Generally with 2 hard drives, you store the OS and applications on one and the data on the second. This is most prevelent with video dumping and editing, so the OS and apps dont interfer and make you drop frames. As for your virtual... probably best also kept with OS and apps or stick on your 3rd HDD. Another thing to keep in mind is to not share the drives with the same IDE port and keep your CD with your OS HDD. The cheap cost of RAM has allowed me to go to 2 gigs on my render/design box. I rarely go over 1 gig and that includes running Vue, Poser, Photoshop and a dozen small apps all the time (I never shut down).