Precision M4500 Owner's Lounge

How do you delete a post?

And: Does anyone know of a WYSIWUG vB text editor capable of displaying color and other text formating and saving in vBulletin format?

 

Unfortunately, the procedure described will result in a broken system. While it is possible to move the User Profile folders to a different partition, the procedure to accomplish this correctly is anything but simple. DO NOT follow the procedure outlined in the post I am replying to. The folder hierarchy your are trying to move contains a number of advanced file system constructs, which will be broken by the simple copy operation described. As a result, while the system may be working superficially, you in fact end up with a half-broken operating system. You have been warned.

As an aside, I do not consider configurations that boot from that small 64GB SSD very practical. This drive is simply too small to be of much use for general applications.

 

Hey Prix, thanks for pointing this out. I'll let you know if/when I run into any problems with the User Profile on this system. I've used a similar procedure on my XP system for about 3 years without a problem. Please provide a link to the more complex procedure. I would like to compare and give it a try.

Edit: I would like to point out that in the method I described the OS treats the User/UserName folder as if it is still on the system drive. This is accomplished using the Linking command with the Junction switch: mklink /J

References: http://blogs.microsoft.co.il

www.windows7home.net

http://social.answers.microsoft.com (last post in thread)

There is also a more complex method of altering the Windows Automated Installation Kit (AIK) and the Windows OEM Preinstallation Kit (OPK) to alter the Install package. Relocation of the Users directory and the ProgramData directory to a disk drive other than the disk drive that contains the Windows directory on a Windows Vista-based or a Windows Server 2008-based computer

The benefit I get from using the 64GB SSD for the OS is faster boot times and more importantly quicker response times for applications.

Do you have the 64GB card? If so, how do you use the card?

Do you know how Dell implements the card in pre-configured systems?

Please explain your opinion on why the 64GB is not enough for hosting the Windows 7 OS and Apps and why this would be of no benefit.

Regards,
Steve

 

64GB is too small a disk for general applications? Assuming you move your user profiles to another disk, it would be difficult for most average Windows users to fill a 64GB C: partition, wouldn't it? (Of course, I recognize also that the average Windows user won't have the skills to properly redirect user profiles to another disk.)

Admittedly I user Linux more than Windows, but on my old Laptop after years of use, my C: partition (which did include my user profile) was still under 30 GB used. For large files (audio and video especially) I had a huge D: partition that was accessible by both Linux and Windows.

For my new (M4500) laptop, I am comfortably able to fit Windows 7 C: and Linux / and /usr and swap on my 64GB SSD. Of course, YMMV. But I'm curious what usage you see that 64GB is too small.

 

On mine (Win7 Pro), I had three partitions. First the Dell Diagnostics partition. Then a system recovery partition that appeared to be empty. Then C:.

When I reinstalled Win7, I first moved the Dell Diag partition to my physical drive in case it's ever useful. Then I wiped the partition table on the 64GB SSD and started clean.

 

Yep, that's correct. Although there are still issues with this procedure on XP (related to the way permissions may be changed during the copy process, due to inheritance), this will work more or less fine on XP. However, from Vista on, Microsoft makes liberal use of reparse points to implement some of the compatibility features in Vista and above. Those will be broken by your process.

See here for one way to do this right.

True, but the cost is that there's a good chance that you'll run out of space, not so much because of the stuff in C:\Users, but because of stuff in C:\Program Files (which you should never, ever, try to relocate). Note that there are straightforward, and supported procedures to move all of your user folders (My Documents, My Pictures, My Music, etc.) to a different partition. Simply change the target location of these shell folders.

No, I don't find it useful, at all, for the above reasons. I just bought a 256GB SSD to replace the hard drive.

Simple. For a fully functional install you will use up roughly 20+GB for OS files, hibernation and paging file, leaving you with barely 40GB or so to grow in the future. Actually, if you happen to be interested in having 8 gigs of memory, you'll use up at least 16GB for hibernation and paging file alone, and the final bare-bones tally will be more like 32GB used up right after installation of Win7. Now, in general, you should install programs in C:\Program Files (which CANNOT be relocated) in order to take advantage of Windows' built-in file protection and virtualization features. You'll also need space in the WinSxS folder which will grow by several gigs over the years, plus space in C:\ProgramData for various cruft dumped by program installations there. If you don't use too many programs, you may be fine, but if you run out of space, you'll be stuck.

Like I said, there may be cases were you know that all you'll ever use is Windows Explorer and Microsoft Office, in which case the small SSD is fine. But if you're not sure, then going that route is a truly bad idea.

 

Thanks EKUNS. It's good to know that my final configuration will be similar to how Dell set it up. Do you know how Dell handled the User Profiles?

My guess is the simply moved the My Documents type folders out and left the System specific profile information on the system drive.

Steve

 

Pirx: Thanks for the link, it is very detailed.


Regards,
Steve

 

You basically got it the same way I did in your later post: SATA as AHCI with boot as Legacy.

I don't know if I had to or not, but I believe I did. I'm not 100% positive.

A Hitachi 500GB 7200 RPM drive; happened to be on sale at Frys for $70 at the time.

 

Well, I bought the system with exactly one drive: the SSD. While I honestly didn't pay any attention to the user profiles at all, I wouldn't imagine they did anything special with them.

I added the hard drive myself, later, due to cost. ($70 vs $400)