Partitions and operating system

[Mattman]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.perform_maintain (More info?)

Where to start... 1st off my internet connection went down, I contacted my
manufacturer who advised me I had a virus or modem failure, and should to a
clean re-installation of my OS. Now this is where the problem starts, I have
no fear of meddling (maybe I should), so I went ahead and did it, but
obviously messed up on the partitions. I created the whole of the C drive as
primary partition, and installed the OS on this. Now other users, i.e. my
kids, do not have access to even delete a desktop item etc.. I presume this
is to do with my dodgy re-installation using the whole of the C drive as
primary, so ... I have partiion magic and partition expert, but would like
advise on how to re-set up the system without losing all my data.

The worst of it is, it turned out that I had no virus, I even bought a new
modem. the problem was with the phone line, some diggers up the lane were
interferring with it somehow, and now it is fixed...duh... I needent have
bothered doing anything at all.

Wel, that's my problem, I hope someone out there understands and can offer
advice, and yes I know I shouldn't have meddled, but my maxim has always been
"jump in at the deep end, theres no better way to learn than sorting out all
the mistakes that you have made".

regards

Matt

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.perform_maintain (More info?)

XP has the concept of user envirnments. That is, each user has his own
desktop, own start menu, etc. Some items may be common to all desktops, but
beyond those, a user is free to change the look/feel.

Have you defined separate user acounts for each of the kids? Be sure that
they are NOT administrators, unless you want them to be able to do install
programs and reformat the hard drive, etc.

As far as partitioning goes, for reasons other than the desktop, I would
recommend a least separating prograsm form data. So, C:\ could be XP plus
programs, and D:\ could be data (XLS, DOC, JPG, etc). If you want to give
each person their own partition as a way to control their saving too much
stuff, that is also a possibility. However, with XP Pro you could just as
easily set quotas. I do not think that works in XP home.

A couple of suggestion before using partition magic: (1) clean up old
temporary files, (2) defrag, (3) run CHKDSK with the /R parameter. The last
will require a reboot and may take 10s of minutes to over an hour. (4) Make
the rescue disks that partition magics suggests, when it is first installed.
You will probably never need them, but you will feel dumb if you do and you
did not make them. (5) perform only one operation at a time in partition
magic, and verify that it worked as expected. (6) run CHKDSK with the /F
option after each partition magic action has been completed. Note that most
partition magic actions are NOT completed until after you reboot. CHKDSK
with /F also requires a reboot, but only on the system partition.

Good luck.

"Mattman" <Mattman@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news😀2A5BFE9-B568-4849-82AD-F836FF78FE97@microsoft.com...
> Where to start... 1st off my internet connection went down, I contacted my
> manufacturer who advised me I had a virus or modem failure, and should to
> a
> clean re-installation of my OS. Now this is where the problem starts, I
> have
> no fear of meddling (maybe I should), so I went ahead and did it, but
> obviously messed up on the partitions. I created the whole of the C drive
> as
> primary partition, and installed the OS on this. Now other users, i.e. my
> kids, do not have access to even delete a desktop item etc.. I presume
> this
> is to do with my dodgy re-installation using the whole of the C drive as
> primary, so ... I have partiion magic and partition expert, but would like
> advise on how to re-set up the system without losing all my data.
>
> The worst of it is, it turned out that I had no virus, I even bought a new
> modem. the problem was with the phone line, some diggers up the lane were
> interferring with it somehow, and now it is fixed...duh... I needent have
> bothered doing anything at all.
>
> Wel, that's my problem, I hope someone out there understands and can offer
> advice, and yes I know I shouldn't have meddled, but my maxim has always
> been
> "jump in at the deep end, theres no better way to learn than sorting out
> all
> the mistakes that you have made".
>
> regards
>
> Matt

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.perform_maintain (More info?)

"Mattman" <Mattman@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news😀2A5BFE9-B568-4849-82AD-F836FF78FE97@microsoft.com...
> Where to start... 1st off my internet connection went down, I contacted my
> manufacturer who advised me I had a virus or modem failure, and should to
> a
> clean re-installation of my OS. Now this is where the problem starts, I
> have
> no fear of meddling (maybe I should), so I went ahead and did it, but
> obviously messed up on the partitions. I created the whole of the C drive
> as
> primary partition, and installed the OS on this. Now other users, i.e. my
> kids, do not have access to even delete a desktop item etc.. I presume
> this
> is to do with my dodgy re-installation using the whole of the C drive as
> primary, so ... I have partiion magic and partition expert, but would like
> advise on how to re-set up the system without losing all my data.
>
> The worst of it is, it turned out that I had no virus, I even bought a new
> modem. the problem was with the phone line, some diggers up the lane were
> interferring with it somehow, and now it is fixed...duh... I needent have
> bothered doing anything at all.
>
> Wel, that's my problem, I hope someone out there understands and can offer
> advice, and yes I know I shouldn't have meddled, but my maxim has always
> been
> "jump in at the deep end, theres no better way to learn than sorting out
> all
> the mistakes that you have made".
>
> regards
>
> Matt

If you did a clean install of the OS, you've already lost all of your data,
especially considering that you've eradicated whatever partitions you had
and created one big one. BTW, this wouldn't have been the correct procedure,
even if you had a virus, and definitely not if the modem was bad. So I'd
suggest not taking advice from that manufacturer again.

As far as your users' access to things, this has nothing to do with the
number of partitions on the drive. If you want more partitions, that's
another matter. Since you've already wiped the drive once, rather than
messing with re-partitioning after the fact, you might as well just start
over and create the partitions the way you want them.

If the real question was about your users access to "even delete a desktop
item, etc." maybe if you elaborate on that problem, someone can figure that
out for you, rather than focusing on partitions and other things that aren't
relevant.