Does anyone else get this?

[Stinky Chicken]

I format my computer perhaps, once every few months or when it needs it. The thing is, I have heaps of music that I have to put back on the computer and doing it every few months is...tedious, and I don't have enough CDs to hold all my music, or an mp3 player large enough to hold all this music. If I did, I could just hook up the player to my computer and do a copy/paste from the player to my comp.

Please comment/commiserate/relate similar situations!

 

[Flerbizky]

I format my computer perhaps, once every few months or when it needs it. The thing is, I have heaps of music that I have to put back on the computer and doing it every few months is...tedious, and I don't have enough CDs to hold all my music, or an mp3 player large enough to hold all this music. If I did, I could just hook up the player to my computer and do a copy/paste from the player to my comp.

Please comment/commiserate/relate similar situations!

Why not get an external USB harddrive ?... Those come for pennies these days and it's always nice to have a backup stored away from the computer.. Imagine a virus deliberately(?) destroying audio files ?....

My $ 0.02....

 

[Jugend]

Use partitionmagic and split your C: into C: and D: - Voila, HD space that get left alone when formatting.

Of course you could split it with FDisk in dos after a format, if there isn't enough empty space to create 2 partitions before formatting.

 

[Stinky Chicken]

Why not get an external USB harddrive ?... Those come for pennies these days and it's always nice to have a backup stored away from the computer.. Imagine a virus deliberately(?) destroying audio files ?....

My $ 0.02....

Hmm. I've heard some bad press about external jobs. Maybe I'll score me a second 40GB and keep it separate to the one I'm formatting.

And let's face it, using Alt Preset Standard through Alt Preset Extreme for my audio encoding, I'm hardly gonna fill up a whole forty gigabytes.

 

[Stinky Chicken]

Use partitionmagic and split your C: into C: and D: - Voila, HD space that get left alone when formatting.

Of course you could split it with FDisk in dos after a format, if there isn't enough empty space to create 2 partitions before formatting.

Been there done that. Partitioned it, vomited, un-partitioned it.

I'm running solo with a 40GB job and when I split it into 20GB parts - which is what I about need for my music - I don't have enough room for my normal hard driving.

 

[Jugend]

Been there done that. Partitioned it, vomited, un-partitioned it.

I'm running solo with a 40GB job and when I split it into 20GB parts - which is what I about need for my music - I don't have enough room for my normal hard driving.

Oh ok. Well then it seems that all you can do then is cash up for a new hd. Btw why go for only 40GB? why not make it 120, it's not that much more expensive?

 

[Stinky Chicken]

Oh ok. Well then it seems that all you can do then is cash up for a new hd. Btw why go for only 40GB? why not make it 120, it's not that much more expensive?

Came with the box I bought.

 

[Jimmy Enslashay]

You're probably better off asking this in the Computers & Electronics Forum.

 

[KieranMurphy]

Came with the box I bought.

I bought a 160Gb HD for about €100 and I have it partitioned into two 60Gb partitions for Windows and my files and the remainder I left for installing Linux. Fitting a hard drive is easy if you don't mind poking around inside the PC case. You don't have to remove the current drive, leave it with a single 40Gb partition, but stick a second slave drive in and store all your data (MP3s, photographs, pornography, etc.) on it.

Also, you could get a DVD burner. You can get 4.7Gb on a single DVD. You'd only need a few to back up all your MP3s.

Also, why do you format your PC every few months? What's the point of that? My PC has been running for over a year and I haven't needed to reinstall anything. It's running just fine. The only issues I've had are spyware/adware but since switching to Firefox, all is well.


KM.

 

[Pako]

As KM questioned, every few months seems a little extreem. Along with a second hard drive, I would also suggest getting a copy of Norton's Ghost. It might even come with a hard drive. Ghost will allow you to Format, Reinstall, and Reconfigure all from a single img file. If you've never heard of Norton's Ghost, you might want to look into it considering how often you format and re-install your OS.

 

[tait]

Get a cheap extra drive. It will pay off in the long run. Has for me and everyone i've talked to that keeps an extra internal drive for backup. C for games and operating system; D for music, photography, photoshop, etc.

 

[Stinky Chicken]

I bought a 160Gb HD for about €100 and I have it partitioned into two 60Gb partitions for Windows and my files and the remainder I left for installing Linux. Fitting a hard drive is easy if you don't mind poking around inside the PC case. You don't have to remove the current drive, leave it with a single 40Gb partition, but stick a second slave drive in and store all your data (MP3s, photographs, pornography, etc.) on it.

Oh, I do that every day. I'm a techie, fitting a hard drive is, excuse the French, a pinch of piss.

Also, you could get a DVD burner. You can get 4.7Gb on a single DVD. You'd only need a few to back up all your MP3s.

I have thought of this, but DVDs are breakable, scratchable, bendable. Not my cup of tea. I thought if I only use the other HDD when I want to listen to music, and don't do anything else to it, I shouldn't have to format.

Also, why do you format your PC every few months? What's the point of that? My PC has been running for over a year and I haven't needed to reinstall anything. It's running just fine. The only issues I've had are spyware/adware but since switching to Firefox, all is well.


KM.

Trust me, my friend, I do so much to my computer that formatting every few months is considered lax.

I do everything. Play with the BIOS settings, install and use every program under the sun, I've done it all. I'm a mad freak for that, I love playing around.

As KM questioned, every few months seems a little extreem. Along with a second hard drive, I would also suggest getting a copy of Norton's Ghost. It might even come with a hard drive. Ghost will allow you to Format, Reinstall, and Reconfigure all from a single img file. If you've never heard of Norton's Ghost, you might want to look into it considering how often you format and re-install your OS.

Norton is RAM-happy, boggy and huge. In the case of the virus scanner it's extremely slow to scan. I've used Ghost before and it's alright, but I prefer my new hard drive idea.

Also, why was this moved? I can understand the "technical" issue but I thought since it had to do with music. Oh well, I guess it's up to the descretion of the moderating team. And I am still learning.

 

[Jugend]

Also, why was this moved? I can understand the "technical" issue but I thought since it had to do with music. Oh well, I guess it's up to the descretion of the moderating team. And I am still learning.

It's not that hard to figure out. What the main discussion will be about decides in what forum it belongs. This thread = 0% music, 100% computers&electronics related stuff.

 

[Stinky Chicken]

It's not that hard to figure out. What the main discussion will be about decides in what forum it belongs. This thread = 0% music, 100% computers&electronics related stuff.

I kinda worked that out for myself, to be brutally honest!

Thanks for helping out a poor newbie though.

 

[KieranMurphy]

Trust me, my friend, I do so much to my computer that formatting every few months is considered lax.

I install and uninstall stuff like crazy. I fit new hardware, update drivers, remove old software, move files, install patches, etc. But I still haven't needed to reinstall Windows XP. My PC is running very smoothly. You're not using Windows Millenium Edition are you? I had to reinstall it every 4 - 6 months because it's the most unstable operating system ever invented.


KM.

 

[RX-7_FC_DrIfteR]

I format my computer perhaps, once every few months or when it needs it. The thing is, I have heaps of music that I have to put back on the computer and doing it every few months is...tedious, and I don't have enough CDs to hold all my music, or an mp3 player large enough to hold all this music. If I did, I could just hook up the player to my computer and do a copy/paste from the player to my comp.

Please comment/commiserate/relate similar situations!

Why must you reformat so much??

 

[Stinky Chicken]

Why must you reformat so much??

Please feel free to read the thread.

 

[Stinky Chicken]

I install and uninstall stuff like crazy. I fit new hardware, update drivers, remove old software, move files, install patches, etc. But I still haven't needed to reinstall Windows XP. My PC is running very smoothly. You're not using Windows Millenium Edition are you? I had to reinstall it every 4 - 6 months because it's the most unstable operating system ever invented.


KM.

I'm using XP SP1. Can't be arsed getting SP2 and anyway, Longhorn will have its era soon enough. 👍

Like I said, formatting every few months is considered lax. I play with the registry something shocking, and I've done quite a few botched overclocks in my time, I must say!

So yeah, I download so much junk that my hard drive becomes clogged and it's actually quite a lot easier to format than to try and remember the name of every single thing I've downloaded and remove them.

Nobody downloads like me. I'm not trying to sound like a bragger, but computers fascinate me, I download everything under the sun, no matter how dodgy it seems!

 

[Omnis]

what about getting an iriver or something for your music. this way you can store your songs and listen to them as well.

i dunno. getting a new HD would probably be the most versatile/ergonomic thing to do.

 

[KieranMurphy]

i dunno. getting a new HD would probably be the most versatile/ergonomic thing to do.

Agreed, but Windows XP won't recognise anything above about 130Gb without installing Service Pack 2. You could quadrulple your storage space for about $100 by sticking another hard disk inside the box.


KM.

 

[Stinky Chicken]

Omnis - I was thinking a Creative Zen, then I could store the music in there and just copy/paste it back onto the HDD when I have a format. Same idea though.