partitioning with xp: what size?

[draboo]

just powered up new build now. am installing xp pro and came to a page about partitioning. it wants to know what size partition i want to use. there are 28642 megabytes in one partition which xp wants to install on. should i partition this in half,thirds or leaveit alone. never been here(installing os or partitioning)before,so dont wanna screw thisup too bad,at least so its repairable. is this xp`s version of f-disk??

brad

[shahani]

Depends on what strategy you want to follow: I'd keep about 10GB for the XP and applications and rest for data with about 500MB partition for swap/page file: so, 10, 18, 0.5.

But there's as many opinions as there are members.

[PresterJohn]

>But there's as many opinions as there are members.

ya got that right

well, 1st question would be will this be a dual boot machine? i generally reserve 2-3 gb for each os partition. and even if you're only gonna run xp on this baby, i still wouldn't go higher than 3 gb for the boot partition...4gb tops if you run tons of software

the way i set up all my MS win machines is:

C: drive, 2-3 gb >install os and all apps
D: drive, 2-8 gb >data files
E: drive, 128-300 mb (depends on RAM) >swap file only
F: drive, ??? >data files or scratch space (for such things as cd dumps for burning, mp3s, etc)

by splitting the partitions, you will minimize the possibility of data loss if a virus/worm/disk crash knocks out your boot partitions, maximize performance, usually less wasted disk space and takes better advantage of extendable partitions, and it is much easier to defrag & backup several smaller partitions than 1 large partition esp if you have thousands of files...

[Beemer]

The installed size of WinXP is about 1.4 gigs.

I used to create 2 gig partitions for my O/S, win98/Y2K and load all my programs for each O/S into a programs partition. With Y2K I found that the 2 gig drive was a little small for accommodating Windows Updates and additional files from installed programs wanting to place files in the WINNT folder. When I installed XP I rebuilt all partitions and reloaded all O/S's to 4 gig partitions. (triple booting here) I have used 2.58 gig's on my XP partition. No personal data or programs loaded on the XP drive or any of the O/S drives. 1.58 gig's remaining of unused space.

My Partitions are as follows:
[C:]Win98 4 gig
[D:]WinY2K 4 gig
[E:]WinXP 4 gig
[F:]Swap 1 gig
[G:]Programs 6 gig
[H:]Files 6 gig
[I:]Backup 3 gig

Cheers!

[Mntsnow]

Note that if you want to use the "restore" function of XP I would give your self 1 to 2 gigs EXTRA per Partition for just the restore function...that way you can have MULTIPLE restore points

But I also Do partitions as

OS
Apps
Data
Backups
Swap

[draboo]

thanx for all the ideas,folks!