do i need to partition?

[lilcapn]

got a new laptop to dedicate to music stuff, wondering if i need to partition the hard drive (i say that as if i would know how to do it, but i wouldn't!) and store "projects", songs, etc in a different place than the software is located, etc.

right now i've just got these different folders, like one in fruityloops, one in acid, etc where i keep stuff i'm working on, but it seems inefficient and wrong...

any help would be appreciated!
thanks!

[eeldip]

it really helps to partition.

but it wont kill you not to.

with a partition you can more easily optimize the drive, and clean up your music files and so on. when you do as much reading and writting as is needed for a DAW the directory info gets screwed up and so forth... so sometimes you can screw up your whole drive if you dont have a partition...

i would do it if i were you...

[markpar]

Probably won't gain you any performance, since it's still the same hard drive, but it won't hurt, either.

-mark

[cassembler]

I would recommend partitioning for the above reasons. As well, it's a little easier to delete a file that you don't know what it is when it's not on the C: drive.

And partitioning is relatively easy, but you'll have to start from scratch and reinstall the OS, just ask us the best way to do it if you decide to.

[eh91311]

If you have a PC laptop, you should be able to repartition the HD without wiping & reinstalling the windows OS by using Partition Magic.

[mofolotopo]

One thing about Partition Magic, though, is that I've had it create inaccessible dummy partitions of a non-trivial size in addition to the new one. In other words, I create a new 3 gig partition for a Linux install or something, and it spins off an additional half gig or so as unusable sapce (no, not the swap partition). I'm not sure if there's a way around this, but if space is a constraint you should keep an eye out for this problem.

[midiot]

If you are running WinXP on your laptop, you don't need Partition Magic to create the partition.

Go to Control Panel / Administrative tools / Computer Management / Storage / Disk Management.

I've creted partitions through there.

If you arent running WinXP, then ignore everything I just said.

[bspro]

I just picked up a new G4 with a 120gig hard drive and it is going to be used as a dedicated 002 machine.

Eventually I plan to add an external drive for portability, but I want to still use some of that 120gigs.

Should I go on and partition? If so, should 40 gigs be plenty for the computer and 80 for the dedicated audio?

[alienate]

I just picked up a new G4 with a 120gig hard drive and it is going to be used as a dedicated 002 machine.

Eventually I plan to add an external drive for portability, but I want to still use some of that 120gigs.

Should I go on and partition? If so, should 40 gigs be plenty for the computer and 80 for the dedicated audio?

i just did the same thing.. got a dual 1.42g4 and the 002r.. the best advice i got (and what i did) is go get a 40gig 7200 internal harddrive, and install the os on that drive, and just use it for protools (i actually partitioned my 40g into two 20g sections, one for protools, one for fcp).. that way you can use the 120g drive as file storage.. the best bet though is to use an external fw drive, if you get two, you can round-robin the file writing, which is nice.. BE WARNED, if you have the dual 1.42g4, the internal fw ports will not work with the 002 and external fw drives.. you need to get a fw pci card and put the drives through that.. digi only lists 3 supported fw pci cards though, and the only one i remember is adaptec, which i bought and works fine.. if you have a fw800 model, and have the cash, go with this for the external drive, it's the closest you'll get to scsi speed..

as far as partitioning, you'll hinder yourself if you keep your system, protools and you audio/session files on the same physical drive, partitioned or not..

[silversound]

If you stick with one drive, partition but not with Partition Magic, or from windows admin. You must do it on a clean instal. This is because your boot sector of your hardrive should include the partition info. Not to mention you can wipe out any junk instaled by the maker of your laptop. Partitioning is a must if you crash. It will keep all of you files seperate from your system drive and you can re-instal Windows without worring about your files.

[The Scum]

Partitioning can help you keep track of things, certainly, but it's not the best for performance issues.

Two important statistics for a recording hard drive are sustained transfer rate, and head seek time. Head seek time is how long it takes the mechanism to get the heads to a new location on the disk, usually in the 5-10 mS range, IIRC.

The suatained transfer numbers will give you an idea as to how many simultaneous tracks you can theoretically expect from the drive.

If you run your OS and audio on the same drive, the heads will spend some time seeking back and forth between the two partitions. This will probably slow things down to some degree. You can mitigate this by feeding the machine lots of RAM, so it won't have to seek into the system partition as often.

But if you're feeding the computer anyways, is it possible to add a second hard drive? That'd be the best all around solution. Do you have firewire?

Byron Jacquot

[Theron D]

looks like if you use two seperate harddrives with one for the OS and the other for Audio is the bes way to go?
Is this what you are saying?