XP partition question.

I'm planning on installing Bootcamp but I'm just not sure how much space to provide for the Windows. All I'm going to use Windows for is to game, that's it. Probably only WoW and a couple others. What would the minimum amount needed be? I want the most space possible for OS X.

 

Well I can tell you Honestly if you want more than like 3 games on windows you are going to want more than the 32gb that bootcamp recommends. The problem with that is FAT32 can't be bigger than that so you're going to need to format it in NTSF which OSX can't read. My advice, split it 50/50 and install VMware or Parallels so you can still use it in Mac.

 

Hmmm well the only ones I'll probably be installing on it are WoW, CS: Source, and Starcraft 2 (when that comes out). You think 32 won't be enough?

 

Perhaps, but is gaming all you are planning to do in windows? Because 32 gigs go fast

 

Yeah, only gaming, without a doubt.

 

WoW uses alot of space, and keeps adding every week with add-ons and updates. I think 32GB might be enough for only games. Are you using XP? Vista might take more but I think 10GB is enough for XP: XP(5GB) + virus scanner (less then 1) + swap file (2GB) + 2GB just in case. If you want to use sleep mode and system restore you will need more. Then add 7GB per game. It would bring you just under 32GB. If you have the space then go for 45GB to be save.

3 things to do to keep the space used by windows small:
Turn off the recylce bin
Turn off system restore
Turn off sleep mode

each will take a few extra GB if you leave it on. You can also use nlite to keep the windows install small.

 

Yeah, I'm using XP. How do I turn off those three things you listed?

 

1. Right click on the Recyle bin on the desktop select Properties and tell it: Dont move files to the recycle bin. Delete files immediatly.
Just be carefull with what you delete since it will be gone. Shouldnt be a problem for gameing.

2. Right click on My Computer on the desktop. Select Properties. Then go to the System Properties tab. Select the Turn off System Restore on all drives check box

3. Right click on the desktop. Select Properties. Go to Screensaver and select Power. Go to the Hibernate tab. There uncheck the hibernation enabled checkbox.

 

You definitely will want more than 32GB for that. Windows itself can take almost 20GB. Then consider that Windows updates (most notably Service Packs) often require quite a lot of free space on your system partition. Then also consider you want to leave at least 10% of any partition free for defragmenting purposes (especially if it's your system partition or gaming partition).

Also, depending on how you buy your games, you might need extra space for the disk images themselves. For example, when I bought NWN2, I needed 4+ GB just for the download, then another 4+ to unzip it, and then the actual space required for the game, not to mention the whole series of updates which took hundreds of MB as well. Of course afterwards, you can move the install files onto other media.

 

??? I have XP Pro, with all the updates, service packs, and whatever else, and it's taking up about 5 gigs.

 

Well, I did just round up to 20 , but, I recently installed Vista Business, and after installation, my 74GB partition was down to ~60GB. I imagine Ultimate would take even more space.

 

so if you make the partition larger than 32 GB for the xp then you cannot access files saved on that partition while in OSX?? is that really all that big of a deal? the only reason I could even see you wanting to do this is like working on school documents or something. or am I missing something?

thanks

 

Not a big deal at all. If you really want you could even make a 3rd partition in FAT32 just for data files (like music and documents). Or you could get 3rd-party software like MacFuse (free) to write to NTFS from OSX, or MacDrive (costs $) to write and read to HFS from Windows.