How to Partiton BIG HDD WINXP Pro & Linux

[MontyW]

QUESTION: Building new system from ground up. Will be WINXP Pro & Linux. Have brand new 80gb WD ATA/100 HDD, how should I partition this big drive. Biggest drive I ever had. Partition #1 FAT32 for Windows, what size? Partition #2 remainder of drive extended with Linux in a logical partition? Heard that a partition that's too big will makes WinXP run slow. True/rumor/false??? Install Windows first then Linux?
Have[ol][li]Full new copy Win XP Pro[/li][li]Mandrake Linux[/li][li]Partition Magic Ver 8 [/li][li]FX5600 video board[/li][li]Plextor DVD& CD burner[/li][li]ABIT IC7-G Max II MB[/li][li]Lian Li PC6100B (very nice) Black Case[/li][/ol] Getting a MAXTOR 60 gb UDMA/133 in late Nov.

Regards
Montyw

 

[dkdude]

Hi MontyW,

I would do this: Create one partition sized 50%. Install WinXP on that AND convert it to NTFS.

Then install Linux on the remaining disk space. I *think* that Linux creates it's own partitions (which, as far as I know is three).

Big HDs slowing down XP? I don't know, however, I know that working with NTFS rather than FAT32 partitions are faster.

Good luck!


Jakob

 

[MontyW]

Do you really think that Windows should be 40GB? I was rethinking things after your post. How about this? Small C: drive where boot code could live with WINXP boot.ini file. Install WINXP in a 20 gb NTFS partition, allocate logical space for WINXP data files 20 gb and divide remaining space to a couple of LINUX test regions(package, kernel& patch testing) and production partitions for Redhat, Mandrake and Suse. Need smaller partitions for backup purposes. The SCSI tape drive write DDS2 tapes and are limited capacity but cheap. You helped me solve my own question. Maybe even a total of 3 pri partitions for WIN & DOS 4th Extended partiton can be carved into multiple logical partitions. One guy in MaximumPC had WORKING 37 different operating systems running. Not all at once but thru a boot manager. Probably carve things up with Partition magic Ver.8 and Boot Magic for the boot sequence without any BIOS tweaking. As far as the boot device is concerned; floppy first;CDROM second;hdd last drive

Regards
Montyw

 

[dkdude]

Hi MontyW,

How to partition really depends on what and how you work with your system.

Here's how I configured my (XP-only) system:

2 HDs : 1 x 40GB and 1 x 60GB

HD1: 20GB XP and program partition, 20GB data partition.
HD2: 1 partition only.

All partitions are NTFS, and I use the different partitions to ping-pong ghost images. The 60 GB is mainly used for video editing, which talkes up A LOT of space 90 minute video is some 20 GB. When done editing I store the result in another partition, delete the source video and do a new ghost image TO the 60GB drive.

I planning on getting another HD to run SuSE from. Plan to install the new and the 40GB drive in trays, so I can just swap the drive before powering up the PC. That is another option to consider?!!

Regards


Jakob