Partitioning drive to prepare for Windows 7

[Howard Kaikow]

I've got a 320GB drive on a Vista Premium Home notebook.

Few user files are actually on the notebook, rather the files are on my desktop, and are processed via the network, or temporarily copied to the notebook.

Currently, C drive is 285.04GB with 246GB free.
HP's recovery partition is 13.05GB, with 2.4GB free.

I am going to shrink the C drive, so I can add a separate partition for my own files, this partition could be shared with Windows 7.

How much space should I leave for Windows 7 Home?
I would end up with the following partitions:

C: For Vista
H: For Howard's files
W: For Windows 7 Home
Unallocated: Likely 32GB, in case I wish to add Ubuntu Linux.
D: Recovery partition for HP. I use image backup so this is not really useful.

 

[ciphernemo]

C: For Vista
H: For Howard's files
W: For Windows 7 Home
Unallocated: Likely 32GB, in case I wish to add Ubuntu Linux.
D: Recovery partition for HP. I use image backup so this is not really useful.

I'd leave 40GB for any Windows partition to be safe, provided you move your paging file onto a different partition and disable hibernation. If you don't want to worry about that, 60GB would be more than safe with plenty of room for apps, etc.

Note that you'll also need 100MB for the Windows 7 boot manager partition. The Windows 7 installer will demand this and it will add an option to boot to your Vista partition as well, automatically.

 

[Howard Kaikow]

I'd leave 40GB for any Windows partition to be safe, provided you move your paging file onto a different partition and disable hibernation. If you don't want to worry about that, 60GB would be more than safe with plenty of room for apps, etc.

Note that you'll also need 100MB for the Windows 7 boot manager partition. The Windows 7 installer will demand this and it will add an option to boot to your Vista partition as well, automatically.

Thanx.

I forgot about swap.

Do Vista and Windows 7 use the same filename for the swap file?
Vista uses pagefile.sys of 4393MB, a strange size.
I may already have hibernation disabled.
If so, I can create a single partition for swap.
How big is the Windows 7 swap file.

So, I need:
C: For Vista, say, 80GB
H: For Howard's files, say, 32GB
W: For Windows 7 Home, say, 100GB
X: For Windows 7 Boot Manager partition, at least 100MB, say, 1GB
S: For swap file(s), at least 4GB.
Unallocated: At least 32GB, in case I wish to add Ubuntu Linux.
D: 13.05GB Recovery partition for HP. I use image backup so this is not really useful.

 

[ciphernemo]

Thanx.

I forgot about swap.

Do Vista and Windows 7 use the same filename for the swap file?
Vista uses pagefile.sys of 4393MB, a strange size.
I may already have hibernation disabled.
If so, I can create a single partition for swap.
How big is the Windows 7 swap file.

So, I need:
C: For Vista, say, 80GB
H: For Howard's files, say, 32GB
W: For Windows 7 Home, say, 100GB
X: For Windows 7 Boot Manager partition, at least 100MB, say, 1GB
S: For swap file(s), at least 4GB.
Unallocated: At least 32GB, in case I wish to add Ubuntu Linux.
D: 13.05GB Recovery partition for HP. I use image backup so this is not really useful.

For the swap/paging file (virtual memory), you can run it on any volume you like. Personally, for defrag purposes, I like to keep it on a separate partition. You can set the paging file to any size you like. By default, Windows 7 probably has some algorithm to set it dynamically based on how much physical memory you have (generally something like 1 to 2 times your RAM).

As for the name of it, I'd have to check when I get home on my Windows 7 system (we use XP on my work PCs). In the mean time, may be someone else knows? I would assume the name didn't change, but you control it through the same way you do in Windows XP via the System properties, advanced, performance settings, virtual memory, etc.

 

[Uber Philf]

The name for te page file, is still pagefile.sys for the Page file, and Hyberfil.sys for the Hibernation file.Don't forget to untick the "hide system files" in folder options, so you can see the page file, and hibernation files.

 

[pbcopter]

Windows 7 will only demand a 100mb partition if there are no other system partitions on the disk.

 

[zigzag3143]

Thanx.

I forgot about swap.

Do Vista and Windows 7 use the same filename for the swap file?
Vista uses pagefile.sys of 4393MB, a strange size.
I may already have hibernation disabled.
If so, I can create a single partition for swap.
How big is the Windows 7 swap file.

So, I need:
C: For Vista, say, 80GB much more than needed (abt 40)
H: For Howard's files, say, 32GB
W: For Windows 7 Home, say, 100GBmuch more than you will ever use (40)
X: For Windows 7 Boot Manager partition, at least 100MB, say, 1GB maybe 500 Mb
S: For swap file(s), at least 4GB.
Unallocated: At least 32GB, in case I wish to add Ubuntu Linux. you will have more
D: 13.05GB Recovery partition for HP. I use image backup so this is not really useful.

You may also have to use bcedt if the boot menu isnt perfect. Other wise its fine

Ken

 

[banderz777]

I've got a 320GB drive on a Vista Premium Home notebook.

Few user files are actually on the notebook, rather the files are on my desktop, and are processed via the network, or temporarily copied to the notebook.

Currently, C drive is 285.04GB with 246GB free.
HP's recovery partition is 13.05GB, with 2.4GB free.

I am going to shrink the C drive, so I can add a separate partition for my own files, this partition could be shared with Windows 7.

How much space should I leave for Windows 7 Home?
I would end up with the following partitions:

C: For Vista
H: For Howard's files
W: For Windows 7 Home
Unallocated: Likely 32GB, in case I wish to add Ubuntu Linux.
D: Recovery partition for HP. I use image backup so this is not really useful.

why don't you just make the recovery disks from HP and delete the partition and then you would have more for Win7.

 

[DJG]

That's what I did with my Lenovo. I use Paragon Drive Backup anyway for image backups, so that whole recovery partition thing is redundant in my case. Since you do image backups, either through Win 7 or another 3rd party util, might as well get rid of it .

Edit: I have a 250GB SSD, and partitioned it 50GB Win + 180GB data (effective size), plus I throw in an image backup or 2 in the 180GB partition.

 

[Howard Kaikow]

The name for the page file, is still pagefile.sys for the Page file, and Hyberfil.sys for the Hibernation file.Don't forget to untick the "hide system files" in folder options, so you can see the page file, and hibernation files.

I always show hidden files.

Since the name in Vista and Win 7 is the same, it makes sense to use a common pagefile.sys. That way both OS can use the same space. I do that on my multiboot systems with earlier versions of Windows.

It's best if the pagefile is on a different physical drive than the OSes, but my notebook has only 1 drive.

On my Vista system, the size of the used pag eis 0 much of the time. See
Verifying whether Javascript is enabled.