New 1TB HD. Partition question.

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lodingi

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I just purchased a WD Caviar 1 TB Black Edition. I am upgrading from a 250 gb Seagate. I also have a Maxtor One Touch 4 Plus external unit at 1 TB.

It's a general use pc for home use. Do I bother partitioning my Caviar, or do I simply leave it as a single drive & backup its entire contents to the external unit. Thanks for your help.
 
lodingi said:
It's a general use pc for home use. Do I bother partitioning my Caviar, or do I simply leave it as a single drive & backup its entire contents to the external unit. Thanks for your help.
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Will you be using it as a boot/OS drive? If so, I would create a partition for OS/Apps/Games (50-100GB) then use the rest for general storage. That way you can format the OS partition without losing all of the data on the drive. If you're not using it as a boot drive (just using it for general storage) there's not much point in partitioning it.
 
Agreed. I think the general recommendation nowadays is about 100GB for the OS partition, the rest of it for storage/whatever. That keeps the OS partition rather small (by today's standards) and makes it very easy to image/back up the OS and the most used applications which should be on that part of the drive to ensure the best possible loading times. Games, etc, that stuff can typically go on the rest of the drive without issues (and not THAT much of a speed hit for load times either).

Keep the OS partition small(ish) so it's easier to restore or start over in case something gets pooched.
 
So the 100 gig partition is for the o/s only? Would I then install apps/games on a separate partiton? Reason I ask is I know my o/s , apps & games are greater than 100 gig. Thanks again.
 
lodingi said:
So the 100 gig partition is for the o/s only? Would I then install apps/games on a separate partiton? Reason I ask is I know my o/s , apps & games are greater than 100 gig. Thanks again.
Click to expand...

No, make the first partition large enough to contain your OS, apps and games. You must have a fair few games if you need 100+ GB to store them :)
 
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