By choice I have the swap file on a different physical disc to the system partition. Partition Magic is a very reliable program. Even so I would echo SNGX and say back up before using it.

Ah, you are right. I don't know how I typed 2 posts on it and didn't catch that. I do infact on both computers I own that have multiple hard disks, have the swap partition on a drive other than the OS drive. Good Catch IronDuke.

SNGX1275
I must say I was surprised that you didn't do this. I thought it a fairly common practice amongst experienced users.

well, since i can't afford Partition Magic and i was in the process of dumping all the music i don't listen to anymore. i should be able to move the files i have left, off of the 80G. Between my wifes and my kids pcs. I should have enough space. :knock: kind of slow setting in that i could do that, I have us all on a network. Thanks to mebers here that taught me how to network!!!


that said and will be done, how to i repartition the drive? without a program i have to buy. is there a command i can run? or something?

i remember someone saying to put my pagefile on my other drive, then i read i should put it in its own partition on the main one.


:eek: Bipolar

These are destuctive methods and so will wipe all data off. Simply install Windows on one disc nad during the installation you'll be given the existing partitions and asked if you want to use these. If you say no you can then delete the old partitions and create new ones.
After doing this you can transfer as many files as you wish to keep from the second drive and then use Disk Management which can be found from Administrive Tools | Computer Management
Create a small partition 1.5 - 2 GB for the swap file on the second drive.
To move the swap file go to Control Panel | System | Advanced tab. Under Performance click Settings go to Advanced tab and under Virtual memory click Change and set [Partition created for swap file]
Select Custom size and set Initial and Maximum size to the size of your swap partition. That is both set to the same size. Click Set. Close out and restart.

Thanks for this link Phant. I had my partitions pretty much sorted. However I had not given any thought to access times. Having been made aware of this I shall be doing a little shuffling.

Again I say cheers Phant very useful.

I read that twice now and it still confuses me some. "bipolar" if i understand it right i should separate my 40 gig like this 1. OS(8 gigs) 2. dummy os(1.5 gigs) - i have dsl and never shut down my pc 3. programs(10gigs) 4. misc. (17.5) give or take. says its 40gigs, realy only 37gigs. Or take my 80g and make it the main drive and do somthing similiar. just have 1 more partition thats 40 gigs for music. Use the 40gig drive for videos. still not sure what is better. (too many options- I CAN'T PROCESS IT) between the drugs i am on for the bipolar and other conditions, and the drugs i self medicated with before i found out i was bipolar... memory is bad and looking at more than a couple options... i get easily confused.

Sorry its just the way i am!


:eek: Bipolar

The dummy OS is a personal thing - I don't do it. Around 10GB for Windows this will also accommodate programs, but you can put them on their own partition. I used to do that but decided that it was not worth it as I found it easier to accept the defaults when using a roaming profile. The main point is to put the swap file on the second disc. Ideally this would be the first partition for best performance.

Thanks IronDuke,

One last ? then should i use the 80G for the main drive or the 40G.
the 80G is newer the 40G is the Factory drive.






Thank you all,

:eek: Bipolar

The chances are the newer drive will be a little quicker and also should be further away from failure.

Good luck with it.

Thanks again IronDuke, i will be dumping my pc now. Be back in a couple hours... make that around five...have to move the 30Gigs of music over to partition the 80G...lol





Bipolar

Drinking when I made the first without mentioning it, and slightly hungover when I made the 2nd :P.

I think a large part why I missed it is the last 3 times I set up partitions (one of my 1hd systems, my mom's comp, and my grandma's comp) were all 1 drive systems. But my 2 systems where I have more than 1 hd have the swap on a different drive on a different channel.

i'm up and running again..lol all updates for windows included. Just have to finish installing programs.


Thanks for all the advice and the help understanding.

Bipolar

No problem at all. Glad we reached a successful conclusion.

ok I have a 120GB HD and and my comp is mainly a gaming comp with a little bit of movies and music what would be a good way to partition should i run the OS and the games all on the first partition and if so how much room should i use for my OS and applications?

i pretty much allot ..say 10 to 12 gigs for the os and programs...you have to assume xp will outgrow anything smaller..bloated monster that it is..then use other drives and partitions for game installs and raw storage of mp3 and video..sounds simplistic but statistically i dont get much better performance with more elite methods..guess when you hit a terrabyte of storage you tend to get sloppy.

Interesting, I think I've read this once before.. And I don't think it goes into discussion about SWAP file and such...

I have 2 drives, 74gb Raptor is partitioned to 30gb C: System drive (WinXP), I also use it for some programs, 44gb D is dedicated program files drive. The 160gb 7200rpm drive has 2 partitions: 152gb: for downloads, photos (RAWs take up to 8mb each), music, videos, etc, 8gb Z (at the fast end of the disk): 4gb fixed Windows paging file, the other 4gb is available for Photoshop - I've tested it with more open photos with multiple layers each, and Photoshop's swap file became only 2gb.

Oh, and I also have a (now) external drive with all the files from before 'the big crash'. I've learned backups are worth more than $100 which is the cost of new disk. If I lost all my photos... I would feel kinda dumb in retrospective. Partitioning aids the disk so that it's more easy to defragment, is more easily accessible in other words - you don't torture it, and the odds are, it's going to live longer.

Does anyone have suggestions for the best way to partition a new 250GB HDD? The system isn't used for anything too taxing (i.e. big time gaming, video editing etc.), and serves more as a "jack of all trades". There's also a chance it will have a second, older and slower, 20GB HDD as well. Should I be making the older HDD solely for the OS, or should I stick w/ the newer and more reliable HDD for everything and just partition more intelligently? Thanks!

Stick with the newer, it's faster.

Perhaps it would not be a bad idea to partition the older HDD in two parts, the smaller, maybe 4 GB one for Windows paging file and the other part for storage of movies, zipped up programs, etc.