Tiplet expert tips & tech support

March 10, 2009

How and Why to Keep Data and Applications on Separate Drives

by David Hakala

When you create a user account under Windows, the operating system sets up a number of different folders to contain data specific to that user. These folders are placed on the same drive with the Windows operating systems files by default. There are some good reasons to change the location of these user files to a drive other than the one which Windows resides.

First, it makes backup operations faster and more efficient. User data changes very frequently, while the operating system changes seldom. If you make backups daily, as you should, then your backup program must a) work to sort changed files from unchanged files before backing up only the changed files, or b) back up unchanged files unnecessarily. Either way, backups take longer and consume more system resources while they are running, slowing down other things you may be doing.
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February 28, 2009

How and Why to Move the My Documents Folder to Another Drive

Filed under: computer performance,Windows — Tags: , , — admin @ 2:00 pm

by David Hakala

Most Windows users store their personal data in the My Documents folder. By default, this folder is located on the same drive as the Windows operating system, usually the C: drive. This poses certain problems.

First, your data collection – documents, pictures, music, videos, etc. – will keep growing while Windows overall does not. Performance degrades as the drive fills up. Eventually, you will run out of hard disk space. Then you will have to delete some files, a hard choice and a tedious exercise.
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