Almy and Tauhid’s Blog

I made a critical mistake during my previous WinXP install — I only allocated 4.5 GB for the Windows partition. This was OK for a fresh install, but as more service packs and patches were released by Microsoft, the partition space quickly filled up. I tried to free up more space by defragging, moving program files to another partition, deleting uninstall files for the service packs, and my last resort was to utilize Winbolic Link. WL is used to ‘redirect’ a file or folder to another place. In short, I tricked Windows into thinking that it was filling up the C partition when in fact it was filling up totally different partition. This worked well for a while, and I was able to redirect huge files that really shouldn’t be there like google map cache files, outlook files etc. This all came to an end when I notice that the C partition became badly fragmented, increasing read times because it was jumping back and forth between partitions to keep Windows operating. Picture ten critical Windows folders spread out among three different partitions, and you get the idea how taxing it is for the hard drive.

So I finally gave up and installed a fresh copy of XP on a 20 GB partition. As of right now, I have 7 GB free with SP3 installed. Will I need more? Definitely.. but I’m hoping I can hold out long enough until 7 arrives.

Tau