do you need to format to short stroke

[Froger96]

hey guys, a few posts recently, but i have only just got back onto my account. so.  my question, i want to short stroke the hard drive on my laptop, but do i need to format my drive to do that, as its the only drive in my laptop, i cant loose it as it has my OS, so can i do it without formatting, and if so, how?

thanks, JOsh

[Tedster]

hey guys, a few posts recently, but i have only just got back onto my account. so.  my question, i want to short stroke the hard drive on my laptop, but do i need to format my drive to do that, as its the only drive in my laptop, i cant loose it as it has my OS, so can i do it without formatting, and if so, how?

thanks, JOsh

 

You should be able to shrink the partition that has the OS on in a way that allows you to manipulate the drive and stuff without reformatting, but unsure.

[The Cool n00B]

Just defrag the drive. That will typically move everything to the outside of the platters.

[Froger96]

 

You should be able to shrink the partition that has the OS on in a way that allows you to manipulate the drive and stuff without reformatting, but unsure.

i have seen that video, but it didn't clarify, so your saying i can put my OS and programmes onto the faster part of the drive without having to delete or format anything?

 

Just defrag the drive. That will typically move everything to the outside of the platters.

so if this is the case, what is the point of short stroking?

[The Cool n00B]

i have seen that video, but it didn't clarify, so your saying i can put my OS and programmes onto the faster part of the drive without having to delete or format anything?

 

so if this is the case, what is the point of short stroking?

Defragging a drive just means that you move everything to one spot. Fragmentation can happen when you install Windows, then install two programs, but then delete the first of the two programs off the drive. In that example, there's a gap on the platter between two things (Windows and the second program) that could be right next to each other. Because HDDs normally fill outside-in, when you defrag everything typically moves toward the outside of the platter and therefore you get shorter strokes.

 

As for the video above, if you partition Windows first, it'll be on the outside and stay there, since it can't change its partition. Then programs can be partitioned separately so they always stay where they need to be, like in the middle of the drive. Because the drives fill outside in, the program partition (which would get treated as its own disk) will always be in the middle, and programs would have to stay there to avoid a broken file system.

 

You'd have to do the partitioning as the first thing you do since you can't split up data into separate partitions. I'd install Windows and drivers and whatnot and then partition that out for short strokes. Then I'd use the remaining partition for programs.