Partitions split the problem?

[sirugo]

In our household there are youngsters and parents.

The parents never visit "strange" sites and really try to stay away from problems by not downloading stuff and never saving attachments from emails.

The youngsters act in a different way. They download, do not stay away from weird places and do not use precautions while saving attachments.

This situation results in viruses/spyware etc affecting both parents and youngsters.

My idea is now the following:

Splitting the disk in two separate pieces (partitions) and forcing the youngsters to use one partition and the parents to use the other. The youngsters will still cause weird problems but hopefully only to themselves.

Will this make the situation better for the parents or are there viruses that can cause cross-partition problems?

 

[pechenegs]

yes, perfect, but you'll possibly need Xp pro for forcing secure log ins as I don't think XP home does it, that is they can by pass the log in screen with home edition buy definetly not XP pro!?

That way they would not be able to log on to say C:\ which is yours and leave D:\ for them lol!

Member of ASAP Alliance of Security Analysis Professionals

under the name khazars

 

[sirugo]

OK, but the problem is not the youngsters.
We can make them undestand to use the right partition.

The problem is only: can the partition be useful in this way, keeping viruses off "our" system, or are there cross-partion-viruses?

 

[pechenegs]

no, if one partitiom gets hit the other one will be ok, unless you crossover with floppies and cds!

Member of ASAP Alliance of Security Analysis Professionals

under the name khazars

 

[Fendal]

I would imagine you'd need a dual boot up ?, my partition (D:\) has programs that still need DLL's from the system32 folder to run, take IE for example it's Temp folder and Temporary Internet Files folder is still on C:/ drive right ?, having said that I'm not 100% sure.

 

[sirugo]

That's what I mean.
How do I make a dual boot?
Of course I want two separate system foders to make sure that eveyrthing is completely separate.

 

[pechenegs]

you'll need to buy a software programme like partition magic, it does it all for you. you simply tel it to take 20 gigs from your hard drive and it will make a d:\partition and if all goes well, it dd for me, then you install another OS on this D:\partition, note that D:\ cd/dvdrom will become e:\ etc!

http://www.symantec.com/region/au_nz/product/partitionmagic/features.html

Member of ASAP Alliance of Security Analysis Professionals

under the name khazars

 

[sirugo]

So it can't be done without partition magic?

 

[spizotfl]

you can look for qt-parted or some of the other linux based partitioning tools. or you could blow out the box and set it up with the xp installer. not entirely sure about getting the xp boot loader to see the 2 separate installs, but i am sure there is info somewhere about how to get that going.

 

[MasterRacker]

If you're starting from a bare metal build, you can do it all with the XP CD.

Boot from the XP CD, choose to create a partition of whatever size you need and install to it. When you're done, boot from the CD again, chose a new installatino again but choose to install to unpartitioned space (the rest of the disk you left behind last time). When you're done you have two OSes on two partitions and boot menu to choose between them.

<sub>Jeff
[purple]It's never too early to begin preparing for [/purple]International Talk Like a Pirate Day

"The software I buy sucks, The software I write sucks. It's time to give up and have a beer..." - Me</sub>

 

[sirugo]

Thanks!
I will use the XP CD from scratch.