Best way to partition a harddisk?

[makeitcount]

What's the best way to partition a harddisk speaking of prefered size. Meaning that partition C for XXX should be atleast 10 gb and partition D for YYY should be atleast 20 gb and then the rest could go into parition E etc.

So how did you partition yours, what did you put where and how would you do it if you had to do it all over again? =)

[ashleys]

I have ALWAYS partitioned my drive into a C: and D: drive configuration. This is true for both my desktop machines and my ThinkPad. My ThinkPad is currently a backup to my desktop and I can switch to using it immediately and the disk/file configuration matches my desktop exactly.


C: is the system volume volume and it contains only the OS and installed applications in the Program Files (sub)folders.

D: Contains all my user data, vendor downloads, E-Mail stores, Documents, Spreadsheets etc., etc., etc.

All the folders on the D: are correctly named to indicate their data content and where required they have subfolders. For example, I have a folder called Downloads and then subfolders for all the vendors (eg, Hitachi, ASUS, Logitech etc).

In the early days, when Windows re-installs were more common this configuration saved me heaps of time. I could just keep re-installing on C: and D: was untouched with all my data immediately available. In later years it has become more useful from a backup point of view. I have some simple DOS batch files which do all my incremental backups/restores from the D: drive.
I never have to worry where my data is because I know it always in the correct folder on D:

As an aside, even though I use automated tools such as Microsoft Update and Software Installer to check levels of service I always download service and install it by hand. This means that in the event of a total failure and being unable to the OS from a backup, I can install from product disks and then apply the required service without need for internet access.

You may have gathered from this, I have never used the Microsoft way of globally using "My Documents". Furthermore, their default way in most products, of placing the default data store in some stupid named subfolder in the bowels of the C: drive I find utterly ridiculous. How on earth are most people going to remember where their data REALLY is and more importantly backup it.

As for sizing, I try and ensure that once I have fully installed the system my C: drive has at least 30-40% spare (just in case ). As an example, I recently upgraded to XP (from W2K) and my C: drive on the desktop has 47% free and on my T30 it has 42% free.
My current allocations are as follows,

Desktop - 160GB drive
C: 13.5 Gb
D: 140 Gb

ThinkPad - 100Gb drive
C: 18.1 Gb
D: 75 Gb

[Paul Unger]

I'd say Ashley has got it right--get your data and software updates/downloads on a separate partition. I just reloaded Windows and it was quite painless, really. My wife thought it would take all day . . . and it would have (figuring out and finding what I had to back up), had I not had all the 'important' stuff in a different partition.

Another scenario, just to prove a point. A friend's computer started bsod-ing on him; every five minutes (or less). I tried to help him salvage his data. It was all on c: . . . And he had a SATA drive. And I only had a PATA USB HD enclosure (I know, I'm so old school!) to get it off his drive onto another machine. And I didn't want to just reload Windows and overwrite his data. We finally traced the problem to a flaky stick of RAM (he had two, and when the first one loaded up and tried to access the second--bam--bsod; or at least that's my take on what the problem was . . . ) We replaced the RAM and the machine hummed away into the sunset. But my point is, if he'd had his data on a different partition from c:, we could have saved ourselves about, oh, four hours trying to figure out how to salvage his data. Do yourself a favour--partition your drive.

For what it's worth . . .

[tomh009]

Errr, how would that have saved four hours? What would you have done? Blown away the Windows partition (which in the end would not have solved anything)?

[Paul Unger]

OK, you got me!

I guess I figured that if we could have transferred his data in a reasonable manner, we would have been free(er) to explore other options. And through process of elimination, get to the source of the problem a bit quicker. But because we were so intent on preserving his data, that became the primary objective (at least for some four hours [spread over two days]). Obviously, my trouble-shooting skills are not the best: my first suspect was Windows, and yes, my first course of action would have been to reinstall it. But I did learn something through it all--a machine with two sticks of RAM can *boot* with one flaky stick (which was in the secondary slot [btw, it was a DELL, not a TP]), but *crash* in subsequent operation.

I still think a data partition is essential . . .

[tomh009]

I used to always do two partitions, but I have given up on that as it usually ends up that the planned ratios will eventually be wrong.

I also hate to reinstall Windows, as it means setting up everything all over again, probably a good day's worth of work. But XP allows you to do a second install on the same partition, just specify a different directory, and keep your existing one if you want to test a clean install. And even if you install in the same directory, it won't reformat your hard disk unless you tell it to.

That's all assuming, of course, that you are booting from a generic or OEM Windows XP CD. If you are using recovery CDs, your choices are rather limited.

P.S. Are you actually on the Solomon Islands? Very cool ...

[GomJabbar]

I used to always do two partitions, but I have given up on that as it usually ends up that the planned ratios will eventually be wrong.

Same experience here. I have come to realize that one maximizes their hard disk space with a single partition.

The above does not mean that I haven't kept a small service partition or a boot manager partition, with space requirements that do not grow appreciably over time. When I used to use OS/2, I had minimal OS/2 install on a small second partition for maintenance tasks. On my T42, I do keep the service partition for the possibility that I may need it out on the road one of these days. After all, what's 5 GB these days? You'll quite likely end up losing significantly more than that by separating your OS and data partitions. Nevertheless, as long as your hard drive has plenty of excess capacity, it probably doesn't matter very much how you partition it (within reason).

tomh009 alludes to another point of consideration. If you ever use the Product Recovery Discs to restore your system, you will lose any extra partitions created anyway.

[ashleys]

Good point about data recovery mechanisms wiping out the complete drive or indeed when you upgrade your drive.

However, my C; and D: drive makes life easier for that as well.
I know that to recover all my user data I just need to restore everything from the D: volume backup.

My backup methodology is that I have two USB external drives, one called backup and one called archive. I have DOS batch files of the same name which just have a one line XCOPY copy command with the correct switches to copy from D: to whichever copy volume. Doing an incremental copy at the VOLUME level means you never have to worry about keeping the backup lists up-to-date.
It's quick, simple, requires no maintenace to keep the procedures up-to-date and therefore encourages it's regular use

Recently when I upgraded my ThinkPad disk I just used RnR to restore my C: volume, formatted my D: partition and then used my restore batch file (one line XCOPY again) to restore my D: volume.

[w0qj]

Last year, i shared that my hard drive which was partitioned into C:\ and D:\ partitions, and then I used RnR v3.x to do restore my C:\ partition.

Resulted in unbootable C:\ after 2nd reboot, needing format of HDD (to erase the 2 partitions), then Product Recovery CD's.


Are you guys saying that RnR has improved to the point that it can restore the C:\ partition, leaving the D:\ partition untouched?

[Paul Unger]

I don't use R&R . . . I just reinstall WindowsXP (and all my other software) from a bootable CD I made from the i386 folder (is that called an OEM disk?). And I'm positive *that* approach leaves the D:\ partition intact--just did it last week. It means I have to reload some other software (office, email, web browser, etc.), but I'm up for that. I play around with so many different software apps--loading and unloading them--that I figure a clean install from time to time will make for a clean(er) registry. But I stand to be corrected on that . . .

[ashleys]

Doing a standard Windows install will keep the D: drive intact, been there, done that.

Using RnR to recover my C: volume WILL wipe out the entire drive. Been there, done that as well. At the beginning of the full restore you get a message about configuring the system. It appears to formatting C: at this point to the size it was when the backup was made. When the system is restored your C: drive has a new volume serial number, proving a format was done. However, as I mentioned, it's so easy to restore the entire D: volume it's no problem at all.

[mhm]

Are you guys saying that RnR has improved to the point that it can restore the C:\ partition, leaving the D:\ partition untouched?

Yes. Just did it last weekend after loosing the winxp MBR (I did a full backup and copied it before the test). So, booting R&R from the HD I selected to "restore factory contents" were it asked to format only C: or restore the original disk partitioning (something to that effect).

It worked as promised and left my linux partition alone and still working as well as the D: drive. After a deep breath of relief I restored the OS/Program partition from an external usb drive.

I'm using R&R version 3.10.0022.