quote:
Originally posted by alegator
Of course I could move all these files to a 2nd physical drive, but I don't want to have a 2nd drive permanently connected to the system, specially since as I said it would be seldom accessed.
You could also use a removable drive, or even transform a buildin HDD to a removable drive (cheap stuff for that exists everywhere in most hardware stores).
And except from boot time, the HDD wouldn't use that much power if it isn't used that much either. (Most power is drawn when the HDD spins up or needs to read/write stuff; so if you don't use > not much power). And most modern HDDs stop spinning anyways after being idle for some time.
quote:
Originally posted by alegator
I found this article which supports the idea of performance increase by partitioning the drive:
http://www.acronis.com.au/resource/tech-talk/2004...-introduction.html
yep, article is entirly correct.
Anyways, except that it would indeed be more convenient to have seperate partitions for your system and for your data:
quote:
Originally posted by djdannyp
It won't protect your data against crashes or anything as its the same physical drive.
On the contrary! It will protect your data more than when you only use 1 partition. Reason is simple: 2 partitions mean 2 MFT's etc. When a crash occurs it usually means that a certain part of the HDD can't be accessed anymore or that the MFT is messed up or whatever. So you would still have the other partition.
Physical crashes where the entire drive would be physically messed up rarely occur. Usually it are messed up tables and file systems, nothing which a format wouldn't be able to fix. And then you will be very happy that you had partitionned your HDD.
... And all other stuff people said...
(I speak out of experience... way too much experience tbh, ... damn HDDs 
)
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