Harddisc Partioning

I have a WD 250gig SATA2 running at SATA1 with 2 partitions, a 50 and a 200(not exact, just nice round numbers for my point :) ) With Windows on the 50 and everything else on the other, My windows takes 1/2 a bar to load & I haven't had any speed decrease or anything with the other :)
 
Please excuse my ignorance but what does "1/2 a bar to load" mean?
 
There is a little bar with blue beads in it while windows is starting. The beads run through this bar a few times and then loads. The amount of times that the beads run through this bar can sometimes give you an indication of the speed of the harddrive. Now he just means that the beads go about halfway and then windows loads, instead of going through a few times.
 
You need to be careful when doing multiple tests, as, if anything is caching I/O requests, your test is pretty useless as the data won't go to the disk, only to the cache.
 
Partitioning can slow down access to certain files; this is because when you partition the disk, a particular partition could land up on a slower section of the disk (like in the inner tracks, where transfer speeds are lower). Files on that partition could thus never be on the faster section of the disk.

Personally, I would never partition my disk; when/if I need to reinstall, I boot up with UBCD4WIN, rename the Windows, Program Files and Documents and Settings folder, and reinstall, and move over data from the renamed folders as I need it.
 
I got a 5gb partition for windows and one for my other stuff and it works great. Whenever my computer get messed up or whatever and i need to format all i need do is format 5gb while keeping all my data.
 
have never noticed speed degredation on a partitioned drive.

i usually go for two partitions

OS / DATA

then a second internal drive for work stuffs

external for movies/games/etc

EDIT: the dude was using windows vista pro when he did his test - isnt that still in BETA?
 
halicon said:
have never noticed speed degredation on a partitioned drive.

i usually go for two partitions

OS / DATA

then a second internal drive for work stuffs

external for movies/games/etc

EDIT: the dude was using windows vista pro when he did his test - isnt that still in BETA?
Click to expand...

Yip... Still in beta phase.


:rolleyes: N7.1
 
Claymore said:
Partitioning can slow down access to certain files; this is because when you partition the disk, a particular partition could land up on a slower section of the disk (like in the inner tracks, where transfer speeds are lower). Files on that partition could thus never be on the faster section of the disk.

Personally, I would never partition my disk; when/if I need to reinstall, I boot up with UBCD4WIN, rename the Windows, Program Files and Documents and Settings folder, and reinstall, and move over data from the renamed folders as I need it.
Click to expand...

It's true that the inner part of the disk is slightly slower, but this is hardly noticeable with modern drives. However, the negligible speed impact of 2 or 3 partitions is not worth arguing about, IMO.

Your strategy is a good one, as is the argument for having a dedicated OS partition. I've found love in Seagate DiscWizard, which partitioned, quick-formatted *and* transferred my OS in 20min. That's from a 20Gb partition to a 40Gb. Very sweet.
 
I think partitions are a hangover from older filesystems(FAT32 maybe) which could only be a max of 30Gig or so.

With NTFS makes no real difference -
 
No, its a leftover from fat16 that could only do..... 2GB per partition!!!!

But actually it does have its uses to have partitions sometimes.
 
In my experience partitions DO slow down your performance but at the end of the day the speed reduction is so small that it isnt really worth mentioning.
To get a decent performance I'd suggest 2 drives (or more) with only windows and apps on your primary drive and keep the other drive for data storage. then to beef up your performance change your pagefile to reside on the second drive not the primary.
 
So when i get my new hard drive, how much space should I partition for XP?
I guess around 5-6Gb will be enough space wise (purley XP and its patches/whatever else goes in the windows folder) and i dont really use any patches, automatic updates are not for me.

Is there a benifit to giving more space for XP to run with? Even if it doesnt need it and its only a partition?

Also, if i get Vista, exactly how much does it use up? 15-20GB?

I use 2 hardrives btw, one wit ha partition for XP and for my games installs and my movies and TV series, and then another for music game ISO's apps, pics etc.
 
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