Partitioning Hard Drives in Windows XP
Remember that old
Radio Shack TRS-80 computer that sat on your desk? One of
the rituals that went with ownership was popping a tape into
the cassette deck to load a program, all the while hoping
the tape didn't get stretched or chewed up before the
process completed. Later on hard drives made an appearance,
but back in those
early days a hard drive was a luxury, and a very expensive
luxury at that when you start computing the cost per
megabyte of early drives. Today, we rarely give much thought
to the hard drive. In one way it's good they have become
inexpensive and so reliable they seldom fail. On the
other hand, because they are so reliable, we tend to ignore
hard drives and overlook ways to make them more useful and
efficient. A modified or advanced partitioning scheme isn't
essential to the basic operation of a personal computer, but
if you're a tweaker or organizational fanatic (I admit it, I
am, on both counts) then partitioning affords a wealth of
customization and organizational opportunities.
The Basic Hard Drive
What's a hard drive? There are tons of
books and sites that delve into detailed descriptions, but
basically it's a storage device. The medium that stores the
actual data is called a platter, usually made from aluminum,
and there are varying numbers of stacked platters depending
on the capacity of the hard drive. The platters are placed
inside a sealed case along with an actuator assembly for the
heads and arms that move back and forth across the platters
to write and retrieve the data. A hard drive is non-volatile
storage. It requires no power supply to maintain the data
that has been placed on the drive. In addition, the data is
completely under user control. Data can be added and deleted
at will and the drive can be configured in various ways to
suit the purpose of the user.
Examining the Hard
Disk Layout
The easiest way
to understand the system drive structure is to use a tool
supplied with Windows XP called
Disk Management, a snap-in that's part of the
Microsoft Management Console. The majority of systems
sold today for home or small business use will come equipped
with one hard drive, although many manufacturers offer
special deals on new systems that make it financially
attractive to add a second, third, or even fourth hard drive
if you have a need for the extra capacity. In spite of the
fact that a single hard drive can be configured in many
different ways, it's a pretty safe bet that an off the shelf
system will arrive in one of two basic configurations.
Either the entire drive will be partitioned as C: as shown
in Fig. 01 or it will be split into two partitions, one as
C: that is visible and another partition that is hidden and
contains an image of the operating system (and a ton of
useless software) in case things go terribly wrong requiring
a reinstall of the operating system.
Fig. 01
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If
you're wondering why
Fig. 01 lists Unallocated space in the key at
the bottom when it isn't shown in the Graphical
View, the answer is because there are other
drives already installed in the system. They
will be addressed later in the article. |
Next: What Is A Partition
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