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Best way to partition HDD for new Vista install.

fuzzybabybunny

fuzzybabybunny

Moderator<br>Digital & Video Cameras
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Just got a new motherboard and going to need to format and reinstall Vista.

1st HDD: 320GB - OS drive
2nd HDD: 400GB - storage - for now
3rd HDD: 750GB - storage
4th HDD: 750GB - mirrored storage for 3rd drive

How should I partition my drives?

Should I create a small-ish 20GB partition on HDD1 just for Vista OS (no programs, no documents, no swap, etc) and have the second partition, which will be the rest of the 320GB drive, devoted to programs and documents, and have the swap file on another HDD entirely?

If I do this configuration, if I ever need to format the 20GB Vista partition, will I lose the ability to use my programs on the 300GB partition after reinstall because things like the registry will have been nuked?
 
I wouldn't split it up at all. Full 320 gigs on one partition for OS, programs and swap. Keeping installed programs separate so they work after an OS reinstall is pretty hit-or-miss depending on the application, so I wouldn't bother personally. Putting swap on a second drive is ok, but it's a largely overblown issue and you're probably better off not messing with it.

Feel free to do whatever lets you sleep at night though. I take it the in-place motherboard swap didn't work out so well for you?
 
Originally posted by: Skeeedunt
I wouldn't split it up at all. Full 320 gigs on one partition for OS, programs and swap. Keeping installed programs separate so they work after an OS reinstall is pretty hit-or-miss depending on the application, so I wouldn't bother personally. Putting swap on a second drive is ok, but it's a largely overblown issue and you're probably better off not messing with it.

Feel free to do whatever lets you sleep at night though. I take it the in-place motherboard swap didn't work out so well for you?
Click to expand...

Ehhhh... it's not that it didn't work, it's just that I don't really feel like dealing with it. I just want to start with a clean slate because my current install is less than optimal at the moment. Hopefully I can do this next install and configure it correctly right from the get-go, then make a sysprep image of it.
 
Originally posted by: fuzzybabybunny
Just got a new motherboard and going to need to format and reinstall Vista.
Click to expand...

Good luck.

1st HDD: 320GB - OS drive
2nd HDD: 400GB - storage - for now
3rd HDD: 750GB - storage
4th HDD: 750GB - mirrored storage for 3rd drive

How should I partition my drives?
Click to expand...

320GB is pretty big iron for an OS drive, you'll have a lot of space left over
for programs / data, though you'll want to be careful because Vista does eat babies (oops I meant hard drives) when it gets very upset.

Should I create a small-ish 20GB partition on HDD1 just for Vista OS (no programs, no documents, no swap, etc) and have the second partition, which will be the rest of the 320GB drive, devoted to programs and documents, and have the swap file on another HDD entirely?
Click to expand...

20GB is too small for a boot partition. I had to resize a 40GB C: to 50GB just to have a FEW GB left over, and that was without a page file or much any software installed on that partition.

Since you have a big drive, I'd say make C: 70GB, put the pagefile and hibernate file on C (there's no choice about the latter), and install "system" software like anti-virus, firewall, data recovery, whatever on C: also.

Lots of applications will, whether you like it or not, install part or all of themselves to C: even if they can install a "lot" of their files to D:, E:, whatever. So allow at least 10GB for such applications that work better on C: or don't work otherwise.

Also for defrag to work well you need at least 25% free space on your C drive, so that should be what you have left over at all times, probably around 15-25GB free.

Keep in mind all the system restore points and temporary files, temporary internet files, and your user profile (Desktop, "My Documents", "My Music", etc.) will also be on C: and a lot of Vista software really EXPECTS your downloads / documents / etc. to live within your user profile on C:. Internet Explorer is a big case in point.

You'll burn through several gigabytes of restore points, temporary files, uninstall files, etc. just installing SP1 in a few weeks.

You never want to be in a position of saying "oops" I need more space on C: since even with a partition resizer it'll be painful or impossible to fix without a SLOW process.

If I do this configuration, if I ever need to format the 20GB Vista partition, will I lose the ability to use my programs on the 300GB partition after reinstall because things like the registry will have been nuked?
Click to expand...

Yes, you'll lose access to all your programs, this sucks royally. Please tell the fine people at Microsoft this and maybe one day they'll change this "C:" and "Registry" insanity. If we tell a program to install to "D:\Somewhere" then that's EXACTLY where it should go, and if you reformat C:, Dual-boot into another OS, whatever, the program should still be usefully installed on D: where you left it. ALMOST NO program installation will survive a dual-boot or reinstallation of C: even if it didn't install any files on C: just registry data etc. Sorry.

For the partition after C: I'd make one that's just a bit bigger than C: then you have a quick place to image-backup your C: to; not a replacement for copying it to a physically distinct drive for secure backup, but a good quick place for a weekly snapshot or something. It'll also be an easily expendable buffer-zone you could delete if you had to expand C: by resizing it to fill into this area.

Then use the rest of drive 1 for program installations and data and such.

The pair of 750's in a RAID is a nice setup for online storage, though probably wasteful if you only occasionally have to get / put files to them. This is just because Windows is pretty rock-stupid about spinning drives down so unless you're very careful and lucky in setting them into suspend mode, they'll spend a lot of the time powered on and idle or spinning, neither or which is ideal for their operational lifetimes if they're really only needed for a couple of hours per day or less. In many cases for offline storage putting them in a cheap 2nd PC that you can turn off independently
makes some sense.

Then again maybe with some power-tools you can get Vista configured to let those drives to into soft-power-down standby mode after an hour or idle time and not wake up every minute for no good reason...




 
i have a large amount of documents so i keep my OS and programs on a smaller partition, helps with defrag speed, also makes restoring a image from acronis a lot quicker, my C drive is typ 30-40 gb, i also keep a copy of my documents on another HD just in case that HD fails, i dont bother with the swap file, i also keep my OS image on another HD.
 
You could image your boot drive or partition then you would not loose your programs installed to a different drive because you would just recover your boot drive using the image. I have done this for years. I'm using XP and less drives though. My setup

C:\ 30 gig Boot drive
D:\ 60 gig programs
E:\ 200 gig backup

OS and all programs that load on boot are installed on C
Any small programs are also installed on C
Any large programs are installed to D
All my data and images from C are on on E
All data and images from E are also copied to a external HD.

I image my boot drive to E after Windows and all programs are installed.
This way if I need to repair XP I just use my backup image. All my programs
on D:\ still work afterward.

If I loose my D drive I just replace the drive and reinstall the programs
again. This has never happened, Knock on wood.

By keeping large programs off your boot drive images made are much smaller and take only a few minutes to make or restore. I can make an image or restore my boot drive in under 10 minutes.

I also make a image of my boot drive right after a clean OS install once its activated. This is so if I want to start clean it takes under 5 minutes to restore the image.

Keep in mind you always want to keep 50% free space on any drive you run programs from because hard drives get slower as they fill up. This also gives some room to grow. So before deciding how you should setup your drives and or partitions if you decide to use them, you need to calculate the space that will be used on each drive.

I use Acronis TrueImage, though there are many other imaging programs you can use.
Keep in mind not all programs support all hardware. So if you decide to buy one test the demo to be sure you can backup and restore images on your system.
 
its also worth noting donot create a fresh install image with a virus software loaded, and use as many windows default drivers as possible but all drivers installed.
 
Originally posted by: wonderwrench
Originally posted by: blazer
its also worth noting donot create a fresh install image with a virus software loaded, and use as many windows default drivers as possible but all drivers installed.
Click to expand...

Good point, that slipped my little mind.
Click to expand...

Why is this?
 
Originally posted by: blazer
a stored image will be out of date as far as the virus definitions go.
Click to expand...

Oh, well that makes sense. But can't you just update all your definitions and drivers right after you boot into the new image? Doesn't seem like that big of a problem.
 
images can be stored for long periods, and the virus definitions not kept up to date will not be updateable and therefor not useable, will cause errors when you have to use them.


as far as the drivers for the OS load all windows defaults drivers you can esp the video, then load only your needed drivers from the MB CD, activate and create your image, then load all programs and create another image, defraging as needed, dumping all temp files also, load your virus prog and get all updates, make a choice where you keep the images and leave them there, never defrag the image hard drive, your ready.
 
Originally posted by: blazer
images can be stored for long periods, and the virus definitions not kept up to date will not be updateable and therefor not useable, will cause errors when you have to use them.


as far as the drivers for the OS load all windows defaults drivers you can esp the video, then load only your needed drivers from the MB CD, activate and create your image, then load all programs and create another image, defraging as needed, dumping all temp files also, load your virus prog and get all updates, make a choice where you keep the images and leave them there, never defrag the image hard drive, your ready.
Click to expand...

The big problem with having AV software installed before you make you first image is, if its a payed version it will expire in time so you would have to uninstall it. Norton comes to mind, as in good luck with the uninstall.

I would never use drivers off the MB CD they are old as hell when you first get the board.
I always download the latest drivers. I do agree that you should only install drivers that the OS does not include for you first backup image after a clean install.

I also agree you need to clean up temp files and defrag before making an image.
You are also right about moving images around. Bad things can happen. I do not know why but I have seen it. If you must more an image copy it then do a integrity check after the copy. Once you know its good delete the original if you no longer need it. I use Perfectdisk and just exclude the directory I store images in. I have done so for several years without problem.
 
Fuzzybabybunny what board did you get? does it have the lattest bios? if not you may want to flash first before any install of the OS, if not sure how to then chk the mfg forum for possible methods on how to.
 
Thanks for the tips guys. I was up all night getting my mobo installed and all the software as well. This was all the way to 7AM. Ugg.

Originally posted by: blazer
Fuzzybabybunny what board did you get? does it have the lattest bios? if not you may want to flash first before any install of the OS, if not sure how to then chk the mfg forum for possible methods on how to.
Click to expand...

I got the Gigabyte P35 DS3R rev. 2.1

I definitely got the latest BIOS. In fact, I had to. Without the latest BIOS I was getting some serious power issues... like the system would just turn completely off in the middle of doing something. And then, by itself, it would try to turn back on, the fans would spin up halfway, then die down, spin up halfway, then die down, doing an endless cycle. My 700W PSU was perfectly fine literally two hours ago with the old system, so I figured it was the motherboard.

What also made it hard was that the keyboard would randomly stop working. The motherboard had issues with its PS/2 port and it would just kill itself at random times in Windows and not start back up again. So I had to boot into Windows and as fast as possible type "Gigabyte" in a Google search because my PS/2 port would kill itself again. Once I had Gigabyte typed in I could then go to the website, download drivers, BIOS, etc without having to use the keyboard (which wasn't working at that point again).

Thank God I had a stupid little USB floppy disk drive to install the BIOS with.
 
I install Vista on my 30G partition and as soon as the installation is complete, I create an image.
This image will always be up-to-date as long as I have not changed motherboard or a major hardware item.

Then, I install drivers (except graphics card) and set up my partition names and background and colors ..... and create a second image.
This image will always be up-to-date as long as the first image is still up-to-date and the manufacturers have not released a new driver for any of my hardware components.

Then, I install my main programs, like Office, FireFox, Acrobat, Anti Virus (Free AVG), backup, ...... and create a third image.
This image will be up-to-date as long as the second image is still up-to-date and none of my main programs has an update or as long as I have not switched using a different program.

Then, I update Windows, set up my start menu shortcuts to the programs that are already installed on my programs partition, which do not need to be installed every time like most of the games, update the graphics driver, and create the final image.


Images always need to be updated.
But, doing it this way, I usually have less to do when time comes to restore or update an image.
 
Originally posted by: fuzzybabybunny
Originally posted by: blazer
a stored image will be out of date as far as the virus definitions go.
Click to expand...

Oh, well that makes sense. But can't you just update all your definitions and drivers right after you boot into the new image? Doesn't seem like that big of a problem.
Click to expand...

Meh. I don't think it is. But then I don't use Norton, which I think is the biggest #$*%ing piece of nagware shite I've ever seen (except for Adobe CS3 suite). I use Avast! which is more than good enough (never had an issue and support sx64) and has the virtue of being free. I don't like paying protection money to Symantec or McAfee. I make sure to run an image every few weeks or so. I hate having to reinstall apps and drivers. But it's all up to individual preferences.
 
Originally posted by: Navid
I install Vista on my 30G partition and as soon as the installation is complete, I create an image.
This image will always be up-to-date as long as I have not changed motherboard or a major hardware item.

Then, I install drivers (except graphics card) and set up my partition names and background and colors ..... and create a second image.
This image will always be up-to-date as long as the first image is still up-to-date and the manufacturers have not released a new driver for any of my hardware components.

Then, I install my main programs, like Office, FireFox, Acrobat, Anti Virus (Free AVG), backup, ...... and create a third image.
This image will be up-to-date as long as the second image is still up-to-date and none of my main programs has an update or as long as I have not switched using a different program.

Then, I update Windows, set up my start menu shortcuts to the programs that are already installed on my programs partition, which do not need to be installed every time like most of the games, update the graphics driver, and create the final image.


Images always need to be updated.
But, doing it this way, I usually have less to do when time comes to restore or update an image.
Click to expand...

I do close to the same thing. I have no less than 4 images from a clean install through complete. I also make a image about once a month and keep the latest plus one previous one. I use Firefox and Thunderbird and back them up using FEBE and CLEO for FF and mozbackup for TB. I do this once a week and prior to adding or removing programs, drivers etc. This way if my system gets hosed I just image back to the latest image then restore FF and TB. I like being able to try out new software, drivers etc. without worry as I can always just image back.

 
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