hard drives, partitions, windows, and re-installations...
 

hi. this is a basic computer question and doesn't really have anything to do with dv editing.

i just got a new hp notebook. it came with a 5400 rpm 80GB hard drive and with windows xp home and some other basic programs already installed on it.

this is the hard drive which i plan to keep the system and programs on. the media will be stored on a seperate external, larger and faster drive.

but, i seem to remember reading somewhere that it is recommended to not only keep programs on one drive and media on the other, but to also partition the drive dedicated to programs, install windows ONLY on one partition and keep the other partition for all other programs and stuff. i think it had to do with making it easier to re-install windows if required to do so.

can someone explain this to me in simple terms? and also explain how to do so with the set-up my notebook was pre-installed with? do i have to format the disc, partition it and then installing windows myself? or can i partition it and throw windows into one partition, and the other things (office, acrobat, video editing software, itunes, etc.) into the second partition without having to format and re-install windows?

thank you.


should i partition it? put JUST windows on one partition and the other programs on the other partition? and if so, if i were to require a re-installation of windows, could i just format that one partition where windows is on and then re-install it without having to touch any other program (which would be on the other partition)?

the notebook came with windows xp home

You have to format the disc (wiping everything off it), partition it, then install windows. If you don't have a Windows CD you can't do this.

To keep programs on the second partition you have to explicitly install programs to that partition.

It's not totally necessary to redo your system this way.

2- If you use partition magic or similar programs you can split an existing partition into two. I haven't gone down this route myself. I don't think this would be worthwhile considering you need to pay for the program.

thanks glen. i'll tell you the reason i'm a bit concerned about doing this. my notebook came with windows xp home already installed (and the cd too). recently i've been reading conflicting opinions on whether or not there are advantages on video editing with windows xp pro rather than xp home. there's the issue with dual processor capability, which i don't need right now, but anyway - some say you can use dual processors with xp home as well. the main issue is stability. some say that xp pro is significantly more stable. the opposers contest that theoretically there is no reason for home to be any less stable than pro.

so i'm just preparing myself, in case i might want to upgrade to xp pro. am i wasting my time?

Don't repartition it. You would need to reinstall the applications if the OS partition was deleted or replaced anyway. This strategy has its roots in earlier operating systems that were less forgiving and tended to take the file system with them when they died, which could be more often than one preferred. This practice was also started by die-hard geeks that frequently were loading beta OSs and multiple OSs on the same system and continues with servers (which still is not a bad strategy, but they also have nightly or more frequent backups).

Yes, ideally, if you could have the OS, applications (not really necessary), media, and renders on different drives, it would probably be the 'quickest' solution.

You probably do not need Pro. Pro adds better user management, better file access controls, domain user support, and better multi-processor support. Since it is a notebook, it is highly unlikely that you will be able to change to the CPU, so additional support there is probably not warranted. I have Home on my unit and run Avid Liquid, Sony SoundForge, and Hash Animation:Master on it.

You can run dual core with home, but not dual processors.

At the end of the day you should be spending your time editing, not tinkering around with your computer.

thanks guys.