Barracuda XT, Barracuda, Barracuda Green, DiamondMax and other desktop SATA and IDE drives

[kcav45]

Hi,

I am about to partition a Seagate hard drive model ST916082A. The reason for making the partition is I want to make an image file of the drive and the image file being created will be as large as the drive being imaged. I believe by partitioning my 150GB drive into two partitions I will fasciliate the process of making and storing image files on a central storage device because I will have smaller files.

I would appreciate comments about my intentions. 

KC

[Melonade]

not a bad idea

thing is, i think that most softwares create image files that are not as big as the original

[kcav45 · Accepted solution]

I found out there is a difference between an image file and a clone.  A clone can not be compressed, but an image file can be compressed.  A clone does not require much CPU power and can be made quickly.  I am going to clone my Seagate , Momentus 160 GB drive to my Seagate, eSATA external 300 GB hard drive. 

Next step will be to partition the Momentus 160 into two 80 GB drives, drive C and drive S and install Windows XP, and configure Windows to redirect My Documents from C to S.   Then make a compressed image file of drive C.  Why bother with partitioning?

Bandwidth.... the reason for the image file is I want to provision remote clients over the Internet.  If I partition and then compress I can reduce the size of a drive image file from 160 to 56 GB.  I wonder how long it will take to transfer 56 GB file using VPN to a DSL server?

My final step will be to restore the Montuse 160 from the eSATA.

Any comments?