I have two drives, one with Vista Ultimate and Office 2007 plus stuff, and
the other with XP and Office 2003 plus stuff, where stuff is almost
identical give or take very small things.. all of my user generated items
are kept away from both drives..
Office 2007 is larger than 2003, but nothing like as much as you suggest..
Vista Ultimate, on the other hand, is substantially larger, but one has to
remember that it creates volume shadow copies..
I would not consider advising the running Open Office unless the OP did not
want to spend to get MS Office or simply could not afford it
(understandable).. ease of use within 2007 is way better than anything
before it once the user has found everything.. effects/changes preview alone
makes Office 2007 worth getting, in my opinion..
Pagefiles, if left to Windows Management, size themselves pro rata RAM
installed, and as many people do have 1gb and more even running XP, I would
not have thought that pagefile size will make much difference..
Some games and some applications do not integrate into Windows at all, but
many do, and at the point of installation it is impossible to determine
which do and which don't.. it is probably best to assume that most do.. all
of my large games do, for instance, as does MS Office..
The best reason for keeping the size of C down is because formatting is
quicker in the even of total OS failure.. in normal operation, optimum
performance is seen when there is more than 15% free space, preferably
nearer 25%
Even budget computers are fitted with 160gb drives these days, so drive
space is not at such premium as it once was.. those upgrading to Vista using
machines at the lower end of the XP level may have a problem in finding
enough free space, but that is to be expected, yes?
"cquirke (MVP Windows shell/user)" <cquirkenews@nospam.mvps.org> wrote in
message news:u2b9b3p8765nrorkkodc6jf3lprj36l4us@4ax.com...
> On Fri, 3 Aug 2007 16:47:41 -0400, "Mike Hall - MVP"
>
>>Programs integrate with the OS so there is no value in installing them on
>>a
>>different drive or partition, because OS failure will require a re-install
>>of all other programs anyway..
>
> Not always true, no. Many games don't care (and they are often the
> largest apps). MS Office will die++, as it is almost welded into the
> OS, so that should go on C:, but Photoshop doesn't care either.
>
> It's very much a YMMV thing.
>
>>I have Vista, Office 2007, various other utilities, Nero etc and 32% free
>>space on a 40gb partition (80gb HDD).. much more, and I am looking at
>>getting a larger drive..
>
> MS Office 2007 has a particularly nasty large footprint; about 3-4
> times the bloat of previous versions of MS Office. Couple that with
> an "air box" (no installation disks, if OEM) and an unfamiliar UI, and
> I'm recommending Open Office as the preferred option for users
> familiar with previous MS Office versions.
>
> Another bloat factor on C: can be inappropriately large page file, as
> happens when you have a large amount of RAM (say, 1G+). You will be
> stuck with a large hibername file, but the page file you should be
> able to shrink, as long as you don't intend to spawn complete RAM
> dumps on system crashes (which may be written to pagefile).
>
>
>>--------------- ----- ---- --- -- - - -
> Never turn your back on an installer program
>>--------------- ----- ---- --- -- - - -
--
Mike Hall
MS MVP Windows Shell/User
http://msmvps.com/blogs/mikehall/