New Here, Little Help Please

I just bought a new Acer TravelMate 4672WLMi CoreDuo T2300 1.66GHz, 15.4", 1024MB , 120GB, DVD-DL, X1400 Radeon Graphics and have been doing some reseach before it come (tomorrow hopefully ).

So on to my questions. I have been reading up on these forums about various things (graphics card, partitions, etc.) and its been useful for it all. I have found information about merging the partitions and changing the file system from fat32 to ntfs.

The only reason I can think of for merging the partitions is just so that I have one big hdd instead of two smaller ones (not counting the tiny hidden partition). So is there any reason for why I should merge the partitions?

My second question is about the fat32/ntfs situation. Why is ntfs better, why should I change it to that/should i even change it to ntfs?
I have been told that if I change to ntfs i will need to reinstall windows and seeing as acer don't give windows installation disc's and i haven't got one that may be a bit of a problem.

In another thread I read that the OS takes up 4/5gb before the change to ntfs and 2/3 after the change. What would need to be done to get that change (reinstallation?)

Once the partitions are merged is there any way for me to change the labeling for drives, more specifically is there any way for me to change the dvd re-writer from what i'm assuming will be e: to d:. Its a bit anal I know but little things like that can bug me .

The last question I can think of at the moment is overclocking the gpu. Is it really worth it? I'll probably be playing most games on 1024X768/1152X864 and don't really mind playing with medium settings for the newer games (if possible) although I suppose I can grit my teeth and bear it on lower settings. From what I have read the laptop should be able to play HL2 and Doom 3 at the higher settings and Quake 4 at medium to high so thats good enough for me.

Sorry for such a long post but those were just some of the things that i had difficulty finding out about from the search function and sorry if i missed any stickies or threads that would explain all these things to me.

Oz

 

If you get Norton Partition magic you will not need to reinstall windows. I've done it on two Acer laptops with no hassle at all. First I merged the drives together, then when that was sorted I changed to NTFS.

As for why to merge the partitions, just for simplicity when dealing with your hard drive, and NTFS is a lot quicker to work with, more secure. Lots of features that us end users need not worry about!

You can change drive letters in disk management (right click on My Computer Icon, select manage)

Overclocking an X1400 is not going to drastically improve your gamin experience. Most folk overclock to get higher 3dmark scores, but in actual gaming you'll probably gain a few fps, which is not going to be noticeable at all.

 

i would actually advise against having just one big partition.

I have 3 partitions:

1) Windows XP Installation and Drivers, etc.
2) Games
3) Schoolwork

It works well, so that in case you need to reinstall and reformat, you dont lose your term papers and games.

 

thanks for the replies.

about the partition thing, I don't mind losing things like "schoolwork" (uni work for me) as I tend to back up all my work on cds and my other pc's at home as well so essential i will have at least 2, more likely 3 versions of any work that will be lost.

I would want two partition though just to have one with all the OS stuff and drivers but I figure that should be really small, like 3-5 gb.

Can anyone be more specific about the benefits of ntfs? I have been told that its a microsoft thing and thats why people "think" its better but fat32 is actually the same or better. Honestly I have no idea about that so any clarification would be helpful.

Also any thoughts about the OS size change i mentioned I read about in another thread? Or was that something I just made up in my own head.

 

FAT32:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FAT32#FAT32

NTFS:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTFS#Features

NTFS allows the restriction of files where FAT32 is open to any user. If you're going with Windows...NTFS is the way to go. Other OS's like other formats.

NTFS also allows disk compression.

 

The main reason I use NTFS is to avoid the 4GB file size when capturing video. I no longer partition my drives, I got tired trying to balance how much space for programs and how much for data. It always seems that I'll fill up one and either start installing programs to the data partition or saving data to the programs partition. What I do now is use the old DOS command SUBST. I make a directory called "data" or some such and SUBST that as a Drive. I created a bat file that does the subsitutions and load it at startup. You can do this for multiple dives/directories.

for example, here's the contents of my drivemap.bat file

@echo off
subst y: c:\yData
subst e: c:\yData\zDrive_E
subst f: c:\yData\zDrive_F-OfficeStuff
subst i: c:\yData\zDrive_I-MyStuff
subst k: z:\zDrive_K-GIS_Projects
subst l: z:\zDrive_L-GIS_Data

To unsubst a drive type: subst <drive>: /d
i.e. subst e: /d

 

whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?

 

I think I understand what he's saying, no idea how to do it but i get what the concept behind it is...I think (not gonna mention it, you know...in case i'm way off )

Anyone able to tell me how good HL2, Doom 3 and Quake 4 run on this? I'm gonna try out my Star Wars: Knights Of The Old Republic when i get the laptop but that pretty old now and probably wouldn't give a good gauge on the game-playing abilities.

 

Quick explination, the command listed above will basically give you a drive called Y: and the root of that drive is actually the directory C:\YDATA

So if all you had under the C:\YDATA folder was a folder called GAMES, then if you used explorer and looked at Y: you'd just see a folder called GAMES in the root.

It's useful sometimes for tricking computers into doing things they aren't supposed to.

 

An easy way to test out the SUBST technique, to see if it'll be useful to you is: Click the Start Button, Click Run, type CMD <enter>

type subst f: (or pick any drive letter) c:\data (pick any subdirectory/folder) <enter>
type exit <enter>

then use windows explorer to check out your new drive. Now is this useful, maybe maybe not, it depends if it fills the user's need.

 

*cough* i smell linux

 

Just plain DOS

 

Well, i was getting a bit worried with all this stuff i would have to do to get my laptop the way I wanted it and all the negative reviews of the X1400 were putting me off so I have cancelled the Travelmate and bought an Asus F3JA instead. !.7 duo processor and X1600 card for only £10 more and the only thing "worse" about it is that the hard drive has 20 gb less at 100gb.

Now to head to the asus section and double check that I won't have to do all this stuff on that .

Thanks for all the help anyway, you guys were very helpful.

 

LOL

Well I think you'll have most of the same issues, however for ten more pounds I'd definately get the Asus instead as the X1600 is a much better graphics card.