My hard drive came partitioned?

[square965]

Hi, I recently bought a laptop and the hard drive came with two partitions. The first is a 70GB partition labeled OS and the second is a 200 GB partition.

What am I supposed to put on the 70GB partition and what is supposed to go on the 200GB partition?

 

[elmo2006]

@ square965

'Hi, I recently bought a laptop and the hard drive came with two partitions. The first is a 70GB partition labeled OS and the second is a 200 GB partition.

What am I supposed to put on the 70GB partition and what is supposed to go on the 200GB partition?'

It seems pretty explanatory from your post - the 70GB is for the OS and the 200GB is for everything else, for example data. If the 200GB is corrupted, it will not effect the 70GB OS partition and vice versa!

 

[square965]

Yes, but by default, all my programs install on the OS partition, is this where I'm supposed to put program files?

 

[elmo2006]

Yes, but by default, all my programs install on the OS partition, is this where I'm supposed to put program files?

Excuse my ignorance and arrogance, but is this your very first computer/laptop or have you ever used a computer/laptop prior to this purchase?

 

[marco324]

yes if it starts to get full you can put programs on the d: partition and downloads drivers service packs music video or whatever

 

[square965]

First laptop yes, all my previous PCs had a single partition...

 

[elmo2006]

In that case then you can elect to have all new applications install on the 200GB instead of the 70GB, but you will have to perform a custom install when prompted to during the initial install of the applicqation or you could just let the application default to the regular destination, usually 'C:\Program Files' and go from there. I doubt you will fill up the 70GB with application install files!
I've got a 56GB partition for my OS and have tons of apps including multiple photo and video editing apps with lots of room to spare!
Just make sure you move the pagefile.sys (hidden) from the 70GB to the 200GB partition.

 

[square965]

Thanks for the tip about the Pagefile.sys, freed up 4gig on the 70gig partition.

At first I was running out of space on the 70gig partition, but I moved my game files and music files to the larger partition, so this is no longer an issue.

 

[square965]

Best answer selected by square965.