It is surprising how strongly some people feel about the issue of partitioning or not. Voices are raised – faces become a bit redder – language becomes a bit more colorful. If you are from the school of thought that partitioning is absolutely not necessary, please leave a comment at the bottom of the page. Your point of view is valuable and should be considered.

This presentation, however, will favor partitioning. There will be some of us who will remember the days when, for example, a 3GB hard drive on your laptop was considered to be “state of the art”, and the cost of that machine was several thousand dollars. Now, that seems archaic, and the hard drives increasingly grow in size – and some are partitioned.

One of the best arguments on the side of partitioning was given by Mitch Tulloch, in an article for Microsoft. The three major points that Mitch basis his argument are:

• partitioning organizes work
• partitioning safeguards the data
• partitioning increases the computer’s performance

One of the points is that Mitch makes is: At the end of each month, I copy last month’s Archive subfolders to CD, label it by date, and put it somewhere safe. That way I have last month’s backup ready if both my hard disks fail from a lightning bolt hitting my office, or my computer is infected with a virus, or a thief steals my computer. Needless to say, the security programs should be run to make certain that the back-up is not infected.

One of the most popular and well-used partitioning programs is Acronis Disk Director Suite. It has won industry recommendations and users’ praise.

The Acronis Disk Management and Partitioning program is easy to use and effective. It supports Windows (NT 4, 98, ME, 2000, XP, Vista). And, until July 22, 2009, the Acronis people are offering our readers an amazing thirty per cent (30%) discount.

This program is a CNET Editors’ Choice Award winner: A suite of utilities that will keep your hard disk healthy. An excellent set of tools that will allow you to keep your hard disk healthy and organized. The Acronis Disk Management program has had many third party reviews and it has been top rated.

Thanks to the Acronis people for the generous offering for our readers.

• Protecting Yourself from a Hard Drive Disaster
• Simple Backups Can Save You Time and Money
• Back Up Your Data with Special Savings from Acronis
• Internet Hard Drive
• Keep Your Computer in Tip-Top Shape
• Backup Security and Synchronizing (even for Macs!)
• Are You a Pack Rat?
• What’s the Best Hard Drive Enclosure to Buy?
• Are Registry Cleaners Safe to Use?
• How to Speed Up Your PC

Add to iTunes | Add to YouTube | Add to Google | RSS Feed

I haven’t installed Boot Camp since I used the Beta version on the Mac Mini. Ponzi needs to use Windows on her MacBook Pro, so she can run various applications. Using Boot Camp allows you to either boot your Mac like an actual Windows machine, or boot to OS X.

Leopard is the world’s most advanced operating system. So advanced, it even lets you run Windows if there’s a PC application you need to use. Just get a copy of Windows and start up Boot Camp, now included with Leopard. Setup is simple and straightforward — just as you’d expect with a Mac. Use Spotlight to search the word boot. Ah, there it is. The first thing it will do is ask if you want to print the instructions. I don’t want to, so I’m just going to click through. Next, it asks how much space you want to partition for use of Boot Camp. Ponzi will be doing a lot in Windows, so I’m going to allocate 25GB of space. Click the button to partition, and wait a couple of minutes for it to do so.

Once it has finished partitioning, you’ll need to grab your Windows install disc. Simply put that in and let it run through setup. After that is done… you’re going to need to pop in the OS X disc and update drivers and things for Windows to run. When you install Windows using Boot Camp, you won’t need to search the Internet for drivers or burn a disc. After you run Boot Camp, simply insert the Leopard DVD to install the necessary drivers. Everything you need to make your Mac work with Windows is right there. When you use a Windows application, you’ll have full access to unique Mac features (iSight, Apple Remote, trackpad, specific keyboard keys, keyboard backlighting) and connectivity (wired and wireless).

See how simple it is to install Boot Camp on OS X and run Windows? I’ve even heard from many sources that Windows actually runs better on the Mac than it does on a regular PC. Of course, a Mac is a PC… and a Mac… and a PC… well, you get the point.

Want to embed this video on your own site, blog, or forum? Use this code or download the video:

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/HggcgYro7T8"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/HggcgYro7T8" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/">Chris</a> | <a href="http://live.pirillo.com/">Live Tech Support</a> | <a href="http://media.pirillo.com/">Video Help</a> | <a href="http://feeds.pirillo.com/ChrisPirilloShow">Add to iTunes</a>

• Mac Vs PC Again
• How is OS X Different than Windows?
• Will Your Next PC be a Mac?
• Have You or Are You Switching from PC to Mac?
• You Just Can’t Escape Windows
• Macs Never Crash… EVER!
• PC or Mac for Education?
• Putting Windows Vista on a Mac from Apple
• Is Mac OS X Leopard Better than Apple’s Tiger?
• Virtual Machine Speed Tips

Add to iTunes | Add to YouTube | Add to Google | RSS Feed

For any of you going through the Boot Camp install on your Mac for the first time, I wanted to show you something that is VERY very important in this process. Failure to do this step properly can result in OS X being completely messed up.

When you get to the screen that allows you to select the partition to install, you will see all of your partitions listed (including unpartitioned space). Make SURE you select the partition that has the Boot Camp label, and is formatted using Fat32. If you choose any of the others listed there, you will honestly completely mess up OS X. Why Fat32 you ask? According to Bwana.tv:

Fat32 gives you read/write access to the partition which is, in my opinion, the main benefit. NTFS is better overall since you don’t have partition and file size limitations and you also get the security features of the file system. The main drawback is that NTFS is read-only from Mac OS X so you can’t write files to your Windows partition.

Also, be sure to choose to “Leave Current File System Intact”.

As I said, this video is dedicated solely to this part of the Boot Camp setup process. I cannot stress enough how critical it is to follow these steps.

Want to embed this video on your own site, blog, or forum? Use this code or download the video:

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/vYkoWEyiPTI"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/vYkoWEyiPTI" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/">Chris</a> | <a href="http://live.pirillo.com/">Live Tech Support</a> | <a href="http://media.pirillo.com/">Video Help</a> | <a href="http://feeds.pirillo.com/ChrisPirilloShow">Add to iTunes</a>

• Vista Rants
• Macbook Pro – Parallels vs VMWare Fusion
• What Drives Your Productivity?
• Parallels Review
• Virtual Machines Love Windows 7
• Apple’s Mac OS X Snow Leopard Review
• Snow Leopard Thoughts
• Should You Create a Partition?
• What is Mozilla’s Prism?
• Mac Mini Unboxing

Add to iTunes | Add to YouTube | Add to Google | RSS Feed

Many of you have asked me for a recommendation for a partition tool. In the past, I’ve recommended Partition Magic, which of course is not free. Wirelesspacket gave me a link to a free partitioning program that appears to be quite good!

PartedMagic is an open source project. It is a Linux LiveCD/USB/PXE with its elemental purpose being to partition hard drives.

What is a partition, you ask? Well, to put it in simple terms… take your Disk on your computer. Usually, your C drive of course. You can use this tool to create “partitions” on it, that is, separate sections. You can have one that boots a Linux distro, one that boots Windows, and even one for your music files. You see where I’m going with this? A partition tool will help you divide that hard disk, and manage the separate sections… or partitions.

There are two things that make PartedMagic stand out above other alternatives. One is the fact that it comes with complete documentation. The other thing is the sheer number of file systems it supports. Parted Magic supports the following: ext2, ext3, ext4, fat16, fat32, hfs, hfs+, jfs, linux-swap, ntfs, reiserfs, reiser4, and xfs.

I’m always interested in hearing your tips, tricks, ideas and programs you can’t live without. I encourage you to send me your thoughts via a comment to this or any other video, or by sending me and email to chris@prillo.com.

Want to embed this video on your own site, blog, or forum? Use this code or download the video:

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/uWYI2p4DhUM"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/uWYI2p4DhUM" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/">Chris</a> | <a href="http://live.pirillo.com/">Live Tech Support</a> | <a href="http://media.pirillo.com/">Video Help</a> | <a href="http://feeds.pirillo.com/ChrisPirilloShow">Add to iTunes</a>

• Should You Create a Partition?
• Windows 7: Resource Monitor Tool
• How to Install Boot Camp on OS X
• Boot Camp Hard Drive Warning
• How to Set up a RAM Disk for Free
• Defrag Your Hard Drives with Diskeeper for Windows