better to have OS X on a small partition? <20-30GB?

[edgarbc1]

something way back i recall saying that it is better for OSX to be
on a relatively small partition because of the swap/temp files it
creates during everyday use.. and to keep the location of said files
not all over the disk platter... and to limit the travel of the disk head
reader thingie all over the disks

Is this myth of better performance on a small disk true still?
(was this ever true?) Panther 10.3.9 or Tiger 10.4.x

my plan is to install Panther on a 200GB disk (thx Newt!) and Tiger on
another 80GB disk...

tia
Edgar