By Gene Barlow
User Group Relations
Copyrighted January 2011
Your computer’s hard drive is the center of your computer system. This is where your Windows operating system, all of your application programs, as well as your important data files are stored. It is not unusual for your hard drive to contain tens of thousands of different files. Windows Explorer is the utility that can show you all of these files, organized in various folders.
When your hard drive was initially setup by the company that made your computer, a single partition on this hard drive was created for your use. This partition is called your c: drive and it contains all of the thousands of files you have available on your computer system. Today, most computer companies also place one or two hidden partitions on your hard drive to store additional files. You cannot access these hidden partitions or store any files in them. They are used for very special reasons by the computer companies and are not available for your use.
Having all of your files stored on your c: drive is NOT the best way to organize your computer’s hard drive, but it was the easiest way for computer companies to set it up this way. Most end-users think they must live with a single c: drive on their computer. They are not aware that there are better ways to organize a hard drive and utilities that make setting up additional partitions very easy to do. This article will show you how I organize my hard drive and tell you why you might want to consider organizing your hard drive in a similar way.
What is a Partition: Your physical hard drive can be divided into many sections called partitions. Each partition is given a name and a drive letter to make it easier to refer to. A partition can be any size, as long as you have enough room on your hard drive. The space inside a partition is organized into a File System, so that you can find and access individual files in the partition. Windows uses the NTFS file system mostly, but the older FAT32 file systems may be used on some computers. Each different file system works in similar ways. The file system provides a directory of the files and folders stored inside of the partition. This helps you to find and access files on your computer.
Instead of one large c: drive on my computer, I divide my computer’s hard drive into three smaller partitions. The first partition I use is my c: drive. I store my Windows operating system and all of my application programs in this partition. The second partition I create on my hard drive is a partition where I store all of my personal data files. These can be my email folders, spreadsheets, Quicken data files, Word documents, etc. The third partition I create on my hard drive is a partition where I store all of my graphical images such as digital photographs, video movies, music files, and graphics files I use on my computer. Let’s look a bit closer at the content of these three partitions.
Program Partition (c: drive): This continues to be the main bootable partition on your computer. Windows resides in this partition as well as all of your application programs. Examples of application programs are Quicken, Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, etc. In addition to all of the programs on your computer, this partition contains all of the setting files that make sure your programs work the way you want them to. The Windows Control Panel is where you make your settings for Windows. Your application programs have settings or property files in each application where you define the settings used by that application program. The files in your program partition are created when you install Windows on your computer or when you install any application programs on your computer. I make sure I backup my entire Programs Partition once a week so that I can be up and running again in minutes if that partition should fail me.
Data Partition: This partition I use to store all of my personal data files that are text based and not graphics based. These are files created by application programs stored separately on my c: drive. For example, I would install Quicken on my c: drive, but then I would save my Quicken data files separately on my Data partition. Keeping all of your data files separate from the program files makes them safer from Viruses and Windows crashes. It also gives you additional options on how often you backup these important files and how long you keep the backups. Since my data files are very important to me, I backup this partition on a daily basis and never delete any of my old backups. When my backup hard drive fills up, I usually replace it with a new empty external hard drive and keep my old backup drives on the shelf if I should ever need them.
Graphics Partition: I have only recently added this partition to my computer system. I am an avid photographer and have hundreds of digital photos I store on my computer. I also have a few video clips that I have made and keep on my computer. In addition, I have collected some music files that I would have a hard time replacing. I also have many graphics images that I use in my PowerPoint slides that I store on my hard drive. All of these files have one thing in common. They are already saved in a compressed format and further compression would not reduce their size much. So, I save these graphical files in a separate partition and when I backup this partition, I do not compress it as that would not reduce the size much and would be a waste of time to try. I add photos to this partition when I download them from my camera. Since I do this every couple of weeks, I only backup this partition immediately after I add files to the partition. I do not delete these backup files, but keep them till the external backup hard drive fills up and then I start a new external hard drive to save my backups.
Creating Partitions on Hard Drives: How do you create additional partitions on a hard drive when the space on the drive is currently allocated to other partitions? You need a special partitioning utility that will let you add partitions to a hard drive that is currently assigned to other partition. Acronis offers the best partitioning utility on the market with their Acronis Disk Director 11 Home product. This powerful tool will let you resize partitions and create new partitions without damaging the partitions and files stored currently on your hard drive.
Let’s assume that your hard drive has a single large c: partition on the hard drive. With today’s very large drives, this partition is probably mostly empty of files. In other words, there is unused space inside of the c: drive. So, using Disk Director 11, you would resize the c: drive down and then in the Unallocated space remaining, you would create two new partitions, one for your data files and one for your graphics files. Then you would use Windows Explorer to find all of your data files and move them to the new Data partition. Next you would find all of your Graphics files and move them to your new Graphic partition. This organization may take a bit of work to get set up, but when you are done it will work great for you.
How to Order: Acronis Disk Director 11 Home partitioning utility can be purchased from us at a great discount price right now. The product is normally sold by Acronis for $50 as a download or $63 on a CD. With our Holiday Special going on right now, you can purchase this product from us for just $25 as a download or $30 on a CD. That makes these prices about half the list price of the product, a real bargain. Just be aware, this Holiday Special price is only good till the end of December, so you need to act quickly to take advantage of this excellent price. To order Disk Director 11, go to http://www.ugr.com/DiskDirector.html and click on the Buy Now button next to the package you wish to purchase.
When you purchase from us, we provide you with a step by step Starter Guide that will help you to use this excellent product to do some common functions such as setting up additional partitions on your hard drive. In addition, I will help you with your technical questions and problems for up to two years after you purchase the product from us. You also get everything that Acronis offers when purchasing from us. Order now while this special price is still good. Please use the order code UGNEWYEAR11 when placing your order.
We appreciate your business and will work to earn your trust. If you have questions about this excellent product, just send a note to support@ugr7.com and I will get back with you shortly.
User Group Relations
Copyrighted January 2011
Your computer’s hard drive is the center of your computer system. This is where your Windows operating system, all of your application programs, as well as your important data files are stored. It is not unusual for your hard drive to contain tens of thousands of different files. Windows Explorer is the utility that can show you all of these files, organized in various folders.
When your hard drive was initially setup by the company that made your computer, a single partition on this hard drive was created for your use. This partition is called your c: drive and it contains all of the thousands of files you have available on your computer system. Today, most computer companies also place one or two hidden partitions on your hard drive to store additional files. You cannot access these hidden partitions or store any files in them. They are used for very special reasons by the computer companies and are not available for your use.
Having all of your files stored on your c: drive is NOT the best way to organize your computer’s hard drive, but it was the easiest way for computer companies to set it up this way. Most end-users think they must live with a single c: drive on their computer. They are not aware that there are better ways to organize a hard drive and utilities that make setting up additional partitions very easy to do. This article will show you how I organize my hard drive and tell you why you might want to consider organizing your hard drive in a similar way.
What is a Partition: Your physical hard drive can be divided into many sections called partitions. Each partition is given a name and a drive letter to make it easier to refer to. A partition can be any size, as long as you have enough room on your hard drive. The space inside a partition is organized into a File System, so that you can find and access individual files in the partition. Windows uses the NTFS file system mostly, but the older FAT32 file systems may be used on some computers. Each different file system works in similar ways. The file system provides a directory of the files and folders stored inside of the partition. This helps you to find and access files on your computer.
Instead of one large c: drive on my computer, I divide my computer’s hard drive into three smaller partitions. The first partition I use is my c: drive. I store my Windows operating system and all of my application programs in this partition. The second partition I create on my hard drive is a partition where I store all of my personal data files. These can be my email folders, spreadsheets, Quicken data files, Word documents, etc. The third partition I create on my hard drive is a partition where I store all of my graphical images such as digital photographs, video movies, music files, and graphics files I use on my computer. Let’s look a bit closer at the content of these three partitions.
Program Partition (c: drive): This continues to be the main bootable partition on your computer. Windows resides in this partition as well as all of your application programs. Examples of application programs are Quicken, Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, etc. In addition to all of the programs on your computer, this partition contains all of the setting files that make sure your programs work the way you want them to. The Windows Control Panel is where you make your settings for Windows. Your application programs have settings or property files in each application where you define the settings used by that application program. The files in your program partition are created when you install Windows on your computer or when you install any application programs on your computer. I make sure I backup my entire Programs Partition once a week so that I can be up and running again in minutes if that partition should fail me.
Data Partition: This partition I use to store all of my personal data files that are text based and not graphics based. These are files created by application programs stored separately on my c: drive. For example, I would install Quicken on my c: drive, but then I would save my Quicken data files separately on my Data partition. Keeping all of your data files separate from the program files makes them safer from Viruses and Windows crashes. It also gives you additional options on how often you backup these important files and how long you keep the backups. Since my data files are very important to me, I backup this partition on a daily basis and never delete any of my old backups. When my backup hard drive fills up, I usually replace it with a new empty external hard drive and keep my old backup drives on the shelf if I should ever need them.
Graphics Partition: I have only recently added this partition to my computer system. I am an avid photographer and have hundreds of digital photos I store on my computer. I also have a few video clips that I have made and keep on my computer. In addition, I have collected some music files that I would have a hard time replacing. I also have many graphics images that I use in my PowerPoint slides that I store on my hard drive. All of these files have one thing in common. They are already saved in a compressed format and further compression would not reduce their size much. So, I save these graphical files in a separate partition and when I backup this partition, I do not compress it as that would not reduce the size much and would be a waste of time to try. I add photos to this partition when I download them from my camera. Since I do this every couple of weeks, I only backup this partition immediately after I add files to the partition. I do not delete these backup files, but keep them till the external backup hard drive fills up and then I start a new external hard drive to save my backups.
Creating Partitions on Hard Drives: How do you create additional partitions on a hard drive when the space on the drive is currently allocated to other partitions? You need a special partitioning utility that will let you add partitions to a hard drive that is currently assigned to other partition. Acronis offers the best partitioning utility on the market with their Acronis Disk Director 11 Home product. This powerful tool will let you resize partitions and create new partitions without damaging the partitions and files stored currently on your hard drive.
Let’s assume that your hard drive has a single large c: partition on the hard drive. With today’s very large drives, this partition is probably mostly empty of files. In other words, there is unused space inside of the c: drive. So, using Disk Director 11, you would resize the c: drive down and then in the Unallocated space remaining, you would create two new partitions, one for your data files and one for your graphics files. Then you would use Windows Explorer to find all of your data files and move them to the new Data partition. Next you would find all of your Graphics files and move them to your new Graphic partition. This organization may take a bit of work to get set up, but when you are done it will work great for you.
How to Order: Acronis Disk Director 11 Home partitioning utility can be purchased from us at a great discount price right now. The product is normally sold by Acronis for $50 as a download or $63 on a CD. With our Holiday Special going on right now, you can purchase this product from us for just $25 as a download or $30 on a CD. That makes these prices about half the list price of the product, a real bargain. Just be aware, this Holiday Special price is only good till the end of December, so you need to act quickly to take advantage of this excellent price. To order Disk Director 11, go to http://www.ugr.com/DiskDirector.html and click on the Buy Now button next to the package you wish to purchase.
When you purchase from us, we provide you with a step by step Starter Guide that will help you to use this excellent product to do some common functions such as setting up additional partitions on your hard drive. In addition, I will help you with your technical questions and problems for up to two years after you purchase the product from us. You also get everything that Acronis offers when purchasing from us. Order now while this special price is still good. Please use the order code UGNEWYEAR11 when placing your order.
We appreciate your business and will work to earn your trust. If you have questions about this excellent product, just send a note to support@ugr7.com and I will get back with you shortly.