Partitioning Hard Drives in Windows XP
Remember that old Radio Shack TRS-80 computer that sat on
your desk? One of the rituals that went with ownership was
popping a tape into the cassette deck to load a program, all
the while hoping the tape didn't get stretched or chewed up
before the process completed. Later on hard drives made an
appearance, but back in those early days a hard drive
was a luxury, and a very expensive luxury at that when you
start computing the cost per megabyte of early drives. Today, we rarely give much thought to the
hard drive. In one way it's good they have become
inexpensive and so reliable they seldom fail. On the other hand, because
they are so reliable, we tend to ignore hard drives and
overlook ways to make them more useful and efficient. A
modified or advanced partitioning scheme isn't essential to the basic
operation of a personal computer, but if you're a tweaker or
organizational fanatic (I admit it, I am, on both counts)
then partitioning affords a wealth of customization and organizational
opportunities.
The Basic Hard Drive
What's a hard drive? There are tons of
books and sites that delve into detailed descriptions, but basically it's a
storage device. The medium that stores the actual
data is called a platter, usually made from aluminum, and
there are varying numbers of stacked platters depending on the
capacity of the hard drive. The platters are placed inside a
sealed case along with an actuator assembly for the heads
and arms that move back and forth across the platters to
write and retrieve the data. A hard drive
is non-volatile storage. It requires no power supply to
maintain the data that has been placed on the drive. In
addition, the data is completely under
user control. Data can be added and deleted at will and the
drive can be configured in various ways to suit the
purpose of the user.
Examining the Hard Disk
Layout
The easiest way to understand
the system drive structure is to use a tool supplied
with Windows XP called Disk Management, a snap-in that's
part of the
Microsoft Management Console. The majority of systems sold
today for home or small business use will come equipped with
one hard drive, although many manufacturers offer special
deals on new systems that make it financially attractive to
add a second, third, or even fourth hard drive if you have a
need for the extra capacity. In spite of the fact
that a single hard drive can be configured in many different
ways, it's a pretty safe bet that an off the shelf system
will arrive in one of two basic configurations. Either the
entire drive will be partitioned as C: as shown in Fig. 01 or it will be split
into two partitions, one as C: that is visible and another
partition that is hidden and contains an image of the
operating system (and a ton of useless software) in case things go terribly wrong
requiring a reinstall of the operating system.
Fig. 01
|
If you're
wondering why
Fig. 01
lists Unallocated space in the key at the bottom
when it isn't shown in the Graphical View, the
answer is because there are other drives already
installed in the system. They will be addressed
later in the article. |
What Is A Partition? | One Partition or Multiple Partitions? | Partitioning A Blank Hard Drive During XP Installation | Reassigning Drive Letters | Resizing An Existing Partition On A Single Hard Drive | Creating A Primary Partition In Unallocated Space | Creating An Extended Partition And Logical Drives | Creating Logical Drives In An Extended Partition | Multiple Hard Drive System Partitioning | Converting Basic Disks to Dynamic Disks
Last Updated:
Tuesday, August 19, 2008 06:27:24 PM |
