Disk Partitioning

[Steve Hayes]

And incidentally, in preference to W7's Xcopy I always XXcopy my
data/user files to an external HD. That way they are immediately
accessible. I have the necessary XXcopy commands ready on a Word
document with its own shortcut on the desktop. Nice and neat!

The only files XXcopy cannot deal with (at least the freebie version) is
filenames with more than 256 characters including the path. And that is
no problem for me.

Please tell more.

I once had DR DOS, which had some useful variants like XDel, which don't seem
to work in Windows XP or 7.

I still use a useful utility that dates back to 1984 or so, called bac.com.

It copies files, but only when the size or date differ. I would have expected
that M$ would long ago have included such a command in their operating system,
but they haven't. Unfortunately bac doesn't work with long file names, so I
try to keep filenames to the 8.3 pattern.

 

[choro]

Can I suggest that you have a look at Microsoft's SyncToy 2.1?

Read about it on the Internet. Saw some user comments about it being
dead slow at times. Just grinding on and on all night long, as someone said.

Besides, XXcopy is a DOS program and as such very rapid. And not only
that it has got so many options/parameters that it is to all extent and
purpose more or less *limitless* in its choices. However, one has to
write one's own command/s which scares many people. But if you are
conversant with how old DOS commands worked, it is in fact very easy to
tailor to your needs. --
choro
*****

 

[choro]

AllWay Sync

I will look into this AllWaySync and see if it will serve me better than
XXcopy. I've commented on XXcopy, its ease of use and speed of action,
to say nothing of its tailorability, once you have written the simple
DOS commands. But anything is worth trying once. Who knows, I might
discard XXcopy! This would be like going into a new relationship while
having a long standing steady relationship with all the dangers that it
entails.

 

[choro]

Please tell more.

I once had DR DOS, which had some useful variants like XDel, which don't seem
to work in Windows XP or 7.

I still use a useful utility that dates back to 1984 or so, called bac.com.

It copies files, but only when the size or date differ. I would have expected
that M$ would long ago have included such a command in their operating system,
but they haven't. Unfortunately bac doesn't work with long file names, so I
try to keep filenames to the 8.3 pattern.

You can doctor XXcopy to copy all the files OR to copy only new files or
updated files that have the A attribute set. What is more you can change
the A attribute of any file that you might not want copied beforehand
and it will skip those files. I did this the other day with some huge
video files that I didn't want copied. It just went ahead and copied
only the other new files.

And because I have the commands on a Word doc file with a shortcut on my
desktop, all I have to do is open the Word document, click in the margin
of the command line to select and copy the command and then paste the
command at the Command prompt. The possibilities are more or less
limitless. It is all done by choosing your parameters.

 

[choro]

I'm, by some quirk (anal retentive, obsessive compulsive, other ???)
of my mentality, an organizational freak. I, by nature, want things well
structured and organized logically.
So, in XP-Pro I have the hard drive partitioned into multiple
partitions _- Office Apps, Internet Apps, Accessories, Utilities,
etc.
I've been told that this "slows" the machine down -- but I don't do
anything (except 1 or 2 CPU-intensive math things I've programmed)
where the slow-down , if it exists, is noticeable.
So, my question --- what's the downside of doing the same thing
on a new Win 7 64 bit computer?

There's another problem not yet mentioned about excessive partitioning.

Windows can only have 26 named partitions, since it uses single letters
to name them - and A:, B:, and C: are pre-assigned[1].

Now if only they used the Chinese character set instead of the English
alphabet! I gather there are 20,000 characters in the Chinese alphabet.
--
choro
*****

If you never plug in a memory stick or a flash card, or (heavens
forfend!) a backup drive, that might not matter to you.

I agree with all of the caveats expressed in this thread.

[1] A: and B: can be preempted, but that is not a great idea, since they
have a standard meaning. C: can vary too, but there must be a boot
drive, of course.

 

[Nil]

I will look into this AllWaySync and see if it will serve me
better than XXcopy. I've commented on XXcopy, its ease of use and
speed of action, to say nothing of its tailorability, once you
have written the simple DOS commands. But anything is worth trying
once. Who knows, I might discard XXcopy! This would be like going
into a new relationship while having a long standing steady
relationship with all the dangers that it entails.

Another possibility, and the one I use, is Microsoft's Robocopy, which
is included with Windows Vista and later.

 

[Steve Hayes]

You can doctor XXcopy to copy all the files OR to copy only new files or
updated files that have the A attribute set. What is more you can change
the A attribute of any file that you might not want copied beforehand
and it will skip those files. I did this the other day with some huge
video files that I didn't want copied. It just went ahead and copied
only the other new files.

And because I have the commands on a Word doc file with a shortcut on my
desktop, all I have to do is open the Word document, click in the margin
of the command line to select and copy the command and then paste the
command at the Command prompt. The possibilities are more or less
limitless. It is all done by choosing your parameters.

I don't seem to have it on my XP system, is it only in Win 7?

Does it do deletions?

 

[Roger Mills]

I don't seem to have it on my XP system, is it only in Win 7?

XXCOPY is not in either system as standard - you have to download it
from xxcopy.com and install it.

Does it do deletions?

It can do, if you use the Clone command. That makes a copy of Source in
Destination - including deleting any existing files in Destination which
are not in Source.
--
Cheers,
Roger
____________
Please reply to Newsgroup. Whilst email address is valid, it is seldom
checked.

 

[Roger Mills]

And incidentally, in preference to W7's Xcopy I always XXcopy my
data/user files to an external HD. That way they are immediately
accessible. I have the necessary XXcopy commands ready on a Word
document with its own shortcut on the desktop. Nice and neat!

I do the same, except that I have a batch file which contains all the
commands, and which is scheduled to run automatically each day.

The only files XXcopy cannot deal with (at least the freebie version) is
filenames with more than 256 characters including the path. And that is
no problem for me.

Another thing the freebie version can't cope with is copying files to a
network drive rather than to a directly connected external drive. To be
more accurate, it *can* do it - but not without producing a 'nag'
message which suggests that you ought to be using the 'paid for'
version. You have to "press any key to continue" to get rid of the
message, which means that you can't automate the process. This is
annoying because the T&C's *do* allow copying to network drives as long
as they're your personal property.

In order to overcome this problem, I've taken to using Robocopy. There's
a bit of a learning curve, but it enables me to achieve everything I
want to do, without any nag messages.
--
Cheers,
Roger
____________
Please reply to Newsgroup. Whilst email address is valid, it is seldom
checked.

 

[choro]

I don't seem to have it on my XP system, is it only in Win 7?

Does it do deletions?

XXcopy is not part of Windows though Windows does, I believe, still
include a similar command called Xcopy accessible from the Command Prompt.

XXcopy on the other hand is a 3rd party program which you've got to
download and install first before you can use it. The two are very
similar with similar commands, though XXcopy is reckoned to be superior
to Xcopy. The free version is more than capable of serving your home
needs. The paid version is more for commercial use to run on servers and
is fairly pricey.

You can find the command parameters on the Internet. the /m parameter
for example will only copy previously uncopied files, i.e. files with
the A attribute set AND also change the A attribute to N once copied so
the same file will not be copied over and over, again and again. There
are attributes that will do almost anything except make the coffee!

It helps if you allocate a fixed unchanging letter to your external HD.
Then you can just copy and paste the command from a line in your Word
doc directly to your Command Prompt.

Will it delete files? Yes and No! How come? Well this depends on whether
you include a parameter in your XXcopy command to delete files under
certain conditions. Read their Help files. Personally I don't use this
option/parameter which will delete files on the xternal HD IF you have
deleted them on your computer. In other words this option Syncs the
original and the XXcopy folders. Not for me! Me no like it!

Both the built-in Xcopy in Windows and XXcopy which you've got to
download and install are powerful DOS commands, as I said, and you need
to know your DOS from DOMESTOS to run them. But both are extremely
flexible because of scores of parameters you can pick and choose from.

Once, for example, my Xternal HD went kaput so I re-copied and pasted my
own command line from my Word document to a brand new Xternal HD but
deleted the /m parameter just before pressing ENTER, using the back
arrow key to get to and then delete the /m parameter from the command
line so that it would copy ALL files willy nilly whether they had the A
attribute set or not. Otherwise I would have got copies of just the new
or altered files.

You get exact immediately working copies of all your files and folders
on the Xternal HD too. And I mean working copies just as if they were on
your internal HD or partition. Naturally you need a different command
line for each partition but this saves you time in the long run as you
can just copy and paste the particular command line for each individual
partition.

XXcopy D:\*.* for example will copy all files and folders on your D
partition. You need to change this to XXopy E:\*.* for your E partition,
for example. *You can of course specify a particular folder to copy
rather than the whole partition*. You specify which drive it will copy
to and which folder. You can sensibly call this destination folder
G:\XXcopies of TOSHIBA D Drive and it will create this directory on your
Xternal HD G:\ for example. If your computer has itself assigned a Drive
letter to your Xternal HD and it is not G:\ it will tell you no such
destination HD exists. That is why it is important to allocate a fixed
letter to your Xternal HD. Of course this saves you time in the long run
as you don't have to run around like a beheaded chicken searching for
what letter your computer has assigned to your Xternal HD this time. In
fact this is a very simple operation but you've got to know your DOS
from your DOMESTOS, as I said earlier.

Both Xcopy and XXcopy are lightning fast, with teh XXcopy being the more
capable of the two. No messing around! They get the job done in no time
and it is easy to make the move from the built in Xcopy DOS command to
the 3rd party XXcopy because their commands are more or less identical.
And you don't really need the more powerful PRO or Paid Version of
XXcopy unless you run a server for a corporation. Incidentally, the
Freebie version is only allowed for Home Use and NOT for Corporate or
Business/Commercial use for which a fairly hefty fee is payable. The PRO
version will also do file paths+names of longer than 256 chacaters,
which the Freebie version will skip! But I doubt that a home user will
have such lengthy filenames.

And because XXcopy will create its own destination folders and
subfolders on your Xternal HD, you can use the same Xternal HD to XXcopy
different computers just by pre-specifying different destination folders
which it will then create on your Xternal HD. No need to pre-create the
destination folder!

So you see, XXcopy is superbly flexible. As flexible in fact as this
beautiful Chinese contortionist girl.

Unfortunately it has no parameter/option to include in your command line
that will make you a cuppa or something on the rocks!

 

[choro]

I do the same, except that I have a batch file which contains all the
commands, and which is scheduled to run automatically each day.


Another thing the freebie version can't cope with is copying files to a
network drive rather than to a directly connected external drive. To be
more accurate, it *can* do it - but not without producing a 'nag'
message which suggests that you ought to be using the 'paid for'
version. You have to "press any key to continue" to get rid of the
message, which means that you can't automate the process. This is
annoying because the T&C's *do* allow copying to network drives as long
as they're your personal property.

In order to overcome this problem, I've taken to using Robocopy. There's
a bit of a learning curve, but it enables me to achieve everything I
want to do, without any nag messages.

Well, yes, I agree with you that preparing a batch file to run the
commands is the more elegant solution though quite frankly I don't mind
copying and pasting my commands to the Command Prompt.

My solution is to create a desktop folder showing up as a large red tick
mark, which includes shortcuts to my constantly used or updated files.
And my XXcopy commands .doc file has a shortcut there. The large red tic
it makes this desktop folder very easy to find.

But maybe I should give *Robocopy* a try. If it's got a learning curve,
so be it, if it is worth the effort. You are the second person
recommending this program.

Anybody to +1 it?--
choro
*****

 

[R. C. White]

Hi, Steve.

Back in 1999 I bought a new computer and the biggest hard disk available
was 8 Gig.

Me, too. And that's about when I started multi-partitioning. I was still
running Win95 when I bought my son a student software bundle that included
WinNT4.0. With much work and experimentation, I learned how to install NT
and dual-boot it with Win95. But NT could not read FAT32, and Win95
couldn't handle NTFS. Both could use FAT(16) partitions, but those could
not be bigger than 2 GB. My new IBM HDD was 9 GB - theoretically - but
after converting sectors, tracks, cylinders, etc., and translating hex to
decimal numbers, there were 4 partitions of 2 GB each, plus about 800 MB
left over. I first created a small primary partition with that 800 MB,
formatted it FAT(16), marked it Active and made it my System Partition.
Then I made an Extended Partition holding 8 GB and created four 2 GB logical
drives in it. The System Partition was Drive C:, Win95's Boot Volume was
Drive D:, Drive E: became Data, Drive F: was for Miscellaneous and Drive G:
was Archives. WinNT's Boot Volume shared the FAT Drive C: with the startup
files, including Boot.ini.

There have been MANY changes over the 15 or so years since then, both in my
hardware and software AND in the capabilities of Windows versions. Each new
HDD was much larger than the one before, and since I had already learned
about Disk Management and partitioning, rather than discard the outgrown
HDD, I just bought a longer cable and added the new disk. (At the moment, I
have 4 internal SATA drives, 200 GB to 1 TB each), 1 external 3 TB USB 3.0,
plus a 180 GB SSD. No, I don't need all that space, but I have it so...
<g>) In 2002, MSFT gave me the MVP Award and invited me to participate in
the beta for Longhorn, which became Vista.

We went through more than a half-dozen successive builds of the OS beta;
each required us to install the new version from scratch, into a separate
partition, and each came in both 32-bit and 64-bit versions. By changing
Boot.ini, we could specify which Disk(#) and Partition(#) to install each
OS. Windows did not require "drive" letters, but we humans are not comfy
without them, so I had pretty soon used up almost all the 26 letters
available. That's when I learned to also assign LABELS to each partition,
so that Vista32 remained Vista32 even when it moved from Drive V: to Drive
X: and its Boot Folder became X:\Windows. At one time, I was
"octo-booting": Boot.ini offered me the choice of 8 versions of Windows
XP/Vista/32/64/NT at each reboot! Thankfully, I'm down to a couple of
choices now and seldom boot anything other than 64-bit Win8.

But THAT was a productive use of multiple partitions. SOME of my data had
to be migrated each time a new OS was installed, but most of the time, only
the current Boot Volume needed to be deleted and recreated to install the
new OS, while all my Data (photos, documents, Quicken records, etc.)
remained untouched on good ol' Drive E:. (Yes, that drive letter has stuck
with me ever since Win95/NT.)

Of course, most of this is of little or no interest to most users, who never
get involved in multiple OSes - but many of us in newsgroups like this DO
get into such adventures. To lump us all together in discussing how, why
and whether to use multiple partitions is to overlook the real world
differences between us.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP (2002-2010)
Windows Live Mail 2012 (Build 16.4.3508.0205) in Win8 Pro


"Steve Hayes" wrote in message

Primarily a waste of time and effort. Makes successful restoration from
backups less likely. All the registry and user info for the
installations remains on the C: drive anyway.

I generally agree but sometimes partitioning makes sense.

Back in 1999 I bought a new computer and the biggest hard disk available was
8
Gig.

When bigger drives became available I got a 40 Gig one, and partioned it
into
D, E, F, and G drives -- back then it was Fat 32, and making it all one
partition would have wasted a bit of space because it would have required a
bigger cluster size. My plan was to use D to back up C, E for programs, F
for
games (I didn't want the kids installing them in my working disk space) and
G
for data.

I installed programs on E because there wasn't enough space on C.

And I've carried the same configuration over ever since, because I don't
like
reinstalling programs -- much too time-consuming.

When I bought a new computer, I bought it without an OS. I just backed up
each
partition on Acronis, and restored it on the new computer's 500 Gig drives.
Everything worked.

 

[John]

I agree with Clorox.

Bloddy, stupid, damned, irritating *SPELLCHECKERS* and the utter
*idiots* who don't see them changing things behind our backs! (Me, I
mean.)
Sorry, choro, *I* typed your 'nym correctly, I just missed the damned
spellchecker helpfully "correcting" it for me.
No offense intended.
J.

 

[Dave]

When bigger drives became available I got a 40 Gig one, and partioned it
into D, E, F, and G drives -- back then it was Fat 32, and making it all
one partition would have wasted a bit of space because it would have
required a bigger cluster size. My plan was to use D to back up C, E for
programs, F for games (I didn't want the kids installing them in my
working disk space) and G for data.

I've never agreed with the cluster size argument. You can't fill a

partition to the very tippy top so you finish up having to try to balance
where you put stuff. Some programs like compression programs require free
space.
Anyway, cluster size argument no longer applies and even it did, hd's are
so huge and inexpensive who would care.

There is an excellent reason to confine the system and installed program
files on one drive and all data on a second drive. Extra partitions may be
needed for alternate systems or other special purposes, like huge photo,
music or video collections. The advantage to doing so is for backup
management. I don't bother.
I use macrium to image the c drive and file backup for the data partition.
I point My Documents to the D drive.

With windows 7 it may be possible to point the user directory to the D
drive but I've never tried it and some of the folder deny access. Linux
with it's home directory is so much better in this respect.

 

[Stef]

Bloddy, stupid, damned, irritating *SPELLCHECKERS* and the utter
*idiots* who don't see them changing things behind our backs! (Me, I
mean.)
Sorry, choro, *I* typed your 'nym correctly, I just missed the damned
spellchecker helpfully "correcting" it for me.
No offense intended.
J.

Turn off auto-spellchecking. I never use it. Use your brain instead.
Works better . . . with practice. Well, with some it will take a lot of
practice. ;-)

And does anyone "proof" there posts and replies anymore?


Stef

 

[pyotr filipivich]

But maybe I should give *Robocopy* a try. If it's got a learning curve,
so be it, if it is worth the effort. You are the second person
recommending this program.

It is worth it. It does have a learning curve, but what doesn't?
(It is a Microsoft Program, well, available from Microsoft.) Use the
/Learn option a lot when starting./testing. I keep a shortcut to the
documentation on the desktop.

And I have built some rather (if I say so my self) impressive
batch files to sync files between computers via thumb drives.

the command line for one transfer is
:
robocopy . R: *.* /xf thumbs.db desktop.ini /XO /S /NP /Tee
/Log+:%DrvBB%:\%Hack%TB-bb.rtf /xd All_cod backup temp /purge /xx /W:1
/R:2

loosely translated:

copy "from here" to R: /eXcludeFile Thumbs.db desktop.ini /XO - copy
only the new or newer files /Subdirectories /NoProcess report (don't
show the % of the file copied) /Tee - two output streams, one to
StdOut, the other to /logfile "%DrvBB%:\%TimeHack%TB-bb.rtf"
/eXcludeDirectories /Purge - remove all files on target not on
original /xx eXclude eXtra file report /Wait:1 second if fail /Repeat
two times.

There are many other options.
I also, for my own "sanity"(Bwahahahahahahaha) use Subst a lot,
making the source drive & path Q: (for Quelle - "source" in German)
and R: the path to where it is going. (from Q to R and then S ...)
Which makes, for me, reading the programs easier. Same with putting
the thumb drive's drive letter into DrvBB and a cleaned up timestamp
into TimeHack. My report files title have the form
0916_0845TB-bb.rtf, which makes sorting them "easier".

I like it, because it lets me just copy the changed files, and the
ones "not there." Ideal for backups.

tschus
pyotr

 

[choro]

Bloddy, stupid, damned, irritating *SPELLCHECKERS* and the utter
*idiots* who don't see them changing things behind our backs! (Me, I
mean.)
Sorry, choro, *I* typed your 'nym correctly, I just missed the damned
spellchecker helpfully "correcting" it for me.
No offense intended.
J.

No offense taken. Reminded me a bit of DOMESTOS which kills all known
germs! Or is it 99 % of all known germs?

Had to look up Clorox as I was not aware of the product/brand!

 

[Stef]

I'm, by some quirk (anal retentive, obsessive compulsive, other ???)
of my mentality, an organizational freak. I, by nature, want things well
structured and organized logically.

Well, then, Windows is not the OS for you. It works best with
everything on a single partition ("drive" in Windows-speak--Microsoft
can't even use the proper term), C:.

Using multiple folders instead of true partitions would be the best
option with Windows.

So, in XP-Pro I have the hard drive partitioned into multiple
partitions _- Office Apps, Internet Apps, Accessories, Utilities,
etc.

Then you want Unix, or one of its variants: Linux, BSB, etc. They
all have been designed from inception to be organized in that way. You
can even spread the OS, files, data, etc. over several actual hard
drives with multiple partitons on each, if you want, with no problems.

I've been told that this "slows" the machine down -- but I don't do
anything (except 1 or 2 CPU-intensive math things I've programmed)
where the slow-down , if it exists, is noticeable.
So, my question --- what's the downside of doing the same thing
on a new Win 7 64 bit computer?

With today's fast hard drives, I don't think you would notice any
difference.

Stef

 

[Dave]

And does anyone "proof" there posts and replies anymore?


Stef

Apparently no.

 

[John]

Turn off auto-spellchecking. I never use it. Use your brain instead.
Works better . . . with practice. Well, with some it will take a lot of
practice. ;-)

I never use automatic spell-checking and correction. I do use a
spell-checker as an extra set of eyes just before I post anything.
Mostly, I proof-read and correct manually, automatically as I type.
Sometimes I miss things.

And does anyone "proof" there posts and replies anymore?

Yes, me. I take it "there" was a joke in their sumwear?
And that is *why* one should never entirely rely on automatics.
They're are two many waze for English to go horribly wrong, even when
the individual wyrds are rite.
J.