperate so you can reinstall it without needing to mess with the rest of your data.

other than that, just leave it alone. I killed a partition setup with one reinstall because I ended up needing more space for one type of file.

also, the necessity of it was lost when fat32 was created. there's no preformance gains either

as for partition magic, it has a c. 30% failure rate. use it at your own risk.

 

[FTC]

flyingember,

I seriously disagree with your statement. In my case Partition Magic has been flawless *every single* time i've needed.... for the last 12 years (already used it a few tens of times already). I am not saying that you do not need backups, just in case, but seriously doubt you can say like that that it has a 30% failure rate.... In my experience, most of the times it fails it is because of users not knowing what they are doing.

Regarding your statement that 'the only reason to partition is to separate data from OS', I feel like this is also too simplistic I can think of the following reasons :

- There ARE performance AND space gains to be achieved with smaller partitions. (ever heard of cluste sizes?). I know NTFS or HPFS do not have this problem, but then you need to be using an OS that supports them.
- There is also the fact that separate partitions can and will in some cases mantain part of your data isolated from the rest of the system
- There is also the compatibility advantages if you use other OS's like linux, OS/2, win95,...
- Another reason to have smaller partitions could be the need to avoid too costly defragments or scandisks
- Also to take into consideration, and depending on your backup strategy, you may want to have small partitions easier to image.
..........

Regards
FTC

 

[Codeman05]

flyingember,

I seriously disagree with your statement. In my case Partition Magic has been flawless *every single* time i've needed.... for the last 12 years (already used it a few tens of times already). I am not saying that you do not need backups, just in case, but seriously doubt you can say like that that it has a 30% failure rate.... In my experience, most of the times it fails it is because of users not knowing what they are doing.

Regarding your statement that 'the only reason to partition is to separate data from OS', I feel like this is also too simplistic I can think of the following reasons :

- There ARE performance AND space gains to be achieved with smaller partitions. (ever heard of cluste sizes?). I know NTFS or HPFS do not have this problem, but then you need to be using an OS that supports them.
- There is also the fact that separate partitions can and will in some cases mantain part of your data isolated from the rest of the system
- There is also the compatibility advantages if you use other OS's like linux, OS/2, win95,...
- Another reason to have smaller partitions could be the need to avoid too costly defragments or scandisks
- Also to take into consideration, and depending on your backup strategy, you may want to have small partitions easier to image.
..........

Regards
FTC

I agree with all of that really...the only problem I've had with partition magic is that every once in a while it will run EXTREMELY slowly and you have to resist the urge to reboot the system and just let it finish. Other then that I love it

 

[XprincoX]

Well one of the main reason i've decide to partition is drive is like FTC said, gonna be moving edit large files(divx, programs, etc) So i didn't want my other programs and things getting defrags or have the possibilty of gettin corrupted if something went wrong. With one partition dedicated to the OS, i will have the ability to reinstall windows or run any other maintence of sys files, like defrag at much faster rates.

But would it be wise to just have a partition specifically dedicated to the OS and all other prog files, games, mp3s, etc on a different partiition? Or is it just when you install the program you need to manually specify the install location?