Partitioning new W11 system

[Melodist]

Hello there,

I’m about to set up my new system with a 3 x 2 TB drives.

Essentially, one is for content creation and the other for Gaming, running 2 different operating systems in the same PC.

My plan was to partition the OS for working into 500 gb for system and 1.5 TB for projects and the gaming OS to 250 gb for the system and 1.75 for installing the games to.

The third 2 TB will be for just dumping things on it for temporary backup.

Now, when I’m in the Windows custom setup menu, when I create by “new” the first partition which also creates alongside all the necessary others: do I leave the unallocated remaining 1.75 TB and create / format it once I’m in the OS or create and format it in the setup menu of windows?

Also, I always only see gaming people do tutorials where they simply hit next on the unallocated space of a drive for a simple installation but when I make the partitions now during the Windows 11 setup, do I also hit format on them or are they already ready to be used and formated, created by using the “new” button?

Let me know how I should proceed?

[greatnull]

Manual partitioning in the same menu, allocate only enough for system partion of that installation, leaving the rest free. Or not. You can format and readjust everything after installation.

That is how to proceed, but you might run into issues eventually for one simple reason:

Windows assumes there is only one system installed on the machine and behaves as such. You are essentially preparing yourself to encounter all the issues of linux/windows dual boot users do, just with the second os being windows also

Since you isolate os installation on separate drive, you should be ok. If you regularly mount something other than data partition from other OS, you might eventually encounter some weird issues like metadata or ownership clashes. Likelihood of that is low, but its terra incongnita problem again.

I would recommend dropping this idea, since you are wading into territory of here be dragons and nobody does this like this.

There also isn’t much of any benefit of keeping separate game/work os that cannot be solved by local VM.

[OliverT]

Having done the dual-boot and multi-boot thing before (anyone remember doing this with LILO ?!) I’d have to agree with @greatnull in terms of this becoming painful to use. Agree also regarding isolation and VM but I wonder if you might consider another option?

A rather cost-efficient way to do this might be the use of a swapable 3.5" hard drive bay. For instance something like this StarTech 2-bay option.
This allows you to use a bootable drive for work[ing] and one for gaming - just power down and swap out the boot drive.

I use this on a test box where I have a bunch of no-name SSD’s to run different operating systems thus allowing me to test fleabay hardware more easily.

Finally, as soon as I started earning I moved towards a multi-system architecture - one machine for gaming, one for working. This gets easier and more cost-effective as you upgrade components
Modern hardware benefits from a Level 1 KVM

HTH.

[Melodist]

I actually have had 3 different operating systems like that on the same machine: browsing (Internet and office stuff), gaming and content creation (in my case DAWs. So far, I haven’t encountered any issues.

I used to have a 250 GB SSD for the gaming system which accessed a 2 TB NVMe for the games installed.

The OS with Avid’s Pro Tools ran off a 500 GB NVMe accessing a 1 TB NVMe off which I ran the sessions.

But it was kind of all over the place in terms of used drives so I decided to swap out the 500 GB and 1 TB and picked a 990 Pro for the content creation OS, 970 Evo Plus for the Gaming system and the old 2 TB for temporary backup storage.

---

So in a dual / triple boot scenario you’re saying I should avoid creating two partitions on the same drive that’s running the OS to avoid meta data and owner ship issues? (I originally wanted to make two partitions on each drive, always one for Windows and the other for the games / projects in Pro Tools).

Or doesn’t creating two partitions on each drive, where the second one solely serves the respective OS on the same physical drive (2nd partition for the games on drive 1 and 2nd partition on drive 2 for projects, corresponding each to the OS only the partition is on), really create the problem you’ve mentioned?

Man, getting my point across is really hard So my my original plan was to have drive 1 with Gaming OS partition and Gaming Storage partition (2 partitions) and drive 2 with Content creation OS partition and projects storage partition (2 partitions).

Would that create issues and rather just having drive 1 with 1 partition, the OS and Games and drive 2 with 1 partition, OS and projects, be better?

I mean, generally, from what I’ve gathered ?both OSs are isolated unless you select the other OS’ user / windows related path of the other drive where Windows asks you whether you really want to access this and give it administrative rights which I’ve never done?

Looking forward to your answer.

PS: Level1tech is actually the first board on the internet where I’m finally getting insight- and helpful information!

[Melodist]

Or do you guys think I should simply run it off the same OS, both the games and my content creation stuff?

And then have a 2 TB for my Games and a 2 TB for my projects?

And then use my dust covering Intel nuc for all the nefarious web activities

[greatnull]

Personally, I would scrap the multiboot completely - its hideously complex solution for problem, that can be solved either by VM or even better, by separate and unprivileged user accounts.

Plus you really gain nothing by having separate gaming and work os on the same machine. If the gaming os was something like tiny11, ie. unofficial extremely modified windows iso, then I wouldn’t trust it with my work data either. But you cant really game without internet access either, so you cant isolate it from network either.

But such “solutions” bring very little benefit in the end, only trouble. I have personally adopted K.I.S.S principle as ultimate guiding principle.

If you want absolutely private disposable machine , consider using external ssd with ventoy. You can have entire library of bootable isos with near native performance. Just load qubes os and do the dirty deed there.

I use samsung T5 and it works flawlessly.

Hot-swapable drive cage also has some merit, its just pain to install the first time.

I would propose following socratic exercise:

• What kind of problem are really trying to solve here?
• How does the initially proposed multiboot solve it?
• What does it do better than the simplest alternative solution?
• Are the costs involved wit it worth the effort?

[OliverT]

@greatnull

I would propose following socratic exercise:

I’m going to have to remember that term!

To chime in on the tech aspect: I’d also have to say that I’d stay away from multiboot.
If you must, read the boot loader docs carefully and use physical hard disk per operating system. That way Windows boot partition updates ought to get the least chance of whacking something else…

Otherwise, use one machine and use restricted user accounts.

On the Windows side I have done exactly that too. I have several admin accounts but most windows stuff (gaming, some work-related things) are done via non-admin users.

Now sometimes, you need elevated permissions - say a Steam update - but you then select the user to run that process as and off you go.,

This also means that if its late, I’m tired and I accidentally goto whitehouse.com rather than .gov, I reduce the risk of PII leakage and machine exposure. Silly example but you get the idea…

HTH!

[greatnull]

If you are woried on PII leakage on the net, only thing that can reasonably help you is well behaved browser like firefox or brave and solid set of ad and tracking blockers.

Plus it makes browsing experience much more bearable. Look around for ublock origin and privacy badger, they compliment each other.