Preparing for a reinstall

[whitesmith]

My PC essentially consists of 2 HDs (160 GB each) and a 3 GHz MB with
1.5 GB of RAM. I have the drive pair configured as C: and D: with no
extra partitions on either. When I installed XP about a year ago I
realized Windows would become unstable at some point and require
reinstallation. Toward that end I set up Ghost 10.0 on D: and have it
automagically do a full backup of C: to D: on the 1st of the month and
a differential of C: to D: every day.

Doom has now arrived and I'll have to go back a month or so and grab a
backup set that is thought to be working properly. I'll lay that down
over the C drive, hopefully wiping away the corruption. Here, finally,
is my question:

Some of my colleagues say I should use PartitionMagic (which I own) to
create a 20 GB partition on C: for the exclusive use of the OS, with
all programs and data on D: or the other partition on C. This makes
little sense because a future reinstall would have to lay down the
same number of bytes, regardless of the partitioning configuration --
or would it? A cogent argument I heard supporting partitioning is that
it would let me restore the smaller system partition by itself the
next time Windows heads for Tijuana.

Any of you gurus have an opinion on this?

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

See below.

My PC essentially consists of 2 HDs (160 GB each) and a 3 GHz MB with
1.5 GB of RAM. I have the drive pair configured as C: and D: with no
extra partitions on either. When I installed XP about a year ago I
realized Windows would become unstable at some point and require
reinstallation.

*** This depends entirely on the way you treat Windows.
*** Most of my clients can use their original Windows
*** installation for years on end, with no problem at all.
*** The damage occurs with all this stuff you download
*** from the Internet.

Toward that end I set up Ghost 10.0 on D: and have it
automagically [automatically?] do a full backup of C: to D:
on the 1st of the month and a differential of C: to D: every day.

Doom has now arrived and I'll have to go back a month or so and grab a
backup set that is thought to be working properly. I'll lay that down
over the C drive, hopefully wiping away the corruption. Here, finally,
is my question:

Some of my colleagues say I should use PartitionMagic (which I own) to
create a 20 GB partition on C: for the exclusive use of the OS, with
all programs and data on D: or the other partition on C.

*** Having the OS on one partition and your programs on a different
*** partition makes no sense. They should be on the same partition
*** (usually drive C, with your data on drive D:.

This makes
little sense because a future reinstall would have to lay down the
same number of bytes, regardless of the partitioning configuration --
or would it? A cogent argument I heard supporting partitioning is that
it would let me restore the smaller system partition by itself the
next time Windows heads for Tijuana.

*** Partition managers and partition restore programs can easily
*** cope with different partition sizes, provided there is enough room
*** for the data contained in the imaged partition. 20 GBytes is a
*** good size for a WinXP system partition.

 

[Noncompliant]

My PC essentially consists of 2 HDs (160 GB each) and a 3 GHz MB with
1.5 GB of RAM. I have the drive pair configured as C: and D: with no
extra partitions on either. When I installed XP about a year ago I
realized Windows would become unstable at some point and require
reinstallation. Toward that end I set up Ghost 10.0 on D: and have it
automagically do a full backup of C: to D: on the 1st of the month and
a differential of C: to D: every day.

Doom has now arrived and I'll have to go back a month or so and grab a
backup set that is thought to be working properly. I'll lay that down
over the C drive, hopefully wiping away the corruption. Here, finally,
is my question:

Some of my colleagues say I should use PartitionMagic (which I own) to
create a 20 GB partition on C: for the exclusive use of the OS, with
all programs and data on D: or the other partition on C. This makes
little sense because a future reinstall would have to lay down the
same number of bytes, regardless of the partitioning configuration --
or would it? A cogent argument I heard supporting partitioning is that
it would let me restore the smaller system partition by itself the
next time Windows heads for Tijuana.

Their point being, I gather, is that restoring (from image format) a windows
only (smaller) partition would be faster than one with all apps loaded on
it? That seems rather trivial.

A clean install of XP (with applications previously installed are currently
on D would require the apps installation again as all the registry entries
and so forth for the apps need installation. Any updated versions of the
apps may be overwritten, then you have to do the updated installation of
that again too.

So, I'm at a loss for a reason for installing 3rd party apps to another
partition.