"Delta" and Stuff (Maintenence & Backups)

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Originally posted by oldhermit
I'm going to include this post, so hopefully I'm not too late again, or speaking out of turn, as usual.

There is more reasoning behind refreshing the config on occasion than most people probably realize.

Additionally, you can check any of the programs you are interested in downloading to see if they are malware before ever downloading them, by checking the list at PepiMK's website (SpybotS&D).
http://spybot.safer-networking.de/in...gebase/threats

A real informative thread, glad to see Delta is back again…

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oldhermit

Good points and someone may want you add to the bit about refreshing the Operating System.

Hi oldhermit, Your input is always welcome. And would you tell everybody more about your "config template" and how you create it so others can try it if they want. Probably alot have found this to be some confusing or did not know such a thing like this could be done.

You mentioned The SpyBot site. I would have to recommend all to get familiar with this site and what the program can do for your computer and your peace of mind. And if you get interested in it, don't get discouraged, because there is quite abit to understand and learn. Just take it a bit at a time. SpyBot is well thought of and there is alot you can find on the subject. :)

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Originally posted by Nix
[list=1][*]Delete TIF,Cookies & History files from a DOS prompt not only to free space but also so they do not subsequently get scanned etc[*]Run Adaware[*]Run NAV full system scan[*]Defrag all drives via registry so that it runs before the desktop loads[*]Ghost all drives[/list=1]

All this on weekly basis on Friday evening

Have 5 weeks worth of Ghost images at any one point in time.
Using XOSL to multi boot WinMe (for family), Win98SE (Games) and Win98SE (work related )

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Forgot to say that I update both Adaware and NAV before running them.

The other thing that I often do before installing a new / demo program is to take a ghost image of the affected partitions.

That way if I install it and don't like it I can just restore the partitions and don't get left with any remnants of the program - of course this would have to be almost immediately and not if I decide two weeks down the track that I don't like it.


As mentioned by someone else, on my brothers system I have created images of a clean install on one of the partitions so that if necessary I can just restore from that rather than re-install everything if he manages to stuff his system up.

Thanks GreenGoose, and I will explain the system that works best for me, as you and Train suggest.

I learned last century (a very long time ago) that two partitions are better than one. One partition contains the OS and all installed programs. The other partition is a library where I put all the files I have created, download from the internet, or otherwise collected. The first partition is 4Gigs, and the second partition runs anywhere from 8 to 12 Gigs in size. Lots of free space remaining, as I will explain.

The OS and programs (including IE) write to the first drive. The only time I ever write to it is to place a program or driver updates there for install. Anything I want to save from that partition is copied or moved to the Library partition. This minimizes clutter and almost completely eliminates any links to the Library partition. The results are shown by 10 minute defrags of the OS partition.

Once the OS partition is set up, it is copied to an identical hard drive using PartitionMagic, and is never copied again. The Library however, gets copied in it's entirety once a month, replacing the existing backup Library on the duplicate hard drive.

Aside from the benefits provided by the very fine PartitionMagic software, a few additional benefits include:
1. The ability to hide the Library at times without causing any trouble to the OS. I do this at times in order to
2. Diagnose, repair, or test other hard drives and devices.
3. Plenty of free space to copy ailing configs and repair them without the necessity of a fresh install. It is amazing how many still arrive with Win98 on a Fat16 partition and the geometrics are all out of whack.
4. A replacement (when necessary) of my OS is always a fresh unused copy, which is copied in turn whenever the defective drive has been repaired (or trashed and replaced with a new one).

I should also mention that whenever I build a new computer for myself, I build two identical systems. This because it is very convenient to have a second computer for some repair work that gets rather involved. And so it has worked for me for several years now.

Also forgot to mention that I have never downloaded anything from Microsoft Update for either WinMe or Win98 and have turned off System Restore in WinMe.

Plenty of tweaking using TweakUI for the WinMe setup.

eg Program Files and Common Files Reside on D: drive so any programs not installed as part of the OS install are subsequently pretty much on D:

My WinMe install uses 496Mb of a 2Gb partition.

My Win98SE install for Games uses 270Mb of a 1Gb Partition - the games themselves are installed on a separate 7.99Gb partition.

My Win98SE install for Work uses 302Mb of a 2Gb Partiton.

Hi All,

oldhermit came up with a pretty good how to on how to back up and save what he needs to recover from a crash. And he separates some things. Even goes so far to have an identical back up computer.

And nix is splitting things up as well. Game data is separate form other data.

Both had ideas that I could implement to tweak my internet computer.

Looking back at what has been discussed so far I see we have reenforced the need for a security system to help the integrity of our files, a back up system to prevent data loss, and a maintenence system to keep it all running smoothly. These three things are a must along with a little common sense of your own. Ones and zeros are very unforgiving if not treated right. Which of course is our individual responsibility.

I am surprised we have not had a few more questions than we have seen. Judging by some of the posts this thread could help some out there. Asking questions as a reaction to a problem on your computer is more stressful and time consuming than spending a little time in preventive measures. (On this one subject I have first hand knowledge. :D :D )

I agree.
All too often there is the situation when a user has attempted a fix on their own, only making matters worse. Better to search out all the info available on a specific problem first. Usually the fix is quick and eliminates the 15 reinstalls that accomplished zero results. It can all be found here at VirtualDr. :)

I'm reading all of this talk about partitions, and I'm sitting here with a lump of a 120 GB hard drive.

What exactly am I risking by NOT partitioning this drive? If I were to do so, what would be the best way to do it?


~richie

Hi Ritchie, here are the steps to partition your hard drive, please note, using FDISK will wipe all data from the drive. BJ

1. First start the computer in DOS. The screen will show the C:/ prompt. You can use a boot disk to start your computer, the screen will show the A:/.

2. Now type FDISK . The partition window will appear with menu options.

3. Enter 5 if you're partitioning a second drive, and select the drive; otherwise, skip to the next step.

4. Enter 1 (Create DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive).

5. Enter 2 (Create Extended DOS) to create a partition.

6. Enter N when the program asks if you want to use the maximum available size.

7. Designate the amount of disk space to allocate to the second partition (the partition will be assigned the next drive letter).

8. Type a name for the new partition and press Enter. The partition menu will appear.

9. Repeat steps 5 through 8 to create additional partitions.

10. Exit the partition command by Press Esc.

11. Now you can Format the newly created partitions.

The advantage of having seperate partitions is you can just have your OS on one drive & all your important data on another, that way if your os screws up you can just format that one drive & not lose any of the important data on the other drives. ;)

Thanks BJ.

How much space should be allocated for Windows XP? Do you recommend a seperate partition for OS, Programs, and Data?

~richie - *wonders where the 't' came from*
:p

Hi richie259,

I split my 80GB hard drives into 8GB partitions to utilize the space on the HDD better. Also with partitions you have control over what you do better I believe. I use two drives for backups on C drive (Using Ghost). Another for downloads. Data Files on another. And the like.

I use Partition Magic now for the most part although awhile back I had to dust off a Western Digital Data Tools floppy to get into and repair a HDD. Nothing else would work.

In answer to your specific question of why not have one partition, if your one drive gets corrupted what do you do to come back up in operation? If you had a backup on another drive, a few minutes and back to operationg. :)

Hi Ritchie,

With Windows 2000/XP it's possible to partition the drive from within Setup when Windows is first installed. Or from the Recovery Console using the Diskpart command. Or from Windows using Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk Management - right-click on the drive and there should be a number of options. All of these are a great deal quicker than using Fdisk and you can work with NTFS formatted drives as well, which Fdisk can't see.

I have my XP Pro partition set at 10GB, but I store very large apps on a separate partition so that I can keep Ghost images to a reasonable size. Also I don't store data on any OS partition.

Thanks for the info BJ, GG, and SS (wow that was easy).

I'll look into it all tonight when I get back on my own machine. Does partitioning through XP the way you said delete the contents of the drive?

Hi Richie (I got it right at last - don't worry I'll learn to read one of these days :D ),

Yes indeedy. If you want to keep the existing contents you need some 3rd party software. Partition Magic 8 is dead easy to use but you have to pay for it. Or Ranish is freeware but has a rather unfriendly UI:

Ranish Partition Manager

Or the other way of doing things if you have Ghost or DI is to create a backup of the C: drive, then repartition and Ghost everything back to C:

richie259

Granted that Ghost, Drive Image, Partition Magic cost money.

But take Ghost for example, Finding out it is part of System Works Pro, then looking further, I was able to get Systems Work Pro 2003 for under $9 including shipping.

Still looking back now, they were good investments. I do not know how many times they have saved my . . . . . whatever .

Granted the first time to do any new program is intimidating, but once you get the hang of it :D

Now for partition sizes. Most of us probably like the first partition under 8GB and then adjust the the other partitons according to what we do. And yes I have a couple 30 and 40 GB partitions that I need when running a couple programs. Does not take long for 2GB size files to fill a partition real quick.