Games on boot drive or second drive ?

Paul11

Paul11

Paul11

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with a setup as example

boot drive = Raptor (150gb)
data drive = (500gb)

would you say its better to put games on the boot drive with OS and Apps

or put games on to the data drive ?
 
it kinda depends on what is important to you
Me
I put games on secondary drive , keep my OS and games seperate
That way if my OS gets screwed I can restore that one partition and not effect my games ( I have had for example ofp installed from first release , this one install has lasted through 7 years and about 5+ PC's )

If you want faster performance than your raptor with all eggs in one basket might be better for you.
 
I've always wondered why people put games on a 2nd partition. It's not like they're going to work after you've wiped windows anyways, the registry entries will have all disappeard :confused:
 
Liquidfox said:
I've always wondered why people put games on a 2nd partition. It's not like they're going to work after you've wiped windows anyways, the registry entries will have all disappeard :confused:
Click to expand...

All Steam games will work which can take up much more than 10-20GB of space. Fresh install and just run steam and it sets up the registry etc on its own. But other games fair enough dont because specific settings or CD keys are saved there :)
 
A lot of my games store their config files and game saves in 'My Documents' or 'Saved Games' (Vista) which are located on my data drive. For any games that don't, you could easily just setup a backup routine for the those files.

If your boot drive fails, then just re-install the games and restore game saves from backups.

Also the last time I used Steam it had a backup option.
 
Liquidfox said:
I've always wondered why people put games on a 2nd partition. It's not like they're going to work after you've wiped windows anyways, the registry entries will have all disappeard :confused:
Click to expand...

This has always been my take on the topic, you're quite lucky if all your games on a storage drive work correctly on a fresh install of windows imo.
 
Paulus said:
with a setup as example

boot drive = Raptor (150gb)
data drive = (500gb)

would you say its better to put games on the boot drive with OS and Apps

or put games on to the data drive ?
Click to expand...

I keep my games on the boot drive, but on a seperate partition.

For example with your Raptor split into two partitions, you could have 40-50GB for the O/S and general program applications, and the other 100GB or so solely for games.

Or even if you want to dual boot O/S, then three partitions. Two for the O/S and the left over for the games.

Even though I tend to reinstall games anyways after a reformat, I still keep the seperate partitions so I can keep all the game data files intact i.e. if they had been patched and/or use them as backup to replace the newly installed version. And some games do work even if it is not in the registry or listed in the Add/Remove Programs section anyways.

Either way its up to your own personal preference.

I always leave the bigger data hard drive seperately for all my storage backups, movies, music etc. Keep all the applications and games on the boot drive since it will be the one doing all the work.
 
I'd go for a second drive every time, unless it is a LOT slower.

I've always kept my games on separate partition (when using Raid 0) and now on a separate drive. Makes defragging much less of a pain too :cool:.

I think a new install = having to reinstall *all* your games is a myth. In my experience most games survive an os wipe and even a move to a new os and hardware pretty well (finally moved to Vista a few weeks ago). Obviously you need to backup your save games, but you need to do this even with a single drive so that's a moot point :p.

Steam games work like a charm and just require a login to Steam to authorise. The GTA series seems to be pretty happy too, including GTA IV, it just required a quick 1-2 min install from CD, not the full painful process (the move to Vista didn't even need that, just reactivation)! Bioshock just asked me to re-enter my key and then was good to go.

The only game that I can remember consistently causing problems and insisting on a reinstall was UT2003 - not tried 2004, as I'd given up clan gaming by then... :)
 
Liquidfox said:
I've always wondered why people put games on a 2nd partition. It's not like they're going to work after you've wiped windows anyways, the registry entries will have all disappeard :confused:
Click to expand...

Complete myth in my experience. I've done multiple formats and have always left my games on a second drive. Never had any problems with running them with a fresh install. Some games will ask me for the CD key on first run, others will just work right off the bat.
 
Liquidfox said:
I've always wondered why people put games on a 2nd partition. It's not like they're going to work after you've wiped windows anyways, the registry entries will have all disappeard :confused:
Click to expand...

it will just rewrite new entries if required.

I'm no expert but I've copied both WAR, WOW and LOTRO onto a usb key and transfered them to my new laptop all 3 ran no problem I just had to login my account.

I have also done it with MOHAA no problem you just need your CD key.
 
blade786 said:
I've never bothered with multiple hard drives, I just keep everything on one drive. Never had any problems with it so far.

Blade
Click to expand...

its nice to have a fast boot drive for OS and Apps (velociraptor) but that would be far to expensive for data as well
 
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