[ZeRealBigBoss]

I cannot but wonder how many people do not take the simplest precaution for a data loss, especially knowing that Windows is so notoriously unstable and has to be re-installed so often. Still, the following is also valid enough for other OS-es.

If you have just one physical hard disk, do not format it completely as one disk, C:. Before installing Win98/95 run fdisk and partition the disk into, say, a 15GB part for C: and the rest for d: ; if you have XP, Vista or Linux you can do that during the installation itself. Then install Windows and all the applications only in C: and put all data only, but only and exclusively, in D:. If now comes the final crash, you can reformat C: without fearing that data are lost and make a new, absolutely clean install. Still, in the worst case you will have to re-install all your application programs again which can take a few hours.

If you can not reformat, your old Windows installation stays on your disk, and it is rather difficult to avoid taking over the built-up errors that are accumulated over time.

If you have an old hard hard disk of 10-20GB, connect that one as C: and the new one as D:, even better. Best of all: buy an image software, make a complete install of everything that you need, configure all programs the way you want them, test all programs for functionality and then make an image of C: on D: or on a CD. If something goes wrong, just restore the image and within 30 minutes everything runs fine again, viruses gone, registry file clean, settings restored.

All this may sound as a no-brainer, but it seems that hardly anyone does it.

[Stoner]

Good advice.....

Been doing it myself.
Has saved me a lot of time and trouble keeping the data on a different partition and a drive image of C:/ in reserve in case of corruption.

[JohnWill]

Data you don't have at least two copies of is data you don't care about.

[IceCoveR]

Great advice. I used, but I can not make my friends to do it. But in the end when I finish installing their Windows they are the ones who are installing all the programs.

[bizziebill]

Have to agree with johnwill, have all of my docs backed up on external drive & zip drive.
Lost lots of stuff in the past.

[Stoner]

Multiple backups are wise.
Re-imaging is no big deal.......but lose your only hard drive and the games over

[sideliner]

Good advice, thanks.

Also a good reminder to me about doing a backup. I keep procrastinating, but I'll be really sorry if something horrible happens. I'm gonna make that a priority.

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

If you have just one physical hard disk, do not format it completely as one disk, C:. Before installing Win98/95 run fdisk and partition the disk into, say, a 15GB part for C: and the rest for d: ; if you have XP, Vista or Linux you can do that during the installation itself. Then install Windows and all the applications only in C: and put all data only, but only and exclusively, in D:. If now comes the final crash, you can reformat C: without fearing that data are lost and make a new, absolutely clean install. Still, in the worst case you will have to re-install all your application programs again which can take a few hours.

I'd also like to understand more about "partitioning." Are you saying that if a system crashes (while the personal data is in a separate partition) the data will still be safe? I've always been a little confused about that. For instance, is it possible that a crash could wipe out the OS as well as the data in the separate partition? Or are there different types of crashes?

Okay, it seems too late for me now to do what is described above. My 160GB hard drive (which is full and needs backing up) was already partitioned when I bought the PC, with the OS recovery residing in a small partition. At least that gives me some protection for regaining my OS if it crashes, (I also made a copy of recovery CDs), but that still doesn't protect my own accumulated data, which is now even more valuable to me than the OS. Even if I completely lost all copies of the OS, I sure wouldn't like coughing up the money to replace it, but at least I could just go buy another. But wow, there's no way at all to "buy" all my personal stuff again. So yeah, after a while the OS becomes even less valuable than the personal stuff.

And now I'm thinking as I always do at times like this... i.e. "on my NEXT computer..." yes, I'll be using your suggestion to keep my personal data separate from the OS. Thanks.

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

If you have an old hard hard disk of 10-20GB, connect that one as C: and the new one as D:, even better. Best of all: buy an image software, make a complete install of everything that you need, configure all programs the way you want them, test all programs for functionality and then make an image of C: on D: or on a CD. If something goes wrong, just restore the image and within 30 minutes everything runs fine again, viruses gone, registry file clean, settings restored.

This part is also confusing for me. Can you explain more about "image software" and how it works?

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

All this may sound as a no-brainer, but it seems that hardly anyone does it.

Ah, I do fully confess to often having "no brain" ...
but hey, I'm trying my best to alleviate that.

[JohnWill]

Backup should be on a separate physical disk. While it's true that many times separate partitions will not lose data during a crash, that's not always the case.

[ZeRealBigBoss]

Oops, that last sentence was not really meant to qualify or quantify you in particular :-)

As John says, you should have a second hard disk in your machine on which you regularly make a 1:1 copy of the data that you have on your working disk. What does a disk cost you, $80? That is less than what you will pay per hour for data recovery. Btw, a partition is another word for a "part"; you must know that we computer guys have our own names for simple things, that improves our self-esteem, just like in the military.

There are two types of crashes: one is caused by the operating system getting so tangled up (on its own, by frequent installing/de-installing for example) or so destroyed (by you, by a virus, by a badly written application) that the only way to get it running decently again is by wiping it all of and re-installing it; the other crash is physical, when a hard disk suddenly starts losing magnetism and drops bits all over the place or when the electronic parts give up.

For the first type not to affect you and cause a data loss, you should have the physical hard disk partitioned in a small part, always called C:, where the OS is and a second one, D:, where all the data are. In that way you can format the OS completely off C: and install it again; you will then also have to install all applications again, but that is just a question of a few hours. You say that you have your disk done this way, so you are OK there.

The second failure can be compensated for by regularly making a complete straight copy of your working hard disk's data department to your, physically different, back-up disk. In case of an emergency one of them is likely to still function and have uncorrupted data, although, as John pointed out at the beginning, practice teaches that that often is a false hope; you will find therefor that many people do have two physical HDs to back-up to.

Imaging is just that: making a copy of a disk partition on another location, for example an image of C: on D: or E:, normally in compressed form in order top save space. The imaging, however, does what a sim[ple copying can not: it preserves not only the file, as with copying, but also the phtysical location. The operating system, for example, is a series of files of which two have to be located exactly at a defined place in the beginning of the HD. If you just copy them onto C: the system will not start up. Imaging does preserve the location. For data back-up you do not need imaging, just copy the files; if you want to have your Windows running again quickly without installing it and the applications, you need an imaging package such as Paragon Drive Backup.

[sideliner]

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

Oops, that last sentence was not really meant to qualify or quantify you in particular :-)

No worries, I was just using your comment to poke a little fun at the both of us. And really, sometimes I do genuinely feel that my brain has gone off somewhere else... so yeah, that "no-brain" description seems appropriate. And actually, I totally agree with all you suggested, that taking these types of precautions is simple and should be routine for all of us. I've been procrastinating way too long and definitely need to stop dragging my feet on this one. This thread prompted me to get moving, and I just ordered an external hard drive, so it's on its way.

And thanks for explaining further. I do appreciate your explanations because you're pretty good at writing about it in a way that makes sense to me (despite my unfortunate "no-brain" circumstances )

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

What does a disk cost you, $80? That is less than what you will pay per hour for data recovery.

Good point. When I bought this computer, I was on an extremely tight budget and couldn't even think in terms of an extra hard drive. I also didn't realize I could actually use up all the HD space so fast! There was just no way for me to anticipate that I would be doing the things I'm doing now, (photos and music). So now the idea of adding another internal HD has been kicking around in my head. But even that shouldn't be done without first doing a backup. That's why I settled on buying an external drive first. Fortunately the prices for some external HDs have recently dropped to being almost equal in price to the internals. (I just ordered this 320GB external HD for $100 from amazon.)

Also I've never done any type of installation whatsoever, but I still want to do the interanl HD installation myself, because I'm typically a hands-on type of person. I've been reading techie books, and realizing I need to get up to speed on my techie knowledge before tackling an installation. Although it's probably very simple for you experienced folks, for us newbies it's not as straightforward as simply plugging in an external drive.

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

Btw, a partition is another word for a "part";

Yes, when I first got my computer it took some head-scratching to figure out that the "partitions" were on one physical drive.

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

you must know that we computer guys have our own names for simple things, that improves our self-esteem, just like in the military.

Ah, were you in the military?... so was I, Navy, (and a WAVE ).

Fortunately, my drive was originally partitioned by the HP folks. In my instance drive C is the bigger portion (NTFS, 142GB), and drive D is the smaller partition (FAT, 9GB). My computer officially refers to it as HP_Recovery (D)... but I always thought that meant it was a type of backup copy to the "real" OS, a separate copy that stayed untouched and unaffected by the usual goings-on. And I thought the OS that was actually doing all the work was on drive C with the rest of my data and other software. Are you saying the "HP_Recovery" is my actual OS that my PC uses everyday in order to run things?

Also, can you explain the advantage of having the 2 partitions formatted differently (NTFS and FAT). I remember reading something about why it's done that way, but I can't recall the reasoning behind it.

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

The imaging, however, does what a sim[ple copying can not: it preserves not only the file, as with copying, but also the phtysical location. The operating system, for example, is a series of files of which two have to be located exactly at a defined place in the beginning of the HD. If you just copy them onto C: the system will not start up. Imaging does preserve the location.

Okay, you seem to have anticipated my next question, and also answered it. As I was reading your comments I had begun to wonder why not just copy everything as is. I didn't know the OS needed to be in a specific location on the HD in order to stay operable. Yep, this is good stuff to know.

And thanks again. You've been a big help.

[ZeRealBigBoss]

Morning Sideliner,

When you said that your drive has two partitions I presumed that the smaller one would be for the programs and the bigger one for the data, as would be the most logical choice. Wrong, thus.

Let's start with FAT and NTFS. Both are an organisation to write files on a disk, FAT being the older one from the DOS times and NTFS the newer one from NT and XP upwards. These are Windows standard; Linux and Unix e.g. use again a different ones, but these both can read and write FATs and read NTFS. There is nothing wrong with either system; what disturbs me about NTFS is that, to my knowledge, it makes the files only accessible if Windows itself is running, so when Windows goes bust you have had it if you are using only this OS. What's more, Windows restricts the user in what he is allowed to do with the files and directories, unlike DOS and Linux. This is why I prefer FAT; after a desaster I can still load my DOS with a floppy and do anything I want. That is most probably also the reason why your 9GB is a FAT system. Smart guys at HP.

What follows now is if you want to take some trouble and time to make things right. If you want to leave things as they are and are content with just a single backup on an extra drive, you can save yourself that.

What I would suggest you do is that first you make, no: HAVE TO make, a complete copy of your data and not-installed executive files onto your new disk because you will next change your internal HD with a GNU re-sizer. Check whether indeed everything is well copied over before you disconnect your back-up drive (and any other internal, for that matter), so you can not make a mistake here.

******
Then go here:

http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page , read that and download the ISO file from here:

http://www.sysresccd.org/Download

Burn a bootable CD from this ISO file and boot on this CD. Now with GNUparted you can erase your existing partitions and create two new ones, the C: with, say, 15GB and D: with the rest. The file system you want to choose is either NTFS or FAT32 (VFAT).
******

The things between the ****** and the ****** you can also do differently, if you can get a bootable floppy with DOS7 (= Windows98) and fdisk.exe and format on it. Boot with the floppy, call fdisk, say yes to large FAT32 and delete first all partitions. Then create with option 1 one partition of 15GB and make that active with 2. Then create the second partition using all the rest of the space. Check whether everything is right with 4. You then re-boot on the floppy and format the partions, although the WXP installation will automatically do that for you, if I remember that well.

This is the main procedure continuation:
Boot with your XP CD and make a complete installation of Windows and every application you want to have running; install Windows and the applications ("program files" folder) all on C:. If you before have chosen the FAT system, the installation will ask you whether you want to make it NTFS. You can do that, but I have not noted a markable speed difference if you keep the FAT system.

When everything is installed, connect the external drive again and copy everything, except the Windows- and the Program Files directories, to your disk D:. Erase the Windows- and Program Files directories on your backup drive.

Ready. It will take you about half a day to do all this. Do not fear, because you will be guided through most of the process and nothing can happen to your data as they are safe on another drive, well, that is, as long as you do not mistakenly erase the back-up. Don't laugh, it happened often enough. Doing this also gives you a feel how things work and what you can do if something goes wrong later on.

If you later on connect a second internal drive to your machine, Windows will automatically detect it if it is a standard drive; if it is a SATA drive you will want to run New Hardware in the control panel after connecting it the first time.

Not being an US citizen, I was in a different army. Because of all those Commies around at those times, 40 years ago in Europe the draft was standard, and they put me in a LRPG. I still prefer solid ground under my feet. :-)

[ZeRealBigBoss]

Forgot to mention that: the second partion with fdisk is of course to be made under the heading "secondary", the first one bing primary.

[sideliner]

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

Morning Sideliner

Morning, you say? Haha, when you wrote that it was way past my bedtime, and pitch black outside. But, I guess it's all relative, eh?

I also had the same idea as you about eventually trying to set up my system in the way you recommended in your first post, but wow, I didn't know it would get so complicated. While reading your instructions, I started feeling a little panicky, because you write about this very casually. But for me it all seems very drastic, scary, especially for someone with my limited skills and knowledge. I'm not so sure I'll be able to pull this off successfully. Or maybe you have more faith in my ability than you should?

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

Do not fear...

Okay, that was actually kinda funny, because I was at that exact moment feeling quite a lot of fear, and trying my best not to panic. LOL

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

Do not fear, because you will be guided through most of the process...

Well, that's somewhat reassuring. So does that mean I can count on you to definitely stick around for a while? (I have serious abandonment issues )... And will you sign a guarantee in blood?... (okay, just kidding, sorta.)

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

...do not mistakenly erase the back-up. Don't laugh, it happened often enough.

Darn it, I wasn't even laughing until I read that part. LOL
Okay, I don't feel any safer knowing that that really has happened to someone. Oh my.

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

Doing this also gives you a feel how things work and what you can do if something goes wrong later on.

Yes, right now that is actually my biggest motivation in wanting to tackle this, because I'm desperate to know how things work. And because I do think gaining this kind of knowledge will help me sort out other problems later. Agreed. And also I naturally have this intense curiosity about all of this that won't let me have any peace. And I like tinkering. Otherwise, I'd probably throw up my hands right now, geez.

Well, you did answer lots of questions again, but also you inspired many new ones. I'll have to read through this a few more times, absorbing and processing, because it's all very new and foreign to me. And I'll also have to figure out where to start asking more of my questions. For instance, I don't understand what a GNU-resizer is, or what it does. And lot of other things are also vague, computer words and phrases I've heard before, but I don't really know how to interpret them.

Originally Posted by ZeRealBigBoss

Not being an US citizen, I was in a different army. Because of all those Commies around at those times, 40 years ago in Europe the draft was standard, and they put me in a LRPG. I still prefer solid ground under my feet. :-)

Ah, I did notice your location, but then forgot again, sorry. I'm not usually the self-absorbed and arrogant type of US American.

BTW I'm a few years behind you, as I joined the Navy in 1974. And in 4 years of service I never even set foot on a ship, and I never left U.S. soil. Yeah, just getting out of the Midwest was quite a big adventure.

And BTW again... what's a LRPG?

Okay, good night/morning ZeRealBigBoss
(Um, that's a real "interesting" handle... but am I gonna have to type all of that each time I address you (and with capitals too?) or is an abbreviation acceptable here?

[ZeRealBigBoss]

>>Morning, you say? Haha, when you wrote that it was way past my bedtime, and pitch black outside. But, I guess it's all relative, eh?

I am living in New Zealand and consequently I am 15 hours older than if I would live in the US.

>> Or maybe you have more faith in my ability than you should?

Not really; how do you think most of us learned it? (See also: wiping out the backup at inappropriate moments; that is why I said: do not laugh. Luckily, on an old disk I still had a backup laying around that was about a year old)

>>So does that mean I can count on you to definitely stick around for a while? (I have serious abandonment issues)

No prob. Rather, now is the best opportunity to get some experience, as you will have your data safe and will have to fumble around on your machine anyway. One tends to get hesitant to these exercises on an OK machine, but if now something goes wrong you just start over without having detrimental consquences.

>> And will you sign a guarantee in blood?

Ugh, Red-Indian speak?

>>For instance, I don't understand what a GNU-resizer is, or what it does.

A resizer does exactly that, it re-sizes the partitions and can preserve the files on the disk. "Can" is the choice word, not always "does". GNU means that the program is placed in the public domain, so it is free. However, you have mixed FAT and NTFS and not all resizers can handle that, so I would start completely from the beginning.

>>And BTW again... what's a LRPG?

Long Range Penetration Group, the ones that go with small groups deeper behind the front into enemy area and try not to get caught. But I was drafted and ordered to be a volunteer; I like to think that re. own initiatives I am rather sane.

Call me Ed, shorter is hardly possible. ZeBigBoss is an Englishman in The Adventures of Asterix. ZeRealBigBoss is my general mail account name in Yahoo.com, too.

[sideliner]

Ed has pointed me to some relevant/helpful articles about partitioning, from
http://www.theeldergeek.com/ ... I thought it would be a good idea to post these here for others. These give a clearly written and thorough explanation of partitions, and why they are useful, practical, safer... and step-by-step instructions on how to create partitions...
Partitioning Hard Drives in Windows XP.
What Is A Partition?
One Partition or Multiple Partitions?
Partitioning A Blank Hard Drive During XP Installation
Reassigning Drive Letters
Resizing An Existing Partition On A Single Hard Drive
Creating A Primary Partition In Unallocated Space
Creating An Extended Partition And Logical Drives
Creating Logical Drives In An Extended Partition
Multiple Hard Drive System Partitioning
Converting Basic Disks to Dynamic Disks