Why Partitioning Your Hard Drive Makes Sense

Most PCs come from the factory with a single partition on their hard drive, meaning that it shows up as one drive in the Computer window (as C:, typically). But keeping your data, applications, and operating system on the same partition can be risky because, if something happens to the partition’s index file (the file that tells your computer where the various pieces of your data are located), your computer won’t be able to boot up off that drive–and even if you boot up with a recovery disc or external drive, you won’t be able to access the rest of your data.

Partitioning your hard drive essentially tells your computer to treat portions of that drive as separate entities. If you keep your system and apps on a partition separate from your data (documents, music, video, and the like), the data will be easier to back up (because your backup utility won’t bother to copy the system and apps, which you can reinstall from the discs or redownload from an online source). In addition, you’ll be less likely to lose your data in an accident; and if you ever need to reformat and reinstall Windows, you won’t have to worry about restoring your data backups.

You can also set up an emergency partition. Suppose that Windows unexpectedly croaks and you don’t have your emergency boot disc handy. If you’ve created a bootable partition that’s large enough to contain a stripped-down OS and a handful of diagnostic tools, you can use it to rescue your data and salvage your computer. Some computer manufacturers (Lenovo, for example) supply a built-in emergency partition on some of their PCs, but you can make your own, if your PC lacks one.

Finally, partitioning lets you try out other operating systems–like Linux, for example. Generally, two operating systems can’t coexist on the same volume without stepping on one another’s toes, so you won’t be able to dual-boot Linux or ease into Windows 7 if you’re on a single-volume system.

How to Partition Your Hard Drive

Note: Users with complicated hard-drive configurations, RAID arrays, or the Windows XP operating system will likely need more-powerful partitioning software than Microsoft’s Disk Management tool–EaseUs Partition Master is a good place to start.

First, back up your data. The partitioning process shouldn’t delete any data, but you can’t be too careful when working with your hard drive.

Open the Disk Management tool by slecting Control Panel, Administrative Tools, Computer Management. An entry for Disk Management should show up underneath the Storage heading on the left-hand side.

Click Disk Management, and you should see a list of your existing drives and partitions (if applicable). To create a new partition, choose a disk that has free storage space, right-click it, and select Shrink Volume. Bear in mind that you can safely shrink only basic disks; if you try to shrink dynamic disks (such as RAID arrays) that are formatted with the NTFS file system, you’ll risk losing your data.

Type in the amount of space you want to shrink the disk by. The number you choose depends on what you want to use the other partition for. If you plan to dual-boot another version of Windows, for example, you’ll want a lot of space (Windows 7 requires at least 16GB of available space, for example); but if you’re setting aside room for an emergency recovery partition, you won’t need nearly as much space.

If you plan to install an OS in this partition (Windows or otherwise), you’ll probably have to stop here–your operating system installer will likely insist on making the partition itself during the installation process.

Once you’ve cleared the necessary space, it should show up in the Disk Management window as Unallocated Space. Right-click this entry, select New Simple Volume, and let the resulting wizard guide you through the remaiing steps of the process. Generally, you’ll want to format the new partition as NTFS; and unless you’re using this partition for archiving purposes, you won’t need to enable file and folder compression for the whole drive. (If you decide to enable compression later, you can do it easily enough: In the Disk Management tool, right-click the partition and select Properties, Compress this drive to save space.)

1. Defrag Disk to Speed Up Access to Information

One amongs the factors that slow the performance of the pc is disk fragmentation. When files are fragmented, the computer must search the onerous disk when the file is opened to piece it back together. To speed up the response time, you should monthly run Disk Defragmenter, a Windows utility that defrags and consolidates fragmented files for quicker pc response.

* Follow Begin > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Disk Defragmenter

* Click the drives you would like to defrag and click on Analyze

* Click Defragment
2. Detect and Repair Disk Errors

Over time, your arduous disk develops dangerous sectors. Bad sectors bog down exhausting disk performance and sometimes create knowledge writing tough or even impossible. To detect and repair disk errors, Windows includes a built-in tool known as the Error Checking utility. It’ll search the hard disk for unhealthy sectors and system errors and repair them for faster performance.

* Follow Begin > My Laptop

* In My Pc right-click the laborious disk you want to scan and click on Properties

* Click the Tools tab

* Click Check Currently

* Choose the Scan for and try recovery of unhealthy sectors check box

* Click Start
3. Disable Indexing Services

Indexing Services could be a very little application that uses a heap of CPU. By indexing and updating lists of all the files on the pc, it helps you to try to to a search for one thing faster as it scans the index list. However if you recognize where your files are, you can disable this system service. It won’t do any hurt to you machine, whether or not you search typically or not terribly often.

* Move to Begin

* Click Settings

* Click Control Panel

* Double-click Add/Take away Programs

* Click the Add/Take away Window Elements

* Uncheck the Indexing services

* Click Next
4. Optimize Show Settings

Windows XP may be a looker. But it costs you system resources that are used to show all the visual things and effects. Windows appearance fine if you disable most of the settings and leave the subsequent:

* Show shadows beneath menus

* Show shadows below mouse pointer

* Show translucent selection rectangle

* Use drop shadows for icons labels on the desktop

* Use visual designs on windows and buttons
6. Disable Performance Counters

Windows XP encompasses a performance monitor utility which monitors several areas of your PC’s performance. These utilities take up system resources thus disabling may be a good idea.

* Download and install the Extensible Performance Counter List (http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/reskit/tools/existing/exctrlst-o.asp)

* Then select each counter in flip in the ‘Extensible performance counters’ window and clear the ‘performance counters enabled’ checkbox at the bottom button below
7. Optimize Your Pagefile

You’ll be able to optimize your pagefile. Setting a mounted size to your pagefile saves the operating system from the requirement to resize the pagefile.

* Right click on My Pc and choose Properties

* Select the Advanced tab

* Underneath Performance opt for the Settings button

* Select the Advanced tab again and underneath Virtual Memory choose Amendment

* Highlight the drive containing your page file and create the initial Size of the file the same as the Most Size of the file.
8. Remove Fonts for Speed

Fonts, particularly TrueType fonts, use quite a bit of system resources. For optimal performance, trim your fonts down to just people who you wish to use a day and fonts that applications might require.

* Open Control Panel

* Open Fonts folder

* Move fonts you don’t want to a brief directory (e.g. C:\FONTBKUP?) just in case you need or need to bring some of them back. The more fonts you uninstall, the a lot of system resources you will gain.
9. Use a Flash Memory to Boost Performance

To boost performance, you wish to install further RAM memory. It’ll let you boot your OS abundant quicker and run many applications and access information quicker. There is no best and additional technically elegant means to do it than use eBoostr (http://www.eboostr.com).

eBoostr could be a little program that lets you improve a performance of any pc, powered by Windows XP in much the same approach as Vista’s ReadyBoost. With eBoostr, if you have a flash drive, like a USB flash thumb drive or an SD card, you can use it to create your computer run better. Merely plug in a very flash drive through a USB socket and Windows XP can use eBoostr to utilize the flash memory to enhance performance.

The product shows the best results for frequently used applications and knowledge, which becomes a great feature for folks who are using workplace programs, graphics applications or developer tools. It’ll surely attract a special attention of laptop homeowners as laptop upgrade is usually additional complicated and laptop onerous drives are by definition slower than those of desktops.
10. Perform a Boot Defragment

There is a easy approach to hurry up XP startup: create your system do a boot defragment, which can put all the boot files next to one another on your hard disk. When boot files are in close proximity to one another, your system will start faster.

On most systems, boot defragment should be enabled by default, but it might not be on yours, or it might have been changed inadvertently. To create sure that boot defragment is enabled:
* Run the Registry Editor

* Move to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Dfrg\BootOptimizeFunction

* Set the Enable string worth to Y if it is not already set to Y.

* Exit the Registry

* Reboot

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