Want one partition only?

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dogbreath

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Running MS XP SP2. Onboard hdd is 120GB. It's formatted as follows:-

C:\ Primary Partition-NTFS-58.59GB-38% free
E:\ Partition-NTFS-53.19GB-39% free (Logical Drive)

I would prefer the disk to all be seen as C:\

E:\ currently contains a number of Acronis images of C:\ which are not essential.

Can this be achieved and if so how? Any help much appreciated.
 
The only problem may be a BIOS limitation, check
your motherboard for this.

But dont forget to consider the SLACK or lost
space from larger cluster size and also the
performance hit you will encounter from having
all 120GB as your boot drive.

If I were you, I would create a 10GB partition for
only OS and related updates, service packs etc-
no programs or anything else.

Then partion the rest of the drive for everything
else. Just my opinion.

Otherwise, simply partition 100% of the drive as you wish.

You can use your XP CD to partition and format etc.

If I was you I would look into cluster size and partitions
before I made my decision.
 
Thanks for that ImUseless. I'll check those things out first. The 10GB partition for the Operating System seems a good idea. I'm having problems getting my p.c. to 'see' an external 160GB usb hard drive which on different days can be visible in none, one or more than one of the following places; Device Manager/Disk Management/My Computer. Having sought help on various forums and having not been succesful, I decided to try and simplify the rest of my system before proceeding further. I'm clutching at straws at the moment but the ext hdd problem is the ulterior motive for all of this.
 
The only problem may be a BIOS limitation, check
your motherboard for this.

But dont forget to consider the SLACK or lost
space from larger cluster size and also the
performance hit you will encounter from having
all 120GB as your boot drive.

If I were you, I would create a 10GB partition for
only OS and related updates, service packs etc-
no programs or anything else.

Then partion the rest of the drive for everything
else. Just my opinion.
What are u talking about? why would BIOS limit him from managing partitions?

and he will not loose any space from cluster size, unless he specified a different cluster size for one of his partitions in the first place. the avalible space ona 60gb partition witha 4k cluster size will be equally perportional to a 120gb partition witha 4k cluster size.

and there is no performance hit from booting off of a 120gb partition as compaired to a 10gb partition... no matter how its partitioned ITS STILL THE SAME PHYSICAL 120gb HD.

NTFS performse better conserning 1 HD if it only has 1 partition on it. if you partition it, it now has to keep track of 2 seperate file spaces instead of just 1. only posible benifit from partitions may be keeping disk less fragmented, but thats only if you have problems with fragmentation in first place, and u can always just Defrag the HD anytime u wont.

If i only ownd 1 HD, i would partition it to keep OS seperate because incase it crashed and i had to reinstall the OS. because i store files on my comp i would keep them on the 2nd partition, safe from the reformat proccess. <-- thats the only reason i c to partition.
 
Thanks jolancer. This demonstrates one of the problems associated with posting a thread on a tech. forum. Guys (and gals) come on, full of confidence, suggesting an answer to a problem. But who's right. Is it ImUseless or is it jolancer??? Or is it neither? For the 'non-techie' like myself it can be a nightmare. Please understand that I value every response I get. The fact that people have taken the time to post is very much appreciated. But then what do I do next? Yes, it's a dilemma! Anyway, I will watch this thread with interest, coz I think it will (hopefully) attract equally vociferous responses. Cheers, dogbreath.
 
I highly reccomend the Windows partition myself (10-15GB). I have done it on a 80GB drive, and saw some huge performance increases in booting and running multiple apps. Also a good Idea to make a swap partition (2 GB, but only set your swap to 1.5-2x your ram).

It doesnt effect benchmarks much, but its one of those things you can actually feel.

As stated, just use your XP CD.
 
Don't except a huge increase in performance by splitting the partitions.

You can use Partition Magic to merge the partitions. Make sure to backup all data before doing this.
 
sometimes i dont know who to believe either.. i just try and use common sence.
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the information i know is gathered from other sources. iv seen topics like this in the past without interacting with them, i forget why maybe i was researching partitions.

but, i think it goes something like this.. a lot of ppl, especialy the old timers are prone to partition by habbit, and i think it was actually good on the Fat32 file system. but NTFS gets no benifit from multiple partitions, example- gregm above posted above to partition it so Paging Files are ona seperate partition... iv hear ppl say that this could actually lower the NTFS performance rather then benifit it.(maybe it was beneficial on FAT32 i dont know). the only real difference would be if you put your paging files ona seperate physical HD anyway.

or maybe the information iv heard is incorrect? if so someone please inform us.
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dogbreath - this partition thing probably doesnt have any affect on your external HD problem anyway.

did u try a different cable for the external drive?
i dont have an external HD otherwise i may have more info, but if its detected u may wont to scan the disk for errors or whatnot.
maybe the enclosure was dropped and there may just be a loose wire connection inside the encloser?
 
I know for a fact when you OS C partition gets full it start acting retarded. you can have another partition such as a your data partition full and you won't lose any performance especially if the OS partition is relatively free of clutter

putting the virtual memory on another partion helps too, as it can be by itself and not be bothered when you are doing other things on the C drive
 
Thanks a lot all you guys. I'll have a think about what would be my best route forward and post back with my conclusions. I've not used Partition Magic, is it user friendly? Also any ideas on the external hard drive probem? It can't be a faulty power cable. The power light is on. It can't be a faulty usb lead, since the drive is usually seen by at least one part of my system. It is nearly always seen in Device Manager, rarely in Disk Management (and sometimes seems to make that feature freeze as I click on) and almost never in My Computer. When first installed the ext. LaCiE hdd (XP Plug and Play- now there's a contradiction in terms!) it functioned fine. It was preformatted NTFS and I saved three (two incremental) C: images using Acronis True Image. Since then it has become temperamental to say the least. One thing I am going to try is connecting the drive to an alternative XP machine to check out whether it is more likely to be a drive rather than a p.c. problem and once again, I'll post back with the results.
 
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