How best to partition 100Gb hard disk

At last, my new system is here:

Athlon XP 1900+
Windows XP Home
512Mb PC2100 SDRAM
100Gb HDD
64Mb Geforce 3 Ti+500 graphics
18" LG TFT monitor
Videologic Digitheatre 5.1 speakers

I've read it's a good idea to separate applications, windows, downloads, even MP3s, and the swapfile....and more!

Where do I start, how do I start? I'm anxious to keep this system pristine from day one, so I haven't installed a thing and am writing this from my sh*tty old P200.

Any advice gratefully received

 

madbadger,

Congrats on getting your new PC. Looks to be a pretty nice system with loads of HD space, RAM and other "goodies".

You are most wise to ask first and do later........

Here is a link to get you started

http://www.newlogic.co.uk/kbase/fdisk/page1.htm

You may be best to post this in the hardware forum, but we'll see how you do here first.

DS

 

I'm getting confused now, my system was delivered with one huge 100Gb partition, containing Windows XP & the utilities & drivers already loaded onto it.

When I went hunting for a way of partitioning the drive further I found this utility in controlpanel/performance & maintainance/admintools/computer management/ which supposedly allows you to create partitions. Am I right?

Anyway, when I try to open disk management in the sub menu of computer management(local), as windows help suggested, I get an error message: Logical disk manager- the RPC server is unavailable.

What is going on here? I found an entry in Help referring to XP's built in firewall & RPC whatever it is. Is this problem occurring because I don't have Outlook or an internet connection configured yet. As you can tell I'm new to all this.

Also if I further partition my 100Gb disk will I lose the programs installed on it by the manufacturer. All I want to do is create a partition fot the OS & applicaations, one for data, one for games & one for music possibly. Help!

 

Oh, another query, I thought of buying Partition Magic 7, BUT it only supports disks up to 80Gb, will I "lose" 20Gb if I use this programme? I'm beginning to regret that huge HD.

Any advice would be very welcome

 

You can separate things in folders just as efficiently as you can separate them in partitions. I know people with very large HDs that do not partition them and claim it is easier to get to everything.

You want to be careful installing second rate software that wants its own folder directly under C. Redirect it during install to your Program Files folder or you will get too many folders directly under the C drive to be able to find things easily.

I have my drives formatted. The main advantage is that I can have a small boot drive (4Gb) that I can Ghost to use as a restore when the system gets cranky with OS decay. I just keep the OS and programs on the boot drive. I also like to have a separate partition for graphics so I can set the cluster size high. Since my graphics files are large the large clusters don’t waste too much space and speed things up a little. Your clusters are going to be pretty large anyway if you don’t partition.

” Note however that XP Setup does not include any capability to non-destructively repartition your hard drives; if you need to do this to dual-boot XP, you will need a third party application such as the excellent Partition Magic 7.” http://www.winsupersite.com/reviews/windowsxp.asp
This means you can’t partition without software like Partition Magic without formatting your HD and losing everything on the computer. That might be your best approach if you have all of your drivers and programs to install. Get back if you want to try that and someone will direct you to some good tutorials.

It is going to take you a while to fill up the 80 Gigs that Partition Magic 7 will give you. I presume it will partition 80 Gigs of your 100. You might drop their support an e-mail before getting it to confirm that.

 

Thanx for taking the time to reply, I agree that it's PM 7 for me tomorrow morning!

I accept it'll take a good long time to fill 80Gb, I can live with the other 20Gb "lurking" in the background, until PM8 appears perhaps. I've already emailed the company to ask their advice.

NOW..... a further problem....unable to dial out at all:

Error 633 the port the modem is installed on is already in use by something else! (COM3)

I've checked device manager, system information, no problem devices, no sign of COM 3 anywhere, no conflicts to be seen

I do have a network card, not set up yet, also a TV tuner, but neither of these seem to be the problem.....I have installed nothing on this system, just tried to dial out on the manufacturer's preinstalled ISP, which seems to be correctly configured. My problem is I'm used to windows9x, this NT/XP set up looks v different "under the hood" and I don't know where to look for help.

Can anyone enlighten me......again ta!

A very Madbadger

 

Thanx for taking the time to reply, I agree that it's PM 7 for me tomorrow morning!

I accept it'll take a good long time to fill 80Gb, I can live with the other 20Gb "lurking" in the background, until PM8 appears perhaps. I've already emailed the company to ask their advice.

NOW..... a further problem....unable to dial out at all:

Error 633 the port the modem is installed on is already in use by something else! (COM3)

I've checked device manager, system information, no problem devices, no sign of COM 3 anywhere, no conflicts to be seen

I do have a network card, not set up yet, also a TV tuner, but neither of these seem to be the problem.....I have installed nothing on this system, just tried to dial out on the manufacturer's preinstalled ISP, which seems to be correctly configured. My problem is I'm used to windows9x, this NT/XP set up looks v different "under the hood" and I don't know where to look for help.

Can anyone enlighten me......again ta!

A very Madbadger

 

Well.. you won't once you start using your computer. I went and got a WD 100 GB HD right when they came out (coincincentally right when I built my P4) and in less than 2 months I had already filled 20 GB... and now I have about 28 or so... so depending on what applications you use your computer for you might notice you won't have a problem filling the HD... but 100 GB and even 80 GB is still ALOT of space and PM should have a version supporting 100 GB by the time you fill the 80.

Also... on a 100 GB drive you are going to have alot of slack space... (the best I could do was 6.9%) so I'm assuming PM will give you a full 80 GB so you really are only losing 10 GB or so...

 

Also... I almost forgot... for most users... you will only need one, or possibly two partitions and like it has been mentioned you can just as efficiently manage things in folders just as with partitions... and folders are less of a hassel once you decide you don't want it anymore... however the more partitions you have the less slack space you will have... but at 100 GB you don't really need to try to squeze a GB or two here and there...

 

madbadger,

I sorry I kinda sorta bailed on you there, but I see you are in good hands here all the same.
I've been curious as to XP and I understand it to be quite stable, I hope you'll post back and let us know what you think there also.

Hey deuce_mn, you've been all over the place here lately.

DS

 

Well DS (or are you DD now... ) actually I have been busier than normal lately... (finals... ugh...grr... which my professors don't seem to really care about... but then again I guess they aren't taking them with us are they... ) anyway I was here last night for ten minutes and haven't been here otherwise since monday or so. I usually make my rounds through the boards but I can't believe I am actually saying this but I have been busy with more important things... (wait... are there more important things than TSG???... ) But yeah... I usually get around...

madbager... so I am interested to hear how you like Xp also... I hear it is very stable and a knock-out OS (surprisingly). I am planning to get it as soon as possible and was supposed to make $250 today and saturday busing tables but it didn't work out... so maybe I will have to wait another week for Xp. I am said I am so busy... I will have hours to catch up on here...

 

A 100-Gigabyte drive partitioned as a single partition does not have twice the available storage space as a 50-Gigabyte. The problem is that huge partitions have huge amounts of slack space. Slack space is the difference between the acutal size of a file and the space allocated to it by the OS.

On a 100-Gigabyte drive, partitioning is of great importance. I wrote the following article when much smaller drives were predominant; but, the same principles apply to your 100-Gigabyte disk. Proper partitioning on such a large disk will be very important to you so I suggest also that you get an understanding of slack space vs. partition size.

There is a Partition/Cluster/Slack table below; but, because of HTML formatting, columns are lost. You'll have to reconstruct the columns for yourself.

The article is pasted below:
====================
A 32-Gig drive can store as much data as a 38-Gig drive. This is not an article on compression, either. Compression is not a factor. If disk space is not important to you, don't read any further. The size of partitions on a hard disk is the most important factor in having the maximum total storage space.

Slack Space as Related to Cluster and Partition Sizes:
Usable drive space and total drive space aren't the same in a FAT system. The Windows FAT32 system divides the hard disk space into clusters and uses a File Allocation Table (FAT) to keep track of which data is stored in each cluster. Cluster size is related to partition size. The following is a table giving the various partition sizes and their corresponding cluster sizes.

Partition Cluster Slack
====== ===== ====
Up to 7.9-Gig 4K 1%
8 to 15.99 8K 3%
16 to 31.99 16K 7%
32G to 2TB 32K 14%

The above table agrees with Upgrading and Repairing PCs, Eleventh Edition, Page 1402 by Scott Meuller, a recognized authority. However, my own experience has taught me that there are variances from this table. Slack space is more directly tied to cluster size, not partition size. Partition size is important only in the sense that larger partitions generally use larger clusters (allocation units).

Slack space will vary from hard disk to hard disk, depending on the data the user stores and the programs loaded; however, unless the system is used for something highly unusual, that variance is extremely small, overall.

Definition of Slack: The difference between the storage space a file actually needs and the space allocated to it in the FAT.

Only one file or portion of a file can be stored in a single cluster. No two files can occupy space in the same cluster. If a file only 1 byte in size is stored in a cluster, it will be allocated a full 16 Kilobytes of space by the FAT in a 16-Gig partition. If a file is 16K plus 1 byte in size, it will occupy one complete cluster plus one byte in another cluster for a total allocated space of 32K. So, a file 16K+1byte takes 32K of disk space. The remaining space in the second cluster is "slack" space.

Most files on a hard disk are very small and almost none have sizes that leave no slack space. So, slack space should be considered when choosing how to partition a hard disk.

Example: two single 15.99-Gig partitions will store about the same total data as a single 38-Gig partition.

The math:
38-Gigs x .72 (100% total space minus 28% slack space or 72% usable space) is 38 x .72 = 27.4 Gigs of usable space.

two 15.99 Gig partitions (32-Gigs when rounded) have only 14% slack space. So, 32 x 86% (usable) = 27.52 Gigs of usable drive space.

So, a 32-Gig drive divided into two 15.99-Gig partitions will store about the same total data as a 38-Gig drive partitioned as 38 Gigs.

 

With 100 GB I am most certainly not concerned with maximizing disc space, so I don't care how I partition it. Your article is good and informative but I may need to disagree with some of your figures. On a 20 GB drive partitioned as 20 GB I have gotten only 6% with Western Digital. 8% with Maxtor on a 20 GB with 20 Gb partition. On my 100 GB WD partitioned as100 GB I have only 6.9 % slack. According to your chart I should have over 30% slack with FAT 32. Am I reading something wrong or am I misuderstanding the definition? I always thought the term meant just as you said it.

 

The last time I used Partition Magic it had a cluster control to determine cluster size regardless of partition size. I made the clusters in my graphics partition large because most of my graphics are saved as large TIFFs and it would be silly to use 8k clusters.

MS allocated the cluster size for a reason. There is a balance between cluster size and speed. If you were to either partition or set the cluster size so they were 8k on a 100 Gig HD the FAT would enormous. The MS philosophy to give up some slack space for speed on large drives was not a stupid decision. That isn’t to say that someone who wants to wring the last bit of space from their HD shouldn’t downsize the clusters some. Just be aware that things will bog down a little as the drive gets full.

 

deuce,

Those cluster sizes were taken from several machines from several locations and used for average business applications and user-created data. The figures were averaged from these machines. These machines were not used for games or large graphics.

What method are you using to determine your slack space?