Demetri: If you're starting from scratch, Fdisk & format will work just fine. Fdisk will prompt you to first establish a DOS (boot) disk, then to establish the remainder of the HDD into an extended DOS partition. Next, you subdivide the Extended partition into "logical" drives. You say you only need four partitions, so you would partition the Extended part into three logical drives. Size? Depends on your OS. We recently divided a 17G HDD into 6 partitions, with a 2.5G DOS (c: drive = boot, etc) drive, the rest at 2G, with the G: as 8.5G. Size depends upon your RAM, total HDD size, etc. We've read that recommended swap file size is best set as a "fixed" (not variable) swap file = 2.5x RAM. Some references say set up a separate logical drive for your swap file for max efficiency, but I can't verify that. If you want to keep your swap file on your c: drive with your OS, you must consider that into your c: drive size. After that, you're on your own - how many apps will be on C: and how many organized onto the other drives? Remember, keep all personal/data files on one logical drive so it will be easier to back them up. And, having one large drive makes audio/video editing easier. Good Luck, Jack Demetri: I've just assembled a new computer and want to install an OS. I have formatted and installed new OS before, so that is not a problem, but this time I want to install multiple partitions. I checked several partition managers, but they seemed more complex than I need, multi OS, up to 200 partitions, etc. I will use one OS, and will not need more than four partitions. Will FDISK, Format commands take care of my needs, or do I need to know or use something else? Is there a limit on size of partitions using FDISK? I have some hard drive manufacturers software, such as Disk Manager and DiscWizard. Better to use one of those? How do I know how large a partition to leave for OS? Demetri Kolokotronis The NOSPIN Group Promotions is now offering Mandrake Linux or Red Hat Linux CD sets along with our NOSPIN Power Linux CD... at a great price!!! http://freepctech.com/goodies/promotions.shtml