Basic XP folder question

[Tom Brown]

I have just installed a new hard disk and gone through the painful process
of restoring the OS and data. I would like to have one partition dedicated
entirely to the OS and another one for all my data. Hopefully, if I ever
needed a fresh install of the OS, I could do that on the C: drive without
disturbing my documents and data. Is that possible?

I would like to find a convenient way to make all the personal folders (My
Documents My Pictures, My Music) go into (by default) the second partition.
At present, my CD is the D: drive so my other partition is now the E: drive.

TIA,

Tom

 

[ANONYMOUS]

Sure it is possible. Try this:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310147

Hope this helps.

 

[Shenan Stanley]

I have just installed a new hard disk and gone through the painful
process of restoring the OS and data. I would like to have one
partition dedicated entirely to the OS and another one for all my
data. Hopefully, if I ever needed a fresh install of the OS, I
could do that on the C: drive without disturbing my documents and
data. Is that possible?
I would like to find a convenient way to make all the personal
folders (My Documents My Pictures, My Music) go into (by default)
the second partition. At present, my CD is the D: drive so my other
partition is now the E: drive.

Truthfully - the best way to do it (IMHO) is not with partitions - but
additional physical hard disk drives.

In either case - there is *no* substitute for consistent backups. With a
good backup system in place - you can be back up (exclusing hardware
replacement time) in a matter of minutes instead of hours/days/weeks as you
would be with a clean installation, etc.

For your first paragraph question - yes, that is possible. With two
partitions, you could install your OS and applications on one partition and
store everything (even redirect your My Documents folder and desktop/etc to
the other partition) on the other partition and in case of a fresh install,
your data would stay intact on the second partition given the right steps.

The reason I do not recommend the two-partition thing over two physical hard
drives is if the first hard disk drive physically fails in a two physical
drive situation, your data is safe on the other drive. If the hard disk
drive fails in the two partition situation - both partitions are toast.
Less chance of two drives dying at one time without some outside catastrophe
than one drive. Of course - the same could be said for the second physical
drive in my scenario - thus why backups are ALWAYS important. An external
hard disk drive is inexpensive and easy. Imaging software can even take
perioodic images of entire drive(s) so you can restore it exactly to a point
in time... *However - they should never be complete substitutes for periodic
individual backups as well.

You can change the drive letters in device manager.

Google for "Folder Redirection in Windows XP" for how to point your folders
to other places.

 

[Tom Brown]

Thanks guys. I'll check out the redirection.

What I guess I failed to mention is that I already have external USB drives
(with multiple partitions) on this laptop and it's getting a little hard to
manage all of of them.

Thanks,

Tom

 

[C.Joseph S. Drayton]

Truthfully - the best way to do it (IMHO) is not with partitions -
but additional physical hard disk drives.

In either case - there is no substitute for consistent backups. With
a good backup system in place - you can be back up (exclusing
hardware replacement time) in a matter of minutes instead of
hours/days/weeks as you would be with a clean installation, etc.

For your first paragraph question - yes, that is possible. With two
partitions, you could install your OS and applications on one
partition and store everything (even redirect your My Documents
folder and desktop/etc to the other partition) on the other partition
and in case of a fresh install, your data would stay intact on the
second partition given the right steps.

The reason I do not recommend the two-partition thing over two
physical hard drives is if the first hard disk drive physically fails
in a two physical drive situation, your data is safe on the other
drive. If the hard disk drive fails in the two partition situation -
both partitions are toast. Less chance of two drives dying at one
time without some outside catastrophe than one drive. Of course -
the same could be said for the second physical drive in my scenario -
thus why backups are ALWAYS important. An external hard disk drive
is inexpensive and easy. Imaging software can even take perioodic
images of entire drive(s) so you can restore it exactly to a point in
time... *However - they should never be complete substitutes for
periodic individual backups as well.

You can change the drive letters in device manager.

Google for "Folder Redirection in Windows XP" for how to point your
folders to other places.

Hi Shehan,

I agree with everything you said. There is though one caveat. if you
are running a laptop with only one hard disk and you don't want to
carry an external hard disk then the OP idea of multiple partitions is
a partial solution.

Of course in the case of a physical hard disk failure the OP would be
out of luck, but if the error is a soft error, then he could still
theoretically save his data. I have actually had cases where the MBR
was wiped out and I had to manually write to the MBR of the effected
drive to point it to the second partition and save the data.

If a second disk is possible than by all means the OP should follow
your idea if a second drive is not an option, then the person should
look at multiple partitions. My dv8100cto does have two physical drives
and I do follow your concept. My old zd7010us didn't so I use multiple
partitions on it.

--

Sincerely,
C.Joseph Drayton, Ph.D. AS&T

CSD Computer Services
Web site: http://csdcs.tlerma.com/
E-mail: (e-mail address removed)