|
Dan - You wrote "Ah, the poor man's mirror! Same system I use;" Just goes to show that Genius thinks alike. Live with it, and be quietly smug in the presence of non-genius ;-) On the principal that Bob Thompson espouses, "You don't really know anything until you begin to write about it", or words to that effect, I have written a (somewhat) complete story of my system, its architecture & the history of it, and its basis. Thought that after going to all that effort, I needed at least one reader/critic. You just volunteered. Seriously - I'm kind of curious as to how many other similarities our systems & philosophies share beyond those you noted. You may reply, or not, as you please. If I can't make what I write interesting enough to warrant a reply - then, obviously, it doesn't deserve a reply. Herewith: |
|
Twin HDDs: partitioned identically, so that a copy of DISK0 is identical on DISK1, except for C: being an Active partition, for boot purposes. (NOTE: mine is an all-SCSI system, except for one CD drive. I don't know how the complex societal relationships of IDE would translate to SCSI, therefore my strategy may not translate to IDE systems.) I was introduced to the concept of a Mirror disc when I became aware of RAID mirroring when I got NT4.0, whose Diskmanager facilitated this. I thought WOW! Instant, constant, backups! That's for me! So I configured DISK1 as a Mirror of DISK0. So far, so good. Then one day NT4.0 went south, and I blithely attempted to access DISK1 to replace the working copy of NT4.0. I was informed that I must "Break the Mirror" in order to access DISK1. Hmmm. In order to do that, I needed NT4.0 online. If I had NT4.0 online, I didn't need a stinking Mirror. Reinstalled NT4.0, repartitioned DISK1, and from then on have been making weekly copies of DISK0 partitions to DISK1. In addition, I have partitioned the HDDs to match the size of my MO removable media and make monthly backup copies of DISK0 to equivalent MO cartridges. I also have a separate front panel power switch wired into DISK1's power lead so that it is offline at all times except when actually in use. Compartmentalization. My system is also peculiar in that it is, for no good reason, a multi-boot system. I can boot into MSDOS 6.22, WfWG3.1, W98, NT3.51SVR (soon to be abandoned), NT4.0WS, and W2K Pro (RC2). Took a bit of doing, and many false starts to accomplish this. First, my boot disc that starts DOS 6.22 also has the required lines in CONFIG.SYS & AUTOEXEC.BAT to start up my CD & MO drives, so that I never have the catch-22 situation of a CD being required but no CD drive online. From DOS boot I can then start WfWG3.1, which gives me a Windows platform. From there I can use File Manager (winfile.exe) to copy Nt4.0, and the rest of F:, back to F: from K: on DRIVE1. I can then reboot to NT4.0 and simply copy everything back to DRIVE0 from DRIVE1 equivalents, and be on my way. During the formatting process, I formatted drive H: (C:'s copy) with the system, so theoretically I could make the now-C: partition (if DRIVE0 were missing) active and boot from it. I haven't tried that as yet. A peculiarity I found in the W95 UG from W3.1 was that it installed with very little of W95 there merely pointers to W3.1 files. This caused numerous problems. I scrubbed C: down to bare metal (after Backup), installed the system on C:. Then installed a bare-bones, plain vanilla version of W31. On C:, and renamed it W95. I copied D:, E:, F:, and G: to their equivalents on DISK1, powered down, and switched off DISK1. I booted to DOS and reformatted D:, E:, F:, and G:. I then began the UG install. When it asked where to install, I selected C:\W95. The Install Gizzard asked if I wanted to overwrite, and I Ok'd that. Install proceeded normally (for W95) from then on. I then powered down, switched on DISK1, and rebooted to W95. Came on like a champ with no redirection to Win3.1 files. ALL of W95 was there. I then used File Manager to copy back the rest of C: files (including BOOT.INI, etc.), and F:, with NT4.0. Rebooted to NT4.0 and I had my multi-boot options back NT4.0, NT3.51, plus W95. Home free, with a good working system. I followed exactly the same process (except for installing W98 over W95) when it came to installing W98. I found then that W98 trashes access to BOOT.INI during the installation process, so I had to install a bare-bones, plain-vanilla installation of NT3.51 in order to activate BOOT.INI and the opening boot options. I then removed the bare-bones NT3.51 copy from the HDD and its BOOT.INI reference, and again had a nice, solid, multi-boot system. LESSONS LEARNED: Windows installations are inquisitive and prying during installation. They will without notice do very undesirable things that reach beyond their partition. To prevent this, I (almost) ALWAYS do a strictly clean install, in isolation, with NOTHING else on the HDD. Then, any linkage can be set up at the user's option after the install. Generally, once installed, Windows OSs ignore other partitions and installations. Also, a W9x install trashes access to BOOT.INI. Install any W9x OS first, so that subsequent installations of NT will restore the BOOT.INI function. Do not go for exotic and incompatible file systems. They are not needed, and add nothing to productivity. In some instances of large corporate installations, NTFS may (emphasis on MAY) enhance overall security. Stick to the FAT16 file system. It can be read & written to by almost anything. An added bonus is that the free Scandisk & Defrag utilities in W98 will perform very effectively on any OS that is on a FAT16 partition, including W2K. No need to buy outrageously expensive defraggers. W2K Install: I had to double the size of W2K's partition, to 1.1GB, due to the bloated code. After the repartitioning & reallocation of files was completed and the dust settled, I again followed the "Super-clean" install process: scrub to the bare bones, format C: with the system, and switch off DISK1. I then installed my first version of W2K, Beta3. Went very routinely, trundled through the install, recognized ALL my peripherals & cards, and completed. Powered down, switched on DISK1, and rebooted to W2K. To my chagrin, I found that the dumkopfs at Microsoft had neglected to include Winfile.exe. I copied it from DISK1 to W2K's system32 directory, and ran it. Ran OK, except that customization would not stick through reboot. No big problem. I used it to restore all partitions from DISK1 to DISK0. Powered down, switched off DISK1, and rebooted to all OSs, in turn. All ticking over like a dollar watch. Next W2K Install: I got cocky and overconfident due to the ease with which the Mighty W2K installed. Instead of a clean install, I simply installed RC1 over Beta3. BIG mistake. It trashed my NT4.0 installation, and was itself kind of funky. Back to basics. I repeated the steps used for the super-clean install of W2K Beta3. Big success. All OSs back to running normally. Again followed the "Super-clean" routine with the RC2 install, with same uneventful success. Since then my box has been rock-steady, and runs on one OS or another pretty much 7/24. Other Peculiarities: I use Program Manager (progman.exe) as my shell of choice, both for aesthetic reasons & efficiency. When I first was confronted by the trashpile of the "desktop" in W95, instead of the neatness & order of Program Manager, I was appalled. I looked around, and came across progman.exe, ran it, and found it was the same old. I configured it, put it in the STARTUP group, and never looked back, except to delete all of the trash icons that I could from an otherwise neat desktop. I use Program Manager to handle all apps in all the OSs, including W2K. Recently I found that I could hide the undeletable icons on the desktop by tucking them under the Tray at the bottom. They are about 95% hidden then, enough so that it is worthwhile to have good looking wallpaper. It no longer looks like a Yosemite trail littered with beer cans. I also use Windows' File Manager (winfile.exe) for all my file wrangling. It is far superior to Exploder; faster, more versatile, more responsive, more intuitive you name it. It is particularly useful in its efficient handling of deleting a whole partition on DISK1 and replacing it with the corresponding partition from DISK0. Exploder makes this a long, tedious, and non-intuitive process. Compartmentalization: I use Netscape in preference to IE, not because it is any "better" (They're a dead heat, IMO), but because IE is so tightly integrated with the OS and has so many well-documented security & privacy holes that it looks like a Swiss cheese. Plus all the holes that haven't been reported as yet. This, coupled with OS integration that makes these holes tunnels to the rest of the OS, and apps, and quite likely the whole system, make it totally unacceptable. Anyone who uses it is living dangerously. I do NOT use Netscape's mail or news apps for similar reasons. I use Eudora for mail, and Agent for newsgroups again, for the sake of compartmentalization. No one app is invulnerable but if it alone is compromised, it may avoid a total OS- or System-wide compromise. I also avoid the default ProgramFiles directory when installing apps. I put each in its own named subdirectory on my mainly-apps partition. That way, I know where they live, and can deal with any problems much more efficiently. Also, it enables me to have one instance of each app that is used by all OSs. This keeps everything neatly synchronized. Most important in Netscape, where multiple BOOKMARKS would be a disaster. Add to that a central FILES subdirectory, where each app keeps its files, regardless of which OS is running it, and you have a pretty lean, mean computing machine. Embellishments: I use InterMute to protect my sanity and privacy while surfing. It blocks ads, cookies, Java, and a host of other things. I use BlackIce to monitor intrusion attempts. Finally, I have Grr! at the gate to warn me of ANY attempt to change the system even by apps that I knowingly install. So far, so good. I have thus far avoided a virus invasion by being paranoid. BlackIce occasionally warns me of various pings, none serious. (I'm on a 56K dialup). Grr! routinely warns me of things but none as yet that I had not instituted by my action although on occasion they were a bit unwarranted and I did not approve the change. And that's the story. [J.H. Ricketson in San Pablo] culam@neteze.com |