Hard Drive Partitioning

Hardware & Technology SIG

Doug Willoughby

April 17, 2007

Agenda

- Not a how-to-do presentation

- Definition & Some overall observations

- Current Hard Drive situation

- Hard Drive Contents

- Advantages

- Programs

- Sample partitions

- Summary

What is Partitioning-

- Splitting one physical hard drive into multiple logical drives which operate the same as physical drives

Some Observations

- When a single HD crashes, multiple partitions do you no good

- There is no right or wrong way to partition

- Setup is based on individual situations

- Drive maintenance is much easier with partitioning

Advantages of Partitioning

- Lower drive effective access time

- Can reformat and reinstall partitions

- Defrag partitions quickly

- Easily create & restore images

- Multi-boot different operating systems

- Increased security by splitting content

- Enhance recovery of lost files

Current Situation

- My first Hard Drive was 10 MB, NOT GB

- Double in size every 18 months (-)

- Current demo 1 Terrabyte HD

- 1000 GB @ Cost- of- $1200

- Generally available: 500 GB for $120

What is on a Hard Drive-

- Windows Operating System

- Page file (Swap) - Extends RAM

- Installed programs/ applications

- Documents & Settings

- Pictures, Music & Video

- Temporary Files - Temp Internet, recent

- Favorite CD-s like Win XP or Office, etc

- Download files

Types of Content

Programs to Partition

- FDISK - wipes out data in partitions

- Manage function in Windows XP

- Partition Magic

- System Commander

- Diskeeper

- Acronis

Sample Partitioning

Drive 0: 40 GB (15 GB Unused)

- C: Operating System - 5 GB

- E: Documents & Settings - 5 GB

- F: Programs & Applications - 10 GB

- G: Downloads - 5 GB

Drive 1:- 120 GB

- D: Page File (Swap) - 1 GB

- H: Temp Files - 1 GB

- J: Video, Music, Pictures - 50 GB

- K: Backup Drive 0 -- 40 GB

- I: Program CD-s - 10 GB

Summary

- With Hard Drives getting so big, more creative ways of partitioning them is required.

- Cost of the large hard drive is small, but the impact on performance and operation can be large if not used efficiently