Partition & Swap File Strategy Advice
Hi,
I'm about to do a clean install and could use some sage advice on how best to proceed.
System: 3.2 Ghz, 1GB Mem, 400GB Primary HD, 250GB Secondary HD. The swap file is currently set to between 1-3GB (vs. system managed).
I currently have WinXP Home installed on C: with just one <gigando> partition.
I've read that the best strategy is to install the OS in its own (first) partition and the swapfile (pagefile.sys?) in its own (first) partition on the second drive. Much of what I've read, however, seems to be several years old and talks about Win95, Win98, etc. Does this strategy still apply to relatively new/fast systems like mine?
If I should optimize then...
What size should the OS partition be and should it be large enough to hold both the OS and programs? Does placing Programs in the OS partition defeat the purpose of a dedicated OS partition?
What size should the SWAP file partition be and where should I locate it? I've read that <some> people, who place the SWAP file on the first partition of the second drive, leave room for a <realtively> small swap file on C: --is this recommended and why? Does this result in 2 potential swap files or 1 swap file with one of two places to land? Also, should the dedicated Swap file partition be a WIN32 FAT w/32kb cluster size vs. the default NTFS?
Thanks, jpb
I'm about to do a clean install and could use some sage advice on how best to proceed.
System: 3.2 Ghz, 1GB Mem, 400GB Primary HD, 250GB Secondary HD. The swap file is currently set to between 1-3GB (vs. system managed).
I currently have WinXP Home installed on C: with just one <gigando> partition.
I've read that the best strategy is to install the OS in its own (first) partition and the swapfile (pagefile.sys?) in its own (first) partition on the second drive. Much of what I've read, however, seems to be several years old and talks about Win95, Win98, etc. Does this strategy still apply to relatively new/fast systems like mine?
If I should optimize then...
What size should the OS partition be and should it be large enough to hold both the OS and programs? Does placing Programs in the OS partition defeat the purpose of a dedicated OS partition?
What size should the SWAP file partition be and where should I locate it? I've read that <some> people, who place the SWAP file on the first partition of the second drive, leave room for a <realtively> small swap file on C: --is this recommended and why? Does this result in 2 potential swap files or 1 swap file with one of two places to land? Also, should the dedicated Swap file partition be a WIN32 FAT w/32kb cluster size vs. the default NTFS?
Thanks, jpb
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Comments
Tex
But both newer drives same speed, then what Tex said makes good sense.
I tend to manage my own pagefile and keep it on a separate physical drive from Windows and most working programs if I can.
have a nice day.
If this is true, then a clean install on C: will cripple the APPS in D: and they'll need to be reinstalled as well. If this is true, why not always put the OS & APPS in the same partition? :rolleyes2
And by alot, I mean between windows 2000 and XP I've installed the OS over the course of 4 years possibly 500+ times just because I was bored. Once a week or more at times :P It sucks that I now have to call into MS to get my key when I install the OS so I just don't mess with it anymore
As for the apps on a sep. drive... I don't do that myself but it can help with loading times in games and such as they'd have their own drive to read from. But it can also help with saved files and such where you can just reinstall the program over the old and it'll work and have your old saved files in it already.
I did a search on C: (including hidden/system files) for "pagefile.sys" and it was not found. Is it possible the system hasn't created a swap file? My RAM size is 1GB.
make sure "show hidden files and folders" is checked.
UNCHECK "hide extensions for known file types" and "hide protected OS files" right below it.
click apply at the bottom. then at the top click apply to all folders!
then go look at your c: drive if thats where the OS is with explorer.
M
That did it! Thanks.
I established 2 partitions on the primary drive, the first (50GB) for the system & apps, the second for data. The second drive was setup with 4 partitions, the first (4GB) for the swap file and the remaining 3 (evenly divided) for data. I haven't noticed any speed advantage in setting up the swap file in this manner.
My plan was to use the 2nd drive, 2nd partition for data but I'm finding that my programs expect to find files on the primary drive in 'My Documents'. Although some programs 'easily' allow you to change default file storage locations--others don't. I've yet to find a way to do this in Adobe Acrobat, for example. Since this has become a hassle, I may revert to saving all my data on the primary in 'My Documents'.
Thanks to all of you who took the time to assist me in this.
MOVE "my documents".
use a tool like x-setup to just point it to the other drive. I have zero probs doing this. I also make a directory called Outlook inside the My Documents one and move all the outlook data files to the other drive also. I backup my docs and EVERYTHING is backed up and I do not have anything in the OS partition.
Tex
PS..... I do this for a living (over 25 years) and I am a benchmark whore but.. bottom line is you can mess around and tweak all the settings in the world trying to optimize and you might get 5 to 10 percent max improvement in the real world. Probably more like 2 to 5 percent.
Windows XP works fine just chunking it out there stock. Tons of us have learned that its really not worth all the hassle spending another 5 hours trying to "optimize" stuff. . If you want it faster then buy faster hardware. I mean I'm a geek and even I figured this out at this point. I now have a set of registry hacks I install as soon as XP is up that deals not so much with speed but little quirks that make me happy as "usability" but..... most the rest of the stuff is just crap and you will never in REAL LIFE feel the advantages.
And if anyone wants those registry changes I make in scripts and stuff I would be glad to send it to them if you email me.
If I could, I would actually prefer to get rid of that swap partition. It's my understanding that one of the reasons for putting the swap file in its own partition is so that the swap file's defragmentation would be confined to its own partition and not creep/spread throughout the drive.
So, are you saying I should remove 'My Documents' from the primary drive and MOVE it to the secondary drive and then use x-setup to tell windows to look for 'My Documents' on, let's say D: as opposed to C:?
I took a quick look at x-setup (nice program) and the closest I could get to 'pointing' to a directory was using the 'Special Folders' section to create a name that points to (or represents) a path. The 'name' appears on the tree and when clicked on displays the folder at the end of the path.
:confused2
x-setup is very cool and can move a bunch of the special directories but for my documents I think you can simply right click on it and go to properties or options and change it can't ya?
Right you are...I never noticed that feature. If you right click on 'My Documents' it allows you to specify the target. Cool. Thanks Tex.
Drive1= Windows install with a small 256meg swap
Drive2= FIRST PARTITION 1.5gig swap
You will only see a bene if its on the first partition on the second drive. Ive found that game maps tend to load a tad faster, but thats the only bene Ive seen.
Gobbles, why do you put the 256MB swap on drive1...why not just maintain the whole swap on drive 2, first partition? I've read about this approach before but I haven't seen an explanation for it. Also, is your partition on drive2 1.5GB and you let Windows manage the size or do you lock-in the swap size at 1.5GB and let it exist on drive2, partition1 with other files?
I have a 1GB SWAP file on my 160GB drive and a 4GB SWAP on my 250GB drive. I should also mention that I have 2GB of RAM. So why do I do it all like this when I have plenty of RAM?
Becuase I can. There is plenty of drive space for me and my stuff, and I used to go crazy on my partitioning and all like your trying to.
Back in the day my general rule of thumb was a 6GB Windows Partition, 4GB SWAP Partition, and the rest would be for files. The other drive would have another 4GB partition for SWAP, 30GB partition for my games and programs I wanted to load faster with and 30GB for other programs that didn't matter.
I would tweak windows to hell and back to have all my temp folders somewhere elsem my documents would be on it's own partition. Blah blah blah.
Now I just keep it simple.... it gets annoying trying to keep up with everything, I like just installing programs with ease and not figureing out what partition letter to put it on and all that crap. The performance gain is NULL from all my own testing.
Now if I were to buy a Raptor drive or like something small and speedy. I'd just keep it for swap, probably don't even need that though. But I don't plan on installing windows again for along long time :P
I have right now running in my house... A nice dual nocona xeon, a dual opteron, an amd 3200+ s754, a s939 3400+ and a s754 3000+ amd64 and to be honest if you took me up to one and I did the normal stuff I do... there is no way I could tell you what was what. Some are ide, some are scsi and some are VERY high end scsi raid. Like 8 15k drives in raid-0.... They are all to close doing NORMAL stuff to tell what is what.
If you have a fast modern cpu and a big ide drive I would NOT format it down with more then two partitions these days.
Times change. Computers change. the cutting them up into a bunch of pieces is old news. Is not right for computers today and needs to be forgotten.
but with the internet unfortunately geeks will be reading this old way of doing stuff for another 5 or 10 years and still doing it.
Tex
Tex
I hear what you guys are saying...this is a classic case of 'diminishing returns'. I'll heed your advice, use Partition Magic and simplify what I've done. (I was wondering 'how the hell am I going to manage/keep track of all these drive letters').
Prior to this thread and when I had just one not two HDs...
My Dell (Maxtor) HD went wobbly on me. Even though the diagnostics reported a HD failure, Dell (initially) refused to replace the drive until I reformatted/re-evaluated, etc. Many frustrating chat/phone hours later, I gave up dealing with Dell's PITA overseas support and decided to replace the drive on my own dime. Enter a WD 400GB SATA from Costco. A week later, my CD drive went wobbly and while battling with Dell again, (and since I was still pi$$ed off at them for not replacing the HD) I took another stab at getting my HD replaced and, to my surprise, they did. Enter a replacement Maxtor 250GB SATA (invoiced at 50% more than what I paid for the WD!). So, now I have two drives, more storage than I know what to do with and figured I would try to use them to create a performance boost. I guess I'll have two or three backups now instead of just one. I can live with that.