Is it safer to put my data in c: drive?

Now:
c:win7 rtm
d:blank(reserved for xp)
e:data

so can I rearrange it like this?
c:data
d:xp
e:win7

1.I experienced a partition table corruption once,and it nearly killed me.So what I want to know is could it reduce the possibility of the partition table error if I put the data in 1st partition(rather than an OS),or if it's corrupt can I still access and read the data in 1st partition?I can reinstall OS but I can't reinstall data,you know.

2.Is the 100m hidden volume of win7 useful?I don't need to encrypt my files,so can I delete it?I heard that if you format it first then do the installation win7 won't create the volume.
And I wanna make a dual boot,if I discard that hidden volume will the dual boot fails or what?xp is more stable and I guess I won't change it,and that's the reason I put it in 2nd partition.win7 is new,so I decide to drop it to the last partition because I may format and re-install it in the future.

I plan to do the re-installation and data transfer lately,so if it's pointless and no need to do that,please tell me soon.

Lots of questions,thank you for reading.

you'll be better off to backup the MBR, the first sector of the hard disk because that is where partition table is stored.

the 100MB partition serves two purposes.

1) it allows you to encrypt the system drive with bitlocker
2) it stores the boot files

If you delete the 100MB partition, chances are your computer will no longer boot into Windows. What you would need to do is move the boot files to some other partition before you deleted it. I've tested that method several times by using the bcdboot command, then make that new partition "active".

You are probably going to stir up a mess on sevenforums by stating that Windows XP is more stable than 7. I'm not going to disagree though, because I still use XP as primary OS myself.

Thank you for replying.

So,it means:

BIOS -> MBR -> 100M partition -> Win 7 ?

Please recommend a software to backup MBR.


So put the data in first drive is a good idea or not?

justi said:

BIOS -> MBR -> 100M partition -> Win 7 ?

Yes that's right.

justi said:

So put the data in first drive is a good idea or not?

Maybe it would be a little faster to recover using partition tools, but whether or not that would be more reliable I don't really know.

Thank you.
I need to know if it's more reliable.I ever suffered a data loss,it's really a disaster.

I had such problem till I bought an external HDD, copied all my stuff to it and safely did a clean install windows. its safer and more effective than lose risk on important data!:)

Good points. Make backups!

If it is not the partition table that fails it is hard drive failure or data corruption, etc..

Dinesh said:

Macrium Reflect Backup and Hard Disk Image software for Windows XP, Vista, Server 2003/2008 works great with Windows 7 x64.

Thank you,I'll take a look.