[mosespatrader]

I ordered a PowerMac with a 250MB hard disk. Should I leave it alone or partition it for performance?

thanks in advance.

[Ω]

I would look to upgrading the HD myself.

[Randman]

Lots and lots and lots of threads on this subject.

[albook]

Originally posted by mosespatrader:
I ordered a PowerMac with a 250MB hard disk. Should I leave it alone or partition it for performance?

A 250MB HDD is not much to split!
I would definatelly leave as one "big" partition...

[tooki]

There really are TONS of discussions on this topic in the forums. Search for "partition" "partitioning" and you should find them.

tooki

[zigzag]

I recently went through the same process and read all the threads, books, etc. I concluded that unless one of the following applies, there's not much point in partitioning with Panther:

1) You're a developer and want different operating systems on different partitions. It used to be common to put OS 9 on a separate partition from OS X, but the G5 can't boot in OS 9, so that particular reason is gone.

2) You want a clean version of OS X on a separate partition, so in case of an emergency you can boot from that partition and do repairs on the other one. OS X has been so reliable for me that I see this as unnecessary (I would just boot from the DVD anyway), and if the drive fails you're screwed anyway, but I'm sure there are those who would disagree, and I guess it can't hurt if you don't need the extra space.

3) You want a separate "scratch" partition for video, image, or audio editing. The theory is that these files are very demanding for a drive and benefit from being on their own disc or partition, where they won't get fragmented among other stuff. Also, when you're done with a project, you can erase its partition and have a clean start. Personally, I've never had a problem editing video on the same partition as everything else, but having a separate scratch disc seems like a sound idea if you have the space. I'm sure there are more experienced users who can speak to this.

My own solution was to put OS X and all of my apps, accounts, and music files on one unpartitioned drive, then install a separate drive for use as a scratch disc (which I partitioned for different projects).

Hope this helps. I like to keep things simple. But I don't claim to be an authority, so don't anyone flame me.

[tooki]

Originally posted by zigzag:
3) You want a separate "scratch" partition for video, image, or audio editing. The theory is that these files are very demanding for a drive and benefit from being on their own disc or partition, where they won't get fragmented among other stuff. Also, when you're done with a project, you can erase its partition and have a clean start. Personally, I've never had a problem editing video on the same partition as everything else, but having a separate scratch disc seems like a sound idea if you have the space. I'm sure there are more experienced users who can speak to this.

A separate scratch disk can be very good for performance. A separate scratch partition can actually reduce performance, by keeping the scratch files physically distant from the application and boot partiton, where they might have been near each other had they been on the same partition.

Not worth it or necessary, IMHO.

tooki

[zigzag]

Originally posted by tooki:
A separate scratch disk can be very good for performance. A separate scratch partition can actually reduce performance, by keeping the scratch files physically distant from the application and boot partiton, where they might have been near each other had they been on the same partition.

Not worth it or necessary, IMHO.

The files on a scratch disk are also distant from the OS/app, so I assume you mean to say that when they're on the same disk but on separate partitions, the drive has to keep up with two partitions at once and therefore has to work harder, whereas when the files are on a separate disk, the drives don't have to work as hard because they're not trying to do two things at once.

Makes sense, if that's what you're saying. Thanks.

I hope the rest of my analysis was sound.