[Ti] new tibook arrival

[b]

According to t molnar:

>Well finally my new tibook, I ordered end of December, has arrived.
>(great rejoicing !!)
>
>However, I thought I would ask some questions of the "Ti wise" about 
>this before I start using it.
>
>1. Is there much advantage if any to setting up different volumes on 
>the 60 Gb hard drive?
>
>2. It comes with 10.2 version OS X.  Sometimes people suggest 
>reformatting the drive and installing everything from scratch, not 
>entirely trusting Apple's initial machine setup.  Is this really 
>warranted or not?
>
>3. Some have mentioned other "preventative" measures.  Are there 
>some that really do make a difference?
>
>Suggestions and advice welcome.
>
>cheers,
>tim

Hi Tim,

First off, Congratulations!  A new Ti is an exciting thing.

I have had my Titanium drive [a 30GB drive] partitioned for about a 
year now. Mine is set up with a partition for the Jaguar system and 
my Home directory, and a larger partition for OS 9.2, all the legacy 
apps, and free disk space for scratch folders, etc.

I have heard 'myths' that Apple recommends not partitioning. I find 
that idea to be unwarranted, and more importantly, a mistake., for 
these few simple reasons:

1- My Mac is a true dual-boot system, meaning at startup, or reboots, 
I can simply hold the Option key down and have a choice of booting 
into OSX or OS 9.

2- I de-frag my partitions regularly, yet more often than not I only 
wish/need to de-frag one partition at any given time. Having the 
drive 'split' saves an enormous amount of time in the process

3- In case of an OSX 'meltdown' of any kind, I can back up the Home 
folder on my OSX partition easily on an external drive, and 
re-install the OS, without having to back up the entire drive.

4- If a carbon app works in OS 9, but is screwing up in X, I simply 
wipe the prefs of the app in question, in the OSX Library, and worse 
case scenario [say, with Photoshop 7, working in DTP with a deadline] 
I can continue the work in OS 9, and deal with the OSX anomalies at a 
more convenient time.

5- Many of my 'boot' disks, from people like Alsoft, Micromat, etc, 
are slow beyond belief, and it is much easier to boot in whichever 
system I wish, in order to run diagnostics and repairs on the 'other' 
partition. One of the advantages to this: I have full access to my 
gigabyte of RAM, rather than whatever RAM was allotted on the 
3rd-party diagnostic boot CD. Repairs and diagnostics proceed much 
quicker that way, as well as having a 'margin' regarding system 
failures at inopportune times.

6- It is easier to maintain 'order'. [this is a personal thing with me though].

7- OSX doesn't 'care' or react in any negative sense, regardless of 
where apps or 'scratch' disks are located. I have OSX-only apps on 
two external drives, as well as on both internal partitions.

etc...

If I had the 60GB drive [and a larger external drive] here now, I 
would run several partitions: 30 or 35 GB for my OSX install, perhaps 
10 or 15 GB for the main OS 9 install, and a pair of 5GB partitions, 
one for a Photoshop, or DVD Studio Pro 'scratch disk", and the other 
5 GB 'clean' for emergency installs of OSX 10.1, or whatever [I 
sometimes burn DVDs to an external writer, using the OWC Enabler, 
which requires 10.1.x].

All in all, I find that the advantages of having multiple partitions 
far outweigh whatever the so-called disadvantages might be. [I 
haven't encountered any drawback, or operational 'attrition', 
whatsoever.  Just my 2 cents.

~flipper