Partitioning for Performance: Hitachi 7K500 Benchmark Setup Specifics

This link lists the major threads/posts I've made with my Hitachi 7K500 upgrade:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=441674


Caution! Long post ahead! Bring coffee, bring food - ack! Bring blankets and sunscreen, but please continue reading, and thanks!

What this thread will concentrate on is my partitioning strategy to keep the performance of my notebook at peak performance as long (and as easily) as possible.

This partitioning strategy takes into account that I use PerfectDisk as my defragging software of choice because of the real and measurable benefits it offers.

Please click the link above to follow the thread of why I know PD is effective at what it claims to do: to not only offer real increased performance benefits to mechanical HD's, but to also significantly stop the re-fragmenting of files as we use our systems over time.

(It does this by placing files on the HD according to how often they are modified, with the most modified placed second last, just before the partition's directory entries).


So, on to my partitioning rationale based on a 500GB drive (465.76GB actual):

First, I had to consider the size of my 'default' install - including all software, tutorials, sample files, hibernation file and also make sure that I have some room to grow into too as newer and always bigger software packages become available and necessary for me.

Looking at my past few installations, I currently need around 65GB for my C: drive of used space. Taking into consideration that I don't want to worry about setting up this system again, to this degree of detail (unless I get an SSD, of course) for up to two years from now, I arrived at a 100GB C: drive partition size. This allows for expansion of any needed new or additional software, plus it gives Windows room to 'breathe'.

Technically, not Windows, per se, but the NTFS file system to be more precise. The more free space available, the faster the NTFS system operates because it doesn't have to search far for a contiguous block of free clusters to save our files to (as it tries very hard to do). Combined with PD as mentioned above, this will give us sustained, good/great performance for a very long time. At least as long as the two years I'm aiming for here.

(BTW, my previous C: drive partitions were 67GB - I outgrew that this past summer).

Thinking of the maximum amount of work I'll do at one time on the notebook, I came to the conclusion that a 64GB Temp partition would be optimum. This partition size will not change, unless the performance of my notebook changes (and only by changing to a better CPU or more RAM, if possible - but I already have max'd the RAM at 8GB already). Since I know I will never change my notebook's CPU, I just had to see on my desktop what a 'lot' of work would be for the notebook and 64GB seems just right.

Note that I don't want to use all of the partition's capacity, I am actually estimating using about 60% at maximum workload (with most of it being temporary and the space will be reclaimed as I shut down each program that uses that partition as it's 'scratch space') and the rest is for the prevention of free space fragmentation, while I'm working.

This Temp partition will host my Downloads directory, the IE cache, PS CS4's Scratch disk, the windows Temporary pointers TMP and TEMP, and also all my other photo editing programs that allow me to use a specific disk as their 'scratch space'. I also move the pagefile here too and disable it for my C: drive partition and all other partitions.

This partition I change drive letters to 'T:' - for temp, of course - but also because I want C: 'first' in file explorer when I'm navigating drives in Windows.

What is accomplished with this Temp partition?

The key thing to remember is that this Temp partition is the first partition of the drive (well, next to the 100MB 'boot' partition Win 7 needs and creates automatically).

This will put and keep all working temp files and the pagefile (which is just a big temp file anyways) at the fastest part of the disk - always. This will also lessen the impact that free space fragmentation has on the Windows system files on our O/S partition (see the paragraph about NTFS, above). It does this by simply not writing all those temp files to the system drive.

What's next? Well, on each system, I keep an ISO of each important software I need - just in case I need to re-install it in the middle of nowhere and I don't want to be carrying my installation media with me wherever I go.

This I'll call my Recovery partition. We don't need speed for this partition, just sufficient space - so 45GB is good enough for now, but I'll make it 64GB to be sure I don't run out needlessly. This partition is the last partition of the drive (the slowest partition).

The remaining space is what will be my Data partition - I don't care how big this partition is (it is what it is), I just need it separate from my temp files, my O/S (so I can re-install Windows 7 if needed without worrying about losing data), and also so I know where to 'go' when I'm doing a search for a particular document or image I need pronto. This also simplifies backups as I only need to select a single directory and all my data gets backed up.

This Data partition would be pretty useless if I had to manually move my data over each time I was done with it. Or, if I had to always choose 'Computer', 'D: drive', 'Data', 'Today's Date', type the filename and then click save!

Thankfully, all we need to do in Win 7 (and Vista) to automatically save to our D: drive is:

Create a folder on D: drive - let's call it 'MYDATA', right click on it, select 'Properties', click on the 'Security' tab, Click 'Edit' then click on our computer's user name - you may need to scroll down the list to see it (lets say our user name is 'ED').

Now, with our user name selected in the top list, Click on the Full control checkbox in the bottom list. Select 'Apply' and 'OK' and close all remaining Properties windows.

Click into the MYDATA folder and then, open another instance of Computer. In the Computer window, click on C: drive, click on Users and finally click on your user name ('ED' in this example). Now, select all folders except Downloads and AppData (if you have show hidden folders turned on), right click and drag the selected folders into our MYDATA folder on D: drive. Release the mouse button and in the menu that appears, select 'Move here'.

In the MYDATA window, navigate to your T: drive, (Temp partition), right click the Downloads folder, drag it to the root of the T: drive (Temp partition), release the mouse button and select 'Move here'.

To be able to write to this folder, we must change permissions again:

Right click on the Downloads folder we just moved to root of our T: drive (Temp partition), select Properties, select the Security tab, select your user name and in the bottom window, click the Full Control checkbox. Select Apply, OK and close all the windows.

Okay, done!

We now have isolated our O/S and programs so that once PD optimizes them, they will stay that way for as long as possible. Very little temporary data is being written to on this partition, nor is any of our data being saved here. Strictly O/S and Apps.

Keep in mind that in our D: drive we will have not only our documents, videos, photos and music on their own partition, but also our desktop, our favourites, our saved searches and our saved games too. Everywhere where we would normally store our data is now in one location - D: drive, nice.

But, why are the Downloads on the same partition as where we have our environment Temp/TMP variables pointed to?

This is because Windows will always download to those Temp/TMP variables and then move the downloaded files to our Downloads directory. When these different directories are on the same partition as we have done here, then it is simply a matter of Windows changing a directory pointer and small and large files will be 'moved' between the folders instantly. If we were to have our Temp and Download folders on different partitions, small downloads may not bother us, but if we downloaded a large (GB sized) file, we would not only have to wait for the download, but then we would have to wait while Windows moves it from the Temp folder on one partition to the Downloads folder on another - with GB sized files (or even several hundred MB ones too) this process can be excruciatingly slow!

Instead, I put the Downloads folder on my Temp partition along with the other temp folders and this issue becomes moot. I also consider anything in the Downloads folder 'temporary' too - if it's really important - I'll move it to my Data partition ASAP.


So, let's summarize what we have accomplished:

T: 64GB - 2nd Partition of our HD
C: 100GB - 3rd Partition of our HD
D: 237GB - 4th Partition of our HD
E: 64GB - 5th Partition of our HD

(To change the Partition's Drive Letter, use Disk Management - right click on Computer, select Manage, select Disk Management).


Remember that the first partition is the 100MB partition Win 7 creates automatically when a clean install is performed.

When you're actually in Win 7 setup, you cannot create the partitions as shown above. In setup, we are limited to a total of 4 Primary Partitions (one of which is the 100MB boot partition) so how can we create this layout we see above?

Consider to totally wipe all partitions the first time you install Win 7 on a HD. Especially on an SSD, as Win 7 will automatically align the partitions for best performance.

Make sure you've saved your data elsewhere first!

In Windows setup, choose advanced install options and select each partition and click remove. Keep doing so until all partitions are removed and you are left with one single unallocated space the size of the drive.

If you do not remove all partitions (even a partition at the very end) Win 7 will not be able to align the partitions properly and an SSD especially, may suffer performance-wise for it. Just warning, is all.

On a brand new HD like the Hitachi 7K500 I just purchased, there are no partitions on it at all. So we can simply start creating them as we need.

First, we'll create our 64GB partition - this will be our T: or Temp drive when we're finished (after Win 7 is installed). When we create this partition, the 100MB boot partition is created automatically for us.

To create these first two partitions (one will be created automatically for us), click on the unallocated space, select new, now type in the size of the partition we want - for our first partition we want a 64GB size so we'll type in 65640. Why that number? Well, 64x1024=65536, now add 100MB for the 'boot' partition Win 7 makes (65636) and add a couple more MB's for each partition that will be created now (65636+2+2), so that Windows will report it as a full 64GB instead of 63.9GB (I hate 'off' numbers!).

Second, we create our 100GB O/S partition which will become our C: drive.

Use the above method to create this partition, but we only need to account for the single partition that is being created if we want a nice 'round' number like 100GB, so 100x1024=102400 and add 2 equals 102402.

Once we have created this partition, leave the rest of the drive as 'unallocated space' and making sure we've selected the 100GB partition, click Next in Windows 7 setup. This will install Windows and as long as we had the 100GB partition selected, it will become our C: drive.

After Windows is setup and booted to the desktop (and after our drivers are properly installed in the correct order), go to Disk Management.

First, we'll change the 2nd partitions drive letter to 'T'. Select the partition. Right click on the partition, select Change Drive Letter and Paths, Click Change and change it to 'T'.

Next, we'll select the unallocated space on our drive in Disk Management and right click on it. Select New Simple Partition and take that number you see in MB and subtract 65540 (64x1024=65536+2+2) from it. Enter that number and click next and next. This is now our 4th partition D: drive.

Finally, select the remaining unallocated space again, right click and select New Simple Partition and hit next and next. This is our Recovery partition located at the end of the drive.


Once set up like this and with PerfectDisk set to run once or twice a month, we are guaranteed that the single HD we are using now will continue to give peak performance with minimal intervention on our behalf, not only now - but well into the foreseeable future too.

We have reduced and almost totally eliminated the free space fragmentation that NTFS balks at on our O/S and Apps partition by eliminating the primary way that fragmentation occurs: temporary files (including our own data files that sometimes are, just temporary).

We have consolidated our data to a single directory which makes backups and searches more simple and direct.

We have made sure that the temp, pagefile, scratch locations and IE cache files are on the fastest part of the drive and by ensuring that our free space is much more than our temp file usage, we also further ensure that we are running at optimum speed while we are using our computer fully too.

We have forced ourselves to be diligent on our downloads - and to promptly save the 'good' ones ASAP to our D: data directory (or elsewhere). This is always a good thing!

We have also left room to grow, into.

Once we have done the 'thinking' as outlined above, the 'doing' is fairly straightforward. If I buy a new machine tomorrow, I don't have to rethink any of the above - as long as I use a mechanical HD with the same capacity or more, the 'data' partition size will change and possibly the 'temp' partition too (depending how powerful the notebook will be), but other than that - its a 'simple' install.

When the above is completed once, an O/S reinstall is a simple matter of formatting the 100GB C: partition in Win 7 setup and hitting next.

Your data will be there when you boot into the desktop for the first time - as long as you didn't touch the other partitions at the setup screen.

Some say that a clean install is a waste of time.

I say a clean install is an opportunity to really evaluate how efficiently the computer will be used and gives us a chance to apply it fully.

Some objections I can already foresee is that since the O/S is not at the beginning (fastest) part of the drive, we are actually losing performance - not gaining it.

I would say that with most HD's, the first 20% to 30% (in capacity) of a drive will give us the maximum performance they can offer. Whether we were at the beginning of the drive or at the end of the 30% mark.

With 465GB total capacity, the 164GB we are using for the Temp & O/S partitions is hitting 35% of the drive - but remember that that percentage is at the end of the 100GB partition and only if we had filled it all to capacity.

With the pagefile and almost all other temp files moved off the 100GB partition, we are using closer to only 1/2 of the 100GB partition. And, with data that is not normally changing. This brings us now to around 25% of actual used space (total) for the drive with the most needed (the temp files) exactly where they should be - at the beginning/fastest part of our drive.

In addition to all the other benefits, most important being keeping free space fragmentation to a minimum (which we are doing capably with this strategy above), not only do we have as much performance as a single HD setup can offer, but we can keep this high level of performance indefinitely (well, at least as long as our CPU is up to the tasks we demand of it, for a given amount of time).

Another objection I foresee is the questioning of the pagefile when I have 8GB of RAM. Simple: insurance and peace of mind. Also keep in mind that at the level this CPU is at (a P8400), a 512MB pagefile is all I need with the work I expect from the system at any given time. Another reason is that CS4 will warn you incessantly about this 'problem' every time you start certain programs.

One last issue raised may be that this is too much work. True, but anything worthwhile is worth doing right. Instead of reinstalling Windows every few months (XP anyone?) because the performance went downhill, I have enjoyed my last few systems until I'm ready to upgrade to the latest and greatest hardware. Also, as noted above previously, this 'work' is only done once - and you'll enjoy the benefits for much, much longer than the initial effort involved.

How effective is this strategy in actually giving performance as promised?

Well, lets just say that on the SSD thread, PS CS4 was mentioned that it takes 7 to 9 seconds for it to load - on a variety of 'high end' SSD's, including the venerable Intel G2 SSD. Scratching my head, I go off to check my notes... Yep, my Hitachi loads PS CS4 in 8 to 11 seconds, but also with 3 suites of plugins installed. Even my now 'old' Scorpio Blue loaded PS in comparable times to the stated times the SSD's take.

So, yes, I'm not only confident this is a real performance oriented partitioning strategy, I've also had independent 'confirmation' of it's strengths too. Importantly, this 'confirmation' is not from its peers, its actually from the next generation of storage tech, hmmmm....

There is a lot of information presented and I may have made an error or two in presenting it, but I hope that this gets everyone thinking about how truly optimizing a system will not only make it a much more enjoyable experience each time it is used, but also allow us to have the luxury of waiting for a real performance upgrade, because our systems will be just as capable tomorrow as they are today (assuming, of course, our computing needs don't change drastically overnight ).

Hope this will help in your quest for a fully optimized system. Cheers!

Thanks for reading.

 

Thanks, it was very well written and useful.

 

Somebody should make it a sticky

 

Hey guys/gals, thanks for the comments. Much appreciated.

 

so much work. and then dave comes in here and says "don't".

1 partition over the whole disk = the way the os is designed for (okay, win7 creates 2 partitions by default, one hidden). all system internal tools are designed around this setup, and work well in it.

the amount of work put into finding out if you gain a little in a different set up is bigger than the gain, most likely.

this is for single disk systems, anyways. multidisks are great for performance-load-balancing.

still, nice work. obviously.

 

davepermen,

this is not a lot of work to do, even though it may have taken me almost 30 yrs to write about it - but implementing it is very worthwhile.

No O/S is 'designed' to be set up on the large capacity disks we have today, optimally, on a single partition. Even MS states this, for many years actually.

The 'work' that I did is that I kept partitioning C: drive smaller and smaller and while it was faster (had more 'snap'), that initial performance was much too quickly (sometimes in weeks) replaced by a substandard user experience that only a reformat/reinstall would 'cure' - for a while.

I then went the other way and quickly noticed that much over 20 - 30% of the size of the HD and performance would drop too - depending on what HD was used, sometimes this drop was drastic (relatively speaking). This is in direct contradiction to what you state and I'm still only using a portion of the HD - and not the entire capacity available, for the O/S to be able to see this performance drop.

When I read and realized why OS/X users (yes, I'm on Windows!) would be recommended a new HD just to make their computers acceptable (but not quicker; the free space fragmentation is very bad on OS/X) as they approached the maximum capacity of their HD's, I wondered if NTFS suffered from that too? It did! That is why my small partitions were starting off so fast, yet would act as if they were possessed after a few lengthy PS sessions (and the inevitable Crash/Blue Screen Of Death that Windows 2000 Professional/XP is so famous for).

Putting the 'ideals' of PerfectDisk together with the things I now knew above, it became clear that the method I propose in the 1st post here was the 'optimal' solution I had been looking for since I did my first install of Windows 1.0 in the summer of 1986(?).

Since PD 2000, defragging my HD's along with the methods outlined in post #1 has netted me many benefits, including the ability to skip a generation or two of so-called 'upgrades' because my systems were still providing the output I needed at the speed (more properly; throughput), I required. When I do make the jump to current technology, the changes are real, immediate and cost effective.

Not to repeat the other benefits in the first post again, but if anyone values a high level experience with their computers over time, then this method may be a wise time investment for them too.

BTW, Thank you for the 'still, nice work.'!

Cheers!

 

in essense that's true. partition too small => system can't stay "ordered" well, resulting in quickly degrading performance. disk too big, and it get spread too much, resulting in not so quickly degrading performance.

still, in 2009, you fix that by buying an ssd, but you knew that ^^

there, the you only have to care about one thing: big enough (my current laptop would still fit nicely onto a 40gb intel btw, it would fill it at around 70% i still love to have a 160gb version instead.. )

 

davepermen,

I can make anything 'fit', but how productive will I be?

Still dreaming about a Christmas G2, but I think Santa knows I've been naughty.

 

i fit this while being productive. i'm just sort of shocked that it still fits i don't actively care if it does anyways.. that's what i bought the 160gb for: to never care about space. so far, i could life with a 40gb ssd exactly the same way. this is nice. but i don't care for the day i can't even life with an 80gb ssd.. as i don't have one

well, yeah, you where naughty. still, i hope he's a nice guy and gets you a g2

 

I like your idea tilleroftheearth. By placing the most used partition on the inside of the drive, that's sort of like short-stroking it which can offer a big speed advantage.

I have a question for you. I'm thinking of getting the 7k500 for video editing since I've run out of space on my 7200.2 (160 GB). I think my current drive's read/write speed is around 45 MB/s, which is decent, but too slow for uncompressed video editing (I have to edit the video uncompressed because the T7700 is too slow to handle H.264 [well, unless I use CoreAVC-- but my video editing program can't utilize that]). Would you recommend placing the OS on a partition on the 7k500 and also using it for video storage? Or would you recommend leaving the OS on my 7200.2 and using the 7k500 for only video storage? Or something different? Thanks!

 

Xcelerate,

Thanks!

Now, with a two drive system hmmm... the possibilities, the possibilities (rubbing hands slowly together with a gleam in my eye ).


First off, I don't know how big your video files are, or the amount of data you can create (at a time). But here goes nothing...

The method I outlined in the 1st post should work for you with a two drive system; maybe just make sure the first 'T' (inside, as you call it) partition is big enough to handle your original video, plus the video you create too (up to 100GB partition size for 'T'). You can then use the old 160GB drive for a combination pagefile/temp files/IE cache and possibly Downloads too, in a 20GB partition and the rest use as a pure DATA partition (to keep your Hitachi as 'clean' as possible and also to be ready immediately (without connecting external storage) for the next project, once the current one is finished).

One additional thing I would change with the configuration above is to place the Video folder on the 'T' drive (instead of 'D'), so that once the video is edited - saving it should be as fast as possible with the Video folder on the same (fastest) partition, rather than saving it across 3 partitions 'T, 1st partition' to 'D, 3rd, partition'. Once it is saved properly, you can then backup to the Hitachi D drive and/or also to your backup 2nd partition on the 7200.3.

The above should give you a very responsive storage system and it will also free your O/S (Hitachi) HD from the pagefile accesses the system needs, again, enhancing the 'feel' of the system.

Summary of setup above:

Drive 1 Hitachi 7K500:

T: 100GB 2nd partition Scratch Disk, Video folder
C: 100GB 3rd partition O/S (if you can go smaller you should up to 50GB size).
E: XXXGB 4th partition DATA

Drive 2 Seagate 7200.2:

D: 20GB 1st partition Swapfile, Temp, IE cache, Downloads
F: 140GB 2nd partition BACKUP


However, I would recommend the following - especially if you have two Hitachi's in your budget.

Drive #1 Hitachi 7K500:

T: 25GB, 2nd partition Pagefile, (remember, Win 7 makes a 100MB 1st partition).
C: 100GB, 3rd partition O/S
E: XXXGB, 4th partition BACKUP, (XXX=remaining space).

Drive #2 Hitachi 7K500:

D: 164GB, 1st partition Pagefile, Scratch Disk, TEMP, IE cache, Downloads (keep clean!)
F: XXXGB, 2nd partition DATA


The above configuration should be able to handle your video needs for a while?

What it offers is the fastest O/S experience (because of the 2nd physical 'D' drive and the files located/pointed there).

It should also excel at not being HD limited in reading or writing your finished video files:

TEMP to DATA is between two different drives and,
DATA to BACKUP is again between two different physical drives = maximum read/write speeds possible.

Notice that there is a pagefile on each drive? That's because Windows is able and smart enough to know which drive is free/quicker and use that for itself. So, setup an adequate sized pagefile on each drive and let Windows decide which to use dynamically ( depending on how you're using the computer). Isn't a two drive system awesome!

One thing to keep in mind - I would only have a single HD installed when I'm installing Windows, then, once the install finished and the hardware drivers were installed, I would connect the second drive and configure them to work 'together'.

I may edit this later - gotta run, but hope this is enough to get you started.

Cheers!

 

Hey, thanks! I'll try that and let you know how it goes.

 

Can we apply these partitioning strategies to desktops?

 

Desktops, why not?

I have 8 HD's in my desktop that post will be massive!

 

Very nice guide. I have a very similar setup. You said that you have 8GB memory, so why not disable Page File?

 

Thanks!

I do not disable the pagefile because it results in a slower responding system.

 

Isn't the system faster as everything that is supose to be in page file is in memory then. RAM is faster than HDD. ??

 

Well, the way I use my computer, I can put all 8GB of RAM to use in medium 'use', let alone maximum use, so if the system is using/relying on RAM to keep the O/S 'up', then no, the system overall is not faster, because it has one less resource (the pagefile) that it knows how to use efficiently/effectively, but it can't (if disabled).

Remember, RAM is a very precious resource. Nothing gets 'executed' except by being in RAM. When you artificially lessen the RAM applications can use by disabling the pagefile, the Application you want/need the performance from simply goes slower - sometimes, much slower.

With PS specifically that uses it's own scratch disk, when we unwittingly disable the pagefile and PS therefore has that much less RAM to work in, it is forced to use it's scratch disk much sooner and that performance hit greatly offsets any performance benefit of having 'no' pagefile at all.

With other programs that cannot handle lack of RAM as elegantly as PS can, we simply get an unstable program or O/S. Worse case, the O/S completely comes unglued and BSOD's or other fireworks show up that not only negate any performance we might have been enjoying up until that point, but it also comes with a productivity loss that may take many hours to regain.

So, if you are using your computer at or near idle (well, certainly below it's 'critical' stage anyway), it may seem like a good idea and even beneficial to disable the pagefile. If however, you normally push it at and beyond it's limits (to the point where the system is relying on the pagefile to keep itself 'alive'), then a pagefile is not only mandatory, it is the smart thing to have (enabled).

Cheers!

 

Just found this test
http://www.pcshoptalk.com/content.php?205-HITACHI-Travelstar-7K500-500-2-5-Hard-Drive/view/1

Might be of interest to somebody

 

Destiny,

Thanks for the link. So, overall, the Hitachi is an upgrade even to an Scorpio Black 320GB model - good to know.

I just wish they specified if it was used as the O/S boot drive when it was tested, or if it was a separate, data only installation. But either way, as long as they tested both of them in the same way and in the same system, then they are comparable to each other.

Cheers!

 

Keep in mind that that review solely relies on synthetic benchmarks (even PCMark Vantage is synthetic).

To add one more synthetic benchmark: the WD1600BEKT beats the 7K500 with a clear margin in the HDTune IOPS benchmarks.

Which drive is faster in real life is uncertain.

 

I'm curious how much time will be saved by setting up all these partitions.

 

As I have bought the same harddisc (7K500) this guide is really helpful.

But I don't really get why you take so much free space on the system-partition.
I always used to make a new partition for my tools and programms.
I agree with you for the temp-partition but this one also seems too big for me - I would choose about 20 GB. How can you fill up 64 GB with temp data?
Using ccleaner regularly will delete most of it...

So it would look like this:
T: 20 GB (temp)
C: 40 GB (system)
D: 30 GB (tools)
E: rest GB (or more partitions)

Is there really a performance improvement if you have more free space on your harddrive? So I in fact have to buy even bigger drives to really use the size that I bought - just because of the big part of empty space which I'll never fill up.

 

Putting your tools and applications in a separate partition from the system causes the hard drive to work harder to start programs. Some of the files the programs use are placed in the Windows folder so you want the applications to be as close to the windows folder as possible so they can be accessed quicker and easier. Putting them in a separate folder on the same hard drive forces the head to have to move further to access them and causes it to bounce between the windows folder and the application folder.

The sizes of each of the partitions can be debated until the cows come home with merit to each, but using a separate application partition isn't debatable, just slower.

 

Good info to know about that hitachi drive, thanks for posting that.
I usually keep 2 partitions on my laptop; one smaller one for OS (40GB) and the rest for documents and media. Can't say I've noticed my system lagging. That's definitely an interesting post to read though. Thanks for going through that and posting it up for us.

 

I have done HDtach (and other) testing with this many times over the years.
I recommended before committing to all of these partitions, you actually test and see what you get because you may be surprised.

Note, I am disregarding the Windows7 swap file in this discussion for simplicity. This partition is necessary and does not effect what I discuss below.

What is being done is called "short stroking", which is the basis of the information posted. Short stroking means you cut the partition short, thereby decreasing the hard disks arm stroke which speeds things up. This DOES work.

However.
The problem comes in with how Windows deals with things. While a short stroked drive increases speeds, a split drive, slows it down. Just adding that extra partition will not only eliminate your short stroke advantage, but will actually make it worse than if you had left only one partition. I suspect Windows has to verify which partition it needs to check, before it can read the master file table of that partition and locate the file.

What was said earlier about Windows operating best with one partition, is true.


Now, there are advantages to multiple partitions, please don't get me wrong. I often do so. Why? Because if you store everything outside of your Windows partition, you can reformat and re-install Windows to your hearts content and not worry about your data being erased.

Oh, in the past I also setup a secondary drive, also short stroked) for a swap file. While a second drive will speed up swap speeds, in truth, you can't tell a difference.

If you do every tweak you can find, you MIGHT see a glimmer of change in speeds of things, but the truth is, the only way you will notice much is in benchmarks. Seat of your pants is more important.

 

Interesting. I was always under the impression the opposite was true, or at least a long while back a dell rep told me the the fuller a hard drive becomes (assuming windows is on the same partition as storage) the slower it would run. I should know better.

And that's the primary reason I use 2 partitions.

 

I just have found some really interesting articles/discussions regarding the "short stroking":
- some tests by Tom's Hardware which somehow shows the I/O-advantage you could gain (also read the comments)
- this short explanation
and finally a discussion which says in fact that there actually is no reallife performance gain by short-stroking your harddrive and losing most of the capacity. they also refer to the article by Tom's Hardware.

It would be nice to hear the opinion of the threadstarter "tilleroftheearth" here.

 

I haven't seen this posted so I thought I would mention that the Hitachi 7K500, 2.5", 7200rpm drive is selling for $78 at Fry's Electronics as of 3/8/10.

http://www.frys.com/product/5966014

 

Not bad. Comes to the same price amazon is offering after shipping is added,though amazon doesn't have it in stock at the moment.

I'm with amazon though, because of the prime trial. The fry's deal is good for locals. I'm wondering how much of a performance gain I'd see with this coming from a WD5000BEVT.

 

Yeah, and Dell reps have been known to day an Intel 950 is better than an Intel HD4500. Dell reps are no better than asking the salesman at Best buy in most cases.

It is however true that full drive will be slower. Short stroking doesn't mean cutting a drive down to nothing, just smaller. The smaller the partition, the more you gain and the faster you lose that gain.

Most people doing this either reformat often, or don't keep enough data there to worry about. I use the same rule as SSD, never put more data than 50% capacity. Beyond that, any drive will be losing a lot of performance.

It's better to use two drives. Better yet, setup a file server with gigabit ethernet. This can handle downloads, movie streaming, routing, remote networking... pretty much anything you want. Allowing to short stroke, format, and play all you want with less hassle or fear.

Correct, you can see it in benchmarks, that's all, same as most overclocks.

I only did it last time to see how fast I could get a set of (raid 0) Raptors to run out of curiosity, and while they did run faster I saw no discernable difference in speed compared to running a single Wd Black drive. What I did do though, is double my chances of data loss, increase drive noise and use more electricity all for a better benchmark.

As mentioned, how far you short stroke is key to any differences, but there is no set rule that I know of for how much you should shorten.

 

Just a quick question... Those TMP and TEMP pointers you refer to in you guide... That is set by Windows automaticly or do I need to change it myself?

 

I think a lot of the speed advantages are anecdotal since it depends on your components and software as a whole. And since no two systems are exactly alike, a performance advantage may be true for some, yet non-existent for others.

On the other hand, I also believe that sometimes many suggestions such as these may be dated since improvements are being made continuously across the industry which can mask or negate some traditional procedures that made measurable improvements in the past.

For example, RAID 0 was instituted primarily to overcome the relatively sluggish nature of past mechanical storage devices and components. And even then, use largely for business applications.

 

I’ve been thinking about how I was going to set up my new rig (in my sig) and this is what I was planning to do:

160Gig Intel G2 SSD
C:\ 100Gig - Used for OS and programs
D:\ 60Gig - Used for my FS Simming install and files

320 Gig Standard platter drive
E:\ 60Gig - Use for TMP, TEMP, Pagefile, Hybernatefile, Firefox, IE Cache, Downloads folder
F:\ 260Gig – Rest of my data, etc..

This thread changed my set up a little by adding the E partition to get a little bit of that “Short Stroking” to speed up that part of the set up. Otherwise I was going to have the 320Gig drive as just one big partition, and use it the same way as E:\ and F:\ was described.

I know how hard drives work, but was not thinking about the increase in speed by putting stuff that you want faster first.

Good Thread!!

 

Large files actually work better at the outside of a conventional drive.

Something to keep in mind with rotational drives...
Inner tracks access faster, outer tracks transfer faster. So if you need to access lots of small files, the inside is where you want them. If you have one large file, like hyberfil.sys and the pagefile, you are better off with those on the outside track, and defragged, where the system can access and rip through them. Windows often places Hiberfil and pagefile in the center of the drive, this way the transfer speed is better without killing your access time.


If you really want speed...
Put a small partition on Wiindows, since it uses mostly small files. Same with temp and internet cache.

Then put a second drive with 2 partitions, one large one, then a second very small, and delete the first. This leaves you a small partition at the outside of the drive to use for hyberfill and pagefile. Also good for games with big files, like flightsim maps or fps maps.

As soon as you have two partitions though, you will see a drop in speed. Grab a spare drive and test it. Access times go up. Granted I will give you that using a second drive for swap is a good idea though. Another issue is that odds are, the 320 is faster then the 160.

The bigger thing to consider though is the speed boost will be negligible. You likely will not be able to tell.

If it was me...
160Gig Intel G2 SSD
160 partition Windows and gaming files
(If this was a standard drive I might short stroke it to 110gigs and call it done)

320 Gig Standard platter drive
320gig hyberfill, installers and personal stuff

I often keep everything needed to re-install on a second drive or partition that way I only need a windows disk to re-install if something happens.

 

It was late when you posted, The 320 is NOT faster that the 160. The 160 is an SSD, it's an order of magnitude faster.

The reason for splitting this up is FS files are constantly being changed by adding, subtracting files tweaking, etc. I want to take snap shot backups of that partition at certain times. If you hose an install of FS its a lot of work to reinstall.

So that in not even up for adjustment consideration.

I may think about that some more, based on how I use my puter. There is a mix of large and small files that would be using the temp folders, but the pagefile is big. I also probably won't use hybernate that much so disabling that would save another large file. my download folder will mostly be smaller files with the occasional large file.

So as you see there are pluses and minuses to the location I put the two partitions at. Also would I notice the differences, probably not.

The biggest benefit I see is moving the constantly changing files off the SSD to reduce the amount of write cycles on my drive.

 

question: how to move "Temporary pointers TMP and TEMP"? just the same way as folders Dowloads, my music and others? There is 1 file in C:\Temp which I can't move. Even in safe mode. Could anyone tell me what to do? And what exactly temp folders to move (there are many of them)

 

boot into linux and remove it.

 

It could be Great Advise!.. But I can boot 2-nd Windows I have and remove last file. But still that file always creates while Windows 7 boots.

I found a solution in additional properties of My computer. The question now is should I change the path of only users temp folders or system too?

 

strange. Windows byitself should not be using C:\Temp as it has its own temp location under c:\windows\temp if I am not mistaken.

If you are not talking about safe mode, I would think it is due do some programs you have installed. But safe mode I assume would not load or run any of them.

you can try to set the global environment variable TEMP=... and TMP=... and see if it helps.

edit:
another possibility, have you been hitted by virus ?

 

Thanks. I changed the variable environment 1 message above. And that's why I am asking if I should change it only for Temp and Tmp or for system folders too (C:\Windows\Temp and other). Also how to change internet temp folder. It is if I'm right in AppData so should I just move it? Also what exactly files are there? Because I use FireFox, not IE.

 

c:\windows\temp is usually used by non-interactive accounts and the security is tight. Temp or Tmp is usually a per user setting that goes under the 'home' directory. IE temp is yet another thing that also goes under 'home'

A standard configuration requires no changes to any of these and there is no C:\Temp as well. you may need to check which process is owning the c:\temp\xxx file or which process create it.

It is very unusual to have such thing in safe mode.

 

FXSAPIDebugLogFile.txt file. I will try to forget about him to make my life easier

 

FXSAPIDebugLogFile have no clue to get rid of it.. But I did remove CmdLineExt02.dll using unlocker from the temp I still have both files on a cd just in case tho.

 

You don't move the physical folders.

You simply point to the new folders (which you created beforehand).

Reboot the system to make sure that the new folders are being used.

If you want/need some files that were in the old temp folders, you now should be able to manually move them there (but I have no idea why you would want to... and, I don't recommend to do so either).

Hope this helped? (Sorry, I was so slow responding!).


The following image shows the two places where these temp/tmp pointers should be changed. Note that I keep the user folders (uT) and the windows folders (wT) seperate, just like Windows wants.

 

Never mind, I'm not newbie. I can use google and other sources Still U gave me an answer should I change system temp folder or not. TNX

 

In general, it should not be changed unless you set proper access right to this system used temp directory. A directory created by yourself as the replacement of system temp directory can have security that ranges from 'too loose' to 'too tight'. too loose, your system is technically considered compromised. 'too tight', you may affect the services that need temp.

Unless you know what you are doing, there is no point in changing either the user or the system temp. And based on your question, you don't know what you are doing.

 

Well I turned off UAC so if I understand right even if system's Temp folder has access right for user as Admin Full access and for user (the same name) as just user specific access while I put full access to both it still won't matter/too loose as all my actions are made as from Admin User (yes I know about higher level of virus infection in this case)

 

well so long you know what you are doing, that is fine.

 

Jesus I just read through that whole post and I must say I am confused.. there is no 'clear cut' explanation as to why all these partitions make a speed increase.. also I can't see any measurements or proof that doing any of this will be faster except your own calculations.

You definitely deserve a bravo! for this thread but I think due to the confusing nature of what you were trying to explain I might just keep my next drive as 1 partition...