Confused about Hard drive Split C / D on New Acer W8 Desktop

OnAndUp

Hello all!

Can someone help me with this please?

I have a new Acer W8 desktop that I'm still currently using alongside my old XP one whilst sorting it.

I have mainly been using it for online stuff so not really saved anything onto it yet.

I'm a bit confused and unsure about this - the HD on the new one is 1TB and when I look at in in My PC it's split like this:

Acer (C: 430GB Free of 456GB
Data (D: 459 Free of 459

My understanding of this is that the Acer System stuff is on the C: Drive? So I'm supposed to save my stuff on the Data Drive?

I just don't understand why it' split like that? Is that a normal split ratio? isn't it a huge waste to have all that free space on the Acer C:? I would expect it to be say 25% C + 75% D?

I just want to know in case I can change / or need to change it before I start saving stuff there etc?

Thanks!

RobTang

There is no normal split ratio its completely up to user preference and you choose to organise your computer.

OnAndUp

Thanks Robtang!

How do I change it then please - as I never "chose" those amounts?

closed

Acer can't possibly know how every single user would prefer their hard disk to be partitioned, so they choose 50/50, some manufacturers choose 100/0.

It's sensible to put data on a different partition, in case windows fails to boot one day, and you have no backup.

how much data have you got, how much data are you going to have in x years time, does it matter, just create a pointer from one to the other.

backup with disc imaging software and create windows discs before you start repartitioning.

macman

The recovery partition is also on one of those virtual drives.

grumpycrab

closed wrote: »

It's sensible to put data on a different partition, in case windows fails to boot one day, and you have no backup.

Please explain.

closed

reinstalling windows wipe's c:, if data is on d: that's not much of a problem.

The Microsoft idea of putting peoples data under the profile directory (which can corrupt) by default is flawed design, as shown by the countless help I've lost all my photo's threads when windows has started up with an empty profile.

The solution to all these type of issues is to backup properly, but hardly anyone does.

Mr_Toad

I haven't been a regular Windows user for a long time so things may have changed.

There is no hard and fast rule about partitioning, it's down to personal preference. Howoever, I used to try and set my system up so the operating system had it's own partition, or HDD, and the data was on a separate partition or HDD.

This was great in theory but not so easy to set up. Changing the default library destination for My Documents, My Pictures etc. was fairly easy but in my experience didn't always work.

It was a source of constant irritation to me that no matter how hard you try some of your data always gets written to the OS partition despite your best efforts to keep them separate.

Usually this is down to individual software packages not checking what your preferences are and hard coding the file locations.

In the end I got fed up of finding I had two My documents folders, mine on the the 'data' drive and the one on the OS disk that some software or other had resurected without giving me the chance to point it somewhere else.

I just like all my related files in one location.

Perhaps things have changed with Windows 8, I hope so.

I suppose my point is that in trying to be well organised and partitioned you could end up with stuff all over the place which can mean backups are a problem and finding files and issue.

esuhl

^^ I've had a separate "data" partition for "My Documents" since I started using Windows XP. It makes reinstalling the OS so much easier and is useful for multi-boot systems.

I've never had any problems with multiple "My Documents" folders being created or stuff getting split across partitions. It seems to work for me.

OnAndUp

Thank you all - really appreciate your replies!

I'm leaving the partition thing on hold for now, but will probably have more questions about it in the near future!??! I haven't yet done the Acer recovery discs the prompt popped up when I was busy the other day so I cancelled it (tut tut - I know!!)

Anyway just gone to do it now before I mess about with anything and the prompts I get are to plug in a USB Stick with at least 16GB free which I don't have. So going to buy one online ASAP. I'm guessing a 32GB (USB 3.0) to be sure there's plenty of space as 16Gb doesn't really hold 16GB? Is that right?

Its a Revo so no Optical Drive, I have bought a USB one and was going to do recovery discs like that. Think I will still be able to do it that way too if I download Macrium too?

Thanks!