Omega Owners Forum

Chat Area => General Discussion Area => Topic started by: sev on 21 July 2009, 12:18:43

Title: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: sev on 21 July 2009, 12:18:43
In anticipation of a fresh install of W7 when the retailbox ships, I'm playing with various configurations for storage and looking at various scenarios.  I've been using 7beta as my main OS for a year now, and it's managed to get me to forget about buying and returning to apple completely.

I don't want to go near raid arrays as I really can't see the benefits trading off the hassle.  considering setting the disk controller up as AHCI now that 7 supports this out of the box.

I'm thinking of the following:

Drive 1 Sytem and programs

Drive 2 pagefile (what sort of capacity woudl suit this?)

Drive 3 User files perhaps partitioned for x2 user (or would a drive for each user be better)

Drive 4 dumping ground for pictures, downloads etc.


What are your thoughts, and if you had say two to four drives kicking around how would you organise your PC?
Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: Mr Skrunts on 21 July 2009, 12:42:23
I allways go

C:  System
D:  program Files

E:  Edit   (I ad this drive if the is the oportunity.
F: Storage/Data
G: My Documents.

Games installed to D:, then if I have to reinstall then generally most/all gaming data is saved or earier to reistall. 

My Documnets alls to a seperatr drive (Plus regular back-ups)  Experiance has taught me that if hit with a virus or cross linked files its easier to reinstall windows than it is to restore data.  Plus I allways store my favouritres in there as well and favourite wallpapers (If and when I actually use them)
Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: cem_devecioglu on 21 July 2009, 12:42:46
one disk > all in one

multiple disks > as you wish..

but for paging file a seperate disk not necessary I think..instead a less used disk will do the job..
Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: Mr Skrunts on 21 July 2009, 12:44:24
Plus I allways keep a set of drivers and upgrades in MyDocuments as I can never find the setup CD when I reinstall, or in some cases need the Lan driver to get on the net. :-/
Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: sev on 21 July 2009, 12:45:36
I thought that wondows really objects to having programs on a different volume?

Or do you just let the core system install as it wishes and then your own programs you point to another drive?

Also when you move my documents in 7 it doesn't actually move the 'users' folder only the contents therin.
Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: Mr Skrunts on 21 July 2009, 12:47:56
Quote
I thought that wondows really objects to having programs on a different volume?

Or do you just let the core system install as it wishes and then your own programs you point to another drive?

Also when you move my documents in 7 it doesn't actually move the 'users' folder only the contents therin.

Windows will create its own secton for program files on C:  as you say I then create one on D: to add all my own programs.

Dont know about MyDocs under 7 as I have never used it or seen it in action, same as vista, no experiance with that either.
Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: TheBoy on 21 July 2009, 16:52:25
pagefile on seperate spindle can give performance benefits, but in reality is often a sign you need more ram ;)

Unless you have very special requirements, I wouldn't get too hung up on the disk layout to be honest
Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: sev on 21 July 2009, 17:23:57
I'm running 8GB so ram's not an issue, and you're right, other than moving big files around I don't really have any specific requirements as such, and I suppose that a folder in a main volume can be protected just as well as multiple volumes, Thanks to you and Cem the systems running like a rocket with the cheetah 15K drives so again why go through all the effort?

Cheers Tb - I always trust you because you tell me what I want to hear  ;D

BTW, what are your thoughts on SSD - I checked out the prices - you've got to be havinga laugh haven't you!!

I still refuse to believe that they're better at the moment that a good old scsi on a PCI-X 64 :y

Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: bertiecbx550 on 21 July 2009, 22:03:05
Ok you lot are barred!!!!.......Lost me as soon as they said windows 7!!!! :D :D :D
Title: Re: Organising your hard drives...
Post by: TheBoy on 21 July 2009, 22:07:34
Quote
I'm running 8GB so ram's not an issue, and you're right, other than moving big files around I don't really have any specific requirements as such, and I suppose that a folder in a main volume can be protected just as well as multiple volumes, Thanks to you and Cem the systems running like a rocket with the cheetah 15K drives so again why go through all the effort?

Cheers Tb - I always trust you because you tell me what I want to hear  ;D

BTW, what are your thoughts on SSD - I checked out the prices - you've got to be havinga laugh haven't you!!

I still refuse to believe that they're better at the moment that a good old scsi on a PCI-X 64 :y

I keep looking at SSD for OOF (OOF is a real disk thrasher, probably the worse app I've ever seen for disk IO), but I'm not convinced about reliability (particularly with the thrashing OOF would give it), so have shy'd away for now.  Yet to see a server use SSD for data (some use for booting), so guess there is still an issue there.