Partition and format with XP setup or drive maker's (Seagate’s) software?

[bdwoolman]

Greetings from Oslo:

Specs in sig.

The Seagate website recommended using their proprietary software to partition and format the drive during the OS installation. This means interrupting the OS install with an F6 command and then using a floppy created with a Seagate download (or from their CD). They claim better performance. What is the story on this?

I have never installed XP before, but have a fair amount of experience (much of it bad) with installing earlier avatars of Windows. Apparently XP setup has a routine that allows me to partition and format. (Goodby FDISK) Frankly, the idea of interrupting an install makes my palms sweat (almost).

My Asus P5GD2 has native SATA support so I won’t need to interrupt the install to plug in SATA controller drivers. But if there are real gains to be had by interrupting the XP load to use the Seagate diskwizard I’ll do it.

Does anyone have the lowdown on this?

Cheers,

b

[glc]

Just let XP partition and format it. If the drive is larger than 137gb, make sure your XP cd has SP1 or SP2 already incorporated.

[bdwoolman]

Originally Posted by glc Just let XP partition and format it. If the drive is larger than 137gb, make sure your XP cd has SP1 or SP2 already incorporated.

Thanks. Appreciate feedback. Just what I wanted to hear. Drive is 160 GB: SP2 bundled with OS.

Regards,

b