Control System Partition During Install

I once read that someone used an XP disc to create the system partition for a Vista or 7 install. The reason being that the Vista/7 system partitions are larger than the ones XP creates.

Anyone know of this technique and if it is safe? By safe I mean 7 would run stable and reliably from a smaller system partition.

Or are there other techniques (maybe a disk partitioner) that would do the trick. I hate to see so much space "seemingly" wasted.

Thanks.

There are several programs available for partitioning disks. I use Easus Partition Manager Express for newer systems (anything SATA) and GPartEd for older systems. They are both free packages, and neither has ever caused any data loss or crashes on my systems. I use them often, and have created as many as 4 bootable partitions on one machine (one drive).

In order to create the boot screen (actually the MBR- Master Boot Record) needed to start up the machine with the choices that are available, use one of the free programs like GRUB.

Remember that you need to have enough space on each partition to meet the minimum amount of storage necessary for the OS that you are installing.

lebadbob said:

There are several programs available for partitioning disks. I use Easus Partition Manager Express for newer systems (anything SATA) and GPartEd for older systems. They are both free packages, and neither has ever caused any data loss or crashes on my systems. I use them often, and have created as many as 4 bootable partitions on one machine (one drive).

In order to create the boot screen (actually the MBR- Master Boot Record) needed to start up the machine with the choices that are available, use one of the free programs like GRUB.

Remember that you need to have enough space on each partition to meet the minimum amount of storage necessary for the OS that you are installing.

Thanks. What size should I be looking to make the MBR for 7? The default is at least 100MB, but the XP ones are usually less (I believe). 100MB just seems awfully large; and I want to maximize my "user-accessible" disk.