Help with Partition strategy for 3 Hard Drive System

[spartancal]

I'm building my new 3 hard drive system. I have one WD 150 GB Raptor X drive, and 2 Seagate 320 GB hard drives. I will use this system as a photo editing computer with Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop CS2. In addition I will store my digital music on this machine. MY planned partition strategy is as follows:

150 GB WD Raptor X ----- C: 50 GB for Windows XP/Vista OS ---- D: 100 GB for Programs Files


320 GB Seagate ----------- E : 12 GB for windows pagefile ----- F: 200 GB for digital music files (AAC, WMA, MP3, FLAC)------- G: 100 GB Back-up files (space for images)

320 GB Seagate-------------H: 12 GB for Photoshop swap file-------I: 200 GB for digital photo files-------J: 100 GB Back-up files (space for images)


Does this makes sense?

My system

Cooler Master 832 Case
Intel E6600 Core 2 Duo
Intel D975XBX2 Motherboard (Bad Axe2)
4 X 1GB of Crucial Ballistix Tracer PC2-8000 DDR2 memory
1 X 150 GB WD Raptor X SATA Hard drive
2 X 320 GB Seagate 7200.10 16 MB cache SATA Hard drive
EVGA Geforce 8800 GTS 320 MB superclocked video card
Corsair HX620 620 Watt Power supply
Lite-On LH-20A1S 20X SATA DVD Writer
Samsung SH-S183L 18X SATA DVD Writer
5 Silenx Ixtrema 120mm fans + Cooler Master cross flow fan

 

[hjo3]

It looks okay to me, though I'm a little curious why you chose to segregate the OS(es) from your programs.

 

[conlan]

If your Photoshop images are irreplaceable, I would back them all up on a different HD then they are stored on.

Why are you planning on Partitioning the Raptor?

 

[Boyo]

Originally posted by: conlan
If your Photoshop images are irreplaceable, I would back them all up on a different HD then they are stored on.

Why are you planning on Partitioning the Raptor?

Exactly. Why are you partitioning your Raptor??? You should leave your Raptor as one whole partition. You should also make one HD for all of your photos, and the other as a backup. You don't want to place your backups with the originals on the same HD.

 

[imported_scoobydoo]

Surely it would make the most sense to put all the swap files on the fastest drive...? (i.e. The Raptor)

 

[pkrush]

No, you really want the swap files on the drive that Windows isn't on. I do agree that it's a bad idea to partition the Raptor, since it'll just slow things down and there's no reason to back up your programs since you can always reinstall those.

 

[spartancal]

I'm sorry if I was not clear. I will back-up the music files on the HD that has the original photos and I will back-up the photos on the drive where I store the original music files.

The reason I was planning to partition the Raptor was because i wanted to create an image of the OS partition on an external drive so that I could restore the OS if it became corrupt without having to reload all of my program files. Is this a bad strategy?

The reason for putting swap files on other drives is because I read somewhere that I was benefical to place your swap file on a different drive than your OS. Is this incorrect?

 

[pkrush]

The swap files are going to be fine where you put them, but you don't necessarily need separate partitions on each drive for them. Also, you can already reinstall the OS without reinstalling all your programs, it's called a repair installation.

 

[conlan]

Originally posted by: spartancal
I'm sorry if I was not clear. I will back-up the music files on the HD that has the original photos and I will back-up the photos on the drive where I store the original music files.

The reason I was planning to partition the Raptor was because i wanted to create an image of the OS partition on an external drive so that I could restore the OS if it became corrupt without having to reload all of my program files. Is this a bad strategy?

The reason for putting swap files on other drives is because I read somewhere that I was benefical to place your swap file on a different drive than your OS. Is this incorrect?

You can make an image of your fresh OS install, then copy it to one of your storage drives.

 

[spartancal]

Any other suggestions?

 

[Raduque]

Originally posted by: spartancal
I'm building my new 3 hard drive system. I have one WD 150 GB Raptor X drive, and 2 Seagate 320 GB hard drives. I will use this system as a photo editing computer with Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop CS2. In addition I will store my digital music on this machine. MY planned partition strategy is as follows:

150 GB WD Raptor X ----- C: 50 GB for Windows XP/Vista OS ---- D: 100 GB for Programs Files


320 GB Seagate ----------- E : 12 GB for windows pagefile ----- F: 200 GB for digital music files (AAC, WMA, MP3, FLAC)------- G: 100 GB Back-up files (space for images)

320 GB Seagate-------------H: 12 GB for Photoshop swap file-------I: 200 GB for digital photo files-------J: 100 GB Back-up files (space for images)


Does this makes sense?

Here's a novel idea: 3 partitions.

C: = 150gb, os programs, ect

D: = 320gb photo and "other stuff" storage

e: = 320gb photoshop scratch disk

Possibly get a smaller, extremely fast drive as your scratch disk instead - a 74gb Raptor, maybe.

I just don't understand the fascination with a million partitions. I have 3 drives with 1 partition each, and I still lose files between the 3 drives. I once knew a guy who had his drives partitioned into 2gb. He had 15 drive letters.