Some simple upgrade Q's

[calius]

Im getting a new rig next month and I have some questions.

It can be shipped with Vista ... I don't really want Vista at the moment and I have XP Pro 32bit already. So my logic is, bundle it with no operating system and throw Vista in the pakage not installed & then install XP Pro 32 bit for now when I get it ... I "think" thats a good idea just passing it past people here for feedback. At least I have vista sat here to install as and when.

The system is 2 gig ram so no 'above 3 gig' worries.

It comes with SATA2 500GB drive .... and I like to Norton Ghost system drives. So, i'm thinking of partitioning say 60 GB for system and the rest for storage. BTW the 60 gig will only be system and apps, NOT games, they can be installed on the other larger partition.

My logic in smaller system partition is mainly because of Ghosting ... as 500GB image would be a joke to store .

Do others think that with swap files and such, that 60 GB will be enough (swap file really)? I have my current PC and its 22GB so far for system and apps, and it will literally be less on the next machine.

I have an external 300GB Seagate Barracuda SATA2 drive in an Icy box via USB2 ... now im thinking to stick that into the PC internal and then my current/older system drive put in the icybox, then theres RAID ... I have that on the new mobo ... I guess I want to actually have 2 separate drives so is RAID pointless, or can I benefit?

Any help appreciated.

[Ruin]

Calius, are you building a rig or buying? I assume "buying" based on your first question.

If it were me, on a 500GB HD... I'd partition 100GB for OS and Apps. Gives you room for system page files, and room for programs that now come 1 to 2GB at a time.

400GB should be plenty for games and music/pictures, unless you have an obscene amount of either. I have 30GB just in 10K pictures I've taken (realistically) over the past year.

Sorry I can't help you with the rest. Others will be along soon I'm sure.

[calius]

Hi Ruin,

I normally build, but i'm buying this time, mainly because what bundles are out actually fit exactly what I want to build, and separates would cost more (oh and im not paying for it either, someone else is ).... and, I cant be bothered to put it together this time

I think I will skip on bundling vista and just have the unit sent without an OS and then install my XP pro for now.

[Ruin]

I'm being told there are still a lot of compatibility issues with Vista and that it's still unstable. I'm getting it because I want to, and I want to grow into it.

If you're only going with one OS (not dual boot) go with XP 32bit. However, since you're not paying for it (lucky sunufagun), I'd have it shipped with Vista 64 (any version you want) and keep it. Might as well get it for free while you can. You said you already have XP Pro. So, if I were you, I would:

Take your 500GB HD, partition about 50GB of space for each OS as a dual boot system, and then take 400GB for Apps, Games, Data, Music, Videos, Pictures etc. I prefer to have my OS on a separate drive that just kinda chills there, with a few core apps (Office, Photoshop etc). That way, if my OS gets hosed, I can format that partition without fearing loss of anything irreplaceable. I've had it happen too many times. For my newest build, I"m actually buying two completely separate HDs for this reason - had too many fry and too much lost data. Now, with 10K pictures, the loss of those would be devastating. But, I digress. If you dual boot you get two OSes, one you know works 99% of the time with everything, and one that's cutting edge that you can use to really unleash the power of your hardware, and some software. You can then grow into Vista over time, until XP is obsolete and then you can reclaim that 50GB for whatever you want.

All in all, up to you.

As far as RAID, there are benefits that someone explained to me in my help thread a few days ago. It doesn't seem worth it to/for me, but some swear by it.

[calius]

Dual boot, of course, that does make allot of sense ... now I haven't set a dual boot machine up since Partition Magic days a few years ago.

Is there a resource that gives good advice of steps to take to have both OS's on a machine ... of course I can google but if you know some decent ones id be interested for a pre-readup before I get the unit.

That way, if my OS gets hosed, I can format that partition without fearing loss of anything irreplaceable.

Im with you on that, I get a 500 gig, I have my 300 gig, so I might swap them around. Either that or I will lay off real important things from the 500 (data what you really cannot replace if it all goes belly up).

Whats the best tool to use for creating partition(s) ... fdisk (when setting back up XP) or use tools from Vista DVD (when I get it).

PS - thanks for swift replies mate

[ROCO*AFZ*]

I would get the vista bundled. Eventually you will buy it, so then you have it + OEM is cheaper when bundled.

Then you can test it if you want... if you have issues, and don't like it...reload with xp.... and BTW you can reload XP overtop of vista. (did that on a laptop at home as XP drivers are unstable in vista and HP ain't making vista drivers for it )

Ruin... also.. there is a patch for 64bit vista for 4gb of ram. Loook for it for your build as it will bluescreen without it... that also means load it with only 1 chip (2gb)

Calius... The easiest way is if you have 2 drives, hit your the key to choose your boot device and then choose the one with the O/S you want.

I haven't messed with the bootloader in vista yet as we haven't had anyone wanting dual boot here.

[Militiaman]

My own advice for upgrading your computer (for whatever it's worth).

1) Get a motherboard that supports Double Data Rate 2 800 (DDR2) Random Access Memory

2) Good choice to stick with Windows XP. Stay with Windows XP for a few more years until the bugs are worked out of all the 64 bit operating systems

[calius]

Cheers fellas,

Indeed its DDR2 Memory (the machine im getting)

I had a decent sniff around online and have all the step by steps to dual boot the unit. I agree, and will get Vista Bundled but not installed so I can then install XP Pro and Vista afterwards.

It will be fun to see what I can (or cannot) do with Vista, I will be using that partition as my Playground and test center than anything work related thats for sure. One thing im not going to do right away is go online with Vista ... I want to find out all about what crap I can kill and any other "questionable" processes before I get out through the pipe via that OS. I will even wipe out all fancy rubbish and transparent windows ... I actually have XP right now with the classic 98 look with small fonts, I cant stand XP's official design ... will do the same on Vista if it's possible, I don't care how much better my new unit will be to switch on all the resource hungry eye candy cheese.

Heres the spec's of the unit im looking at but a few things "might" change as Im not getting it untill next month, so price and changes by that time may dictate a few tweaks :

- AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000 3.00GHz Dual Core CPU

- AMD approved cooler

- Asus M2N-SLI Deluxe (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard

- Award winning OCZ Revision2 2GB Ultra PC2-6400 CAS4 (2x1GB) Dual Channel Kit

- 500GB Western Digital Enterprise 16MB Cache SATA-2 Hard Drive

- NVIDIA 8800 GTS 640MB GDDR3 VIVO HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) DirectX 10 Graphics Card

- Samsung 18x DVD±RW Dual Layer LabelFlash ReWriter (Black)

- Black Sony Floppy Drive

- Antec NINE HUNDRED Gamers ATX Case

- Antec 650W Next Generation Power Supply

The GPU is "GTS" I checked out some hardware sites ans even thought this is less in the range of 3 of the 8800 its stilll fast and fast enough for me thats for sure. I had Nvidia and moved to Radeon ... now I want to move back to Nvidia mainly because of old skool 3D stereo and things like that.

The HD is Western Digital, Im a Seagate fan myself, I will use my own seagate as the boot drive and just have the Western as disc 2 me thinks. I have a firewire Maxtor One Touch and fortunately thats on the Mobo so thats sorted too.

Beleive me from a 3 or so year old 333Mhz Athon 2600+ 1.7 Gig (333) machine with a Radeon 9800Pro (now with dodgy fan) ... its a decent jump into DX10 ville.

[Kamakazi]

Looks like a good setup, but I would suggest going for an Intel CPU, for $170 for that 6000+ you can get a pretty good Core 2 Duo that, when overclocked, will out perform it.

[calius]

Noted I will look into that CPU comparison, I do have a "thing" for AMD, but I will look again at it before Im completely committed.

[Kamakazi]

http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu.html

Check that out for some of the most exhaustive CPU comparisons anywhere.

[CrowmanUK]

As far as I remember and its been a while since I checked mate so feel free to look it up but making one drive with a few partitions and a swap partition as one of em wont make much difference as you still have one physical reader on the drive so it'll be "overworking" that one drive still even though the swap drive will be on a different partition, for the best performance put another physical drive in and use that just to keep your music on and make a partition on that one for your swap drive.

Also if you make a ghost image of a 500Gig drive you dont actually make a 500Gig image, it only makes an image of data on that drive so my ghost image of windows xp with minimal stuff on it comes in at just over 2.5Gig.

[calius]

Just to clarify then Crowman (BTW : Hello mate) ...

Stick my Western Digital in as secondary and My Seagate as Master ... install XP Pro on Master and the install Vista on secondary, right?

IE:

DRIVE 1 : partition 1 (XP) Other Partition (rest of space = data)

DRIVE 2 : partition 1 (vista) Other Partition (rest of space = data)

Its the "Swap Drive" bit im confusing things with. Im not sure what you mean by "make much difference" ... the only thing is just to have both OS's running ... are you referring to just the physical drive issue or something else? If this way helps to keep the drive in good condition and good speed access then I will do that.

Also if you make a ghost image of a 500Gig drive you dont actually make a 500Gig image, it only makes an image of data on that drive so my ghost image of windows xp with minimal stuff on it comes in at just over 2.5Gig.

Ok cool,dumb of me to think it would image unused drive sectors/space ... ... thats a relief because I do like to Ghost me drives!

Kamakazi - Cheers for link.

PS ... as regards having 2 O/S's on separate drives ... anyone got a decent web link to a step by step of that procedure (I will google but any direct decent ones would be great).

[CrowmanUK]

Almost but not quite, make 2 partitions on the first drive and install an OS to each of them, then on the second physical drive put your swap file, if you put the os and the swap file on the same physical drive you wont get any performance increase even if theyre on different partitions because that drive still only has 1 head and can only be in one place at a time, if you have the swap file on a separate physical drive it can be doing its thing over there without interrupting any programs (windows,graw etc) that are using the 1st hard drive to access their files.

Does that clarify it a bit for you mate?

[Ruin]

PS - thanks for swift replies mate

Never a problem (Except when I spend a weekend at the beach with no net access. )

Looks like a nice setup. As far as partitioning, I've ALWAYS done it through the Windows Install. Always recognized multiple drives, and setting up partitions was quick, easy and painfully easy. You should be fine.

Enjoy the new PC! I have to wait until Feb for mine.

[calius]

Crowman ... I get you know cheers

Swap File & Swap Drive confused me at first. Ok I will edit XP's settings and set swap to my second drive. The only question that spins off from this is :

Whats the naming convention for Vistas swap file? IE: if XP & Vista's swap file is set to my second drive will they both sit together as 2 separate files happy, or will each O.S see each others on start up and remove in turn without a problem or with a problem?

Realistically for the initial stages Vista's swap file can be local because It wont be my hardcore working partition just test space really, just interested in that scenario they like each other. This is of course based on the fact that Vista still works in this manner like XP or has it changed in the swap file arena? (I really haven't taken time to bother looking into Vista so far).

(Except when I spend a weekend at the beach with no net access)

To be honest I feel a beach weekend is time to escape the digital realm

Also @ Kamakazi ... Toms Hardware link was great, loving the ease to compare, deffo firm bookmark. To have a Core Duo with 8800 GTX (rather than my GTS) adds a few too many UK pounds out the range of what Ive got as a budget (that someone else has set). It would be real nice to have that unit, but the comparisons still show that even on the setup I will get it will be in the realms of "flying", it was useful to see what framerates and render times the CPU & GPU will pull off from this site so im happy I think now. Still room to upgrade certain parts later thats the key thing.

[Danish1705]

Hey Calius, our rig almost identical, especially those vid card, CPU and mobo. Im too in process of upgrading my PC. Right now i have pucrhcased all 3 items and when time permit i will install the new rig in my casing.

I am too has the "thing" on AMD processor! go AMD!!!

[calius]

I will be ordering mine at the end of this month so if you get it running before then post back or PM me with your take on it with games etc, id still be interested to here especially as the main parts are the same

[CrowmanUK]

Not sure how Vista does it mate but what i'd do is put them both on the same partition of the second physical hard drive if it will let you. Best thing to do is wait and see then go from there.

[calius]

Gearing up to reinstall software in the correct order is like a small version of moving house ... so much crap to remember to back up and steps to take in the right order! LOL.

I think once Im done after a loooong day of getting it back and working as my current machine, I will finaly be able to install my copy (gathering dust ATM) of Armed Assault to celebrate with a few cool beers and crack the setting up

[Danish1705]

I will be ordering mine at the end of this month so if you get it running before then post back or PM me with your take on it with games etc, id still be interested to here especially as the main parts are the same

Will do Calius. I will PM or replied back in here.