Partitioning

Gerardus

Registered
Good Afternoon,

I will be changing out the hard drive on my Mac Mini (2005) from 80 GB to one of 320 GB. I have already upgraded (this spring) the OS to Leopard and increased the memory from 512 Mb to 1 Gb.

Also, recently, I have purchased a 1TB desktop external drive and use Time Machine to back up. I hope to modify the backup frequency using Carbon Copy or Super Duper in conjunction with Time Machine. I have successfully used Carbon Copy to partition the new drive into 3 volumes using an external OWC case and Firewire. I have entitled and sized (approximately) the volumes as Leopard 160GB, Panther & Classic 40 GB and Data 100 GB. The present 80 GB HD has been cloned using Carbon Copy into the Leopard volume.

The Mini is used by the whole family so there are five user accounts. My account is also the administration account. The teenagers have lots of photos and music and other teenager stuff.

My intention is to have the OS’s in their own volumes i.e. Leopard in one, Panther & Classic in the second and have the third for data in a Data volume. I believe in this way that a) I can access the data from either OS so won’t double up the data. 2) If one OS has problems I still can access the data and also use the other OS. I am undecided whether to reserve a volume for Windows, should I?

I have several major questions
1) When in either OS and say “Documents” is selected will the OS know to go to the Data volume?
2) Will the “Applications” stay with the OS volume?
3) What about “itunes” and “iphoto” will their music and photos be saved in the OS volume or the Data volume?
4) Am I going about this wrong?
5) Should I partition using other volume sizes?
6) What would the OS’s reed to run if all the data is kept in it’s own volume?
7) Will each user have their own area of the Data volume or will everyone have access to all?

I can still re-partition and re-clone if necessary.

I have searched the Internet and have found a lot of information on Partitioning and using different OS’s but no specific answers to my questions. It may be obvious to the persons that do so but unfortunately it isn’t to me!

Thank-you.

Sincerely,

Gerardus
 
My intention is to have the OS’s in their own volumes i.e. Leopard in one, Panther & Classic in the second and have the third for data in a Data volume. I believe in this way that a) I can access the data from either OS so won’t double up the data. 2) If one OS has problems I still can access the data and also use the other OS. I am undecided whether to reserve a volume for Windows, should I?

I have several major questions
1) When in either OS and say “Documents” is selected will the OS know to go to the Data volume?
2) Will the “Applications” stay with the OS volume?
3) What about “itunes” and “iphoto” will their music and photos be saved in the OS volume or the Data volume?
4) Am I going about this wrong?
5) Should I partition using other volume sizes?
6) What would the OS’s reed to run if all the data is kept in it’s own volume?
7) Will each user have their own area of the Data volume or will everyone have access to all?

I can still re-partition and re-clone if necessary.

I have searched the Internet and have found a lot of information on Partitioning and using different OS’s but no specific answers to my questions. It may be obvious to the persons that do so but unfortunately it isn’t to me!

Thank-you.

Sincerely,

Gerardus

If you look in each users Music folder in /YourHardDrive/Users/YourUserName/Music/iTunes/. Now things would be so much simpler if you had an external you could "clone" with something like Carbon Copy Cloner and you would have a backup.

Plus you could keep iTunes music on an another drive by following the steps listed in blog post Transferring your iTunes Library.

The moral of the story if this data is SO important you should always have it backed up. If you loose data you only have yourself to blame.

1) Documents are keeps in /YourHard Drive/Users/YourUserName/Documents/.

2) Yes OS X keeps /Applications/,on the top level of the hard drive order, so all Users on that Mac have access to all the programs installed on that Mac.

3) To move your iPhoto library read the Apple article iPhoto: How to move the Library folder to a new location.

4) Not having a backup before you start! On the new OS X volume see /Applications/Utilities/Migration Assistant. It should come up when you first install OS X.


5) Totally up to you. Why are so may old Windows users obsessed with partitions? To repeat "OS X is not windows. So with are you treating it like Windows?

6) A "Cloned" backup that looks exactly like original. See Carbon Copy Cloner again Unlike Windows, OS X can boot from a backup with no problem using System Preferences->Startup Disk.

7) In OS X each user should only see his or her own data. It has to do with Unix permissions (that OS X is based on BSD Unix). So if Dick & Jane have their own accounts, Jane can't see what dick has done in his folder and vise-virsa.
 
Last edited:
Good Morning,

Thank-you for the advice. My computer is backed up in Time Machine and data on yet another drive. I wouldn't have it any other way. In the interim I have done a sucessful clone on an external firewire drive and all works as described.

An additional question:
In Leopard I understand that I may adjust the size of partitions without affecting the information within (as long as enough room is left) I have tried this to no avail. Is this because i have a G4 chip and this feature is only available on Intel Macs?

Sincerely,

Gerardus
 
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