Partition size advice - Linux Setup, Configuration & Administration

[Mike]

Hi all,

I´m narrowing things down now, and have read a lot of material, but still
have questions (of course). I´ve made most of the decisions as to how to
proceed (except whether I´ll go with SuSE or RH, and I´m looking for your
opinions on this partitioning layout:

Laptop with a 30 gig HD, 256MB RAM, 2.53GHz P4:

hda1 NTFS 15GB Win XP (currently a shade over 8GB used)
hda2 ext3 100MB /boot

hda3 ext3 5.5GB /
hda4 ext3 400MB /swap
hda5 FAT32 5GB shared by Win and Linux
hda6 ext3 4GB /home

Primary partitions: hda1, hda2, hda5
Logical partitions: hda3, hda4, hda6

I´m not planning on installing every package under the sun (yet)...I´ll be
using it mainly as a home user.

Also, it's recommended that I make boot disks for Linux and Win, but I´m on
a laptop and don´t have a floppy drive. Should I then boot from the install
disk, or burn a boot disk CD (not the most economical in terms of the CD,
but they´re cheap enough I guess).

I´m a newbie with Linux, and I´m open to any suggestions you might have!

TIA,
Mike Trozzo

[Eric]

> I´m narrowing things down now, and have read a lot of material, but 

/swap does not exist (ordinarily)
 

That makes no sense.
hda5 is a logical partition by definition.
hda3 and hda4 are primary by definition.
 

Not really necessary for the linux case at least.
Any ol' installation CD will do. There are also several rescue CD
images to be found on the web.
 

I find your /home fairly big.
But it depends on your usage whether or not it is too big.
I would grant more space to the win/linux share instead.
2G is plenty for a single user /home

finally, although you can grant /boot a separate partition,
there's no real need. other partitions, like /var, would be better
served by their own partition. But for your system, just separating
/home from the rest will suffice. After you used the system a while,
you can check what amount of space some major directories take.
Then you could start to partition your system properly, matching
your usage profile.

Eric

[mjt]

Mike Trozzo wrote:
 

put the fat32 partition up just after the ntfs partition.
for a simple home box, it's not important to put /home
in its own partition. so, what you'd have:

P ntfs
L fat32
L swap
L /boot
L /

the 'L's signify logical partitions. it really is a
personal preference, but __i__ like to create the one
primary, then create an extended to consume the
balance of the drive, then create logicals inside it.
 

this is incorrect. hda5 would be an extended, which takes
up one of the primary partition slots. all after hda5 are
then logicals. hda1-4 are primary partitions
 

just hang on to the install CDs - they can be used to boot
into the system in case of catastrophic failure
..
--
/// Michael J. Tobler: motorcyclist, surfer, skydiver, \\\
\\\ and author: "Inside Linux", "C++ HowTo", "C++ Unleashed" ///
\\\ http://pages.sbcglobal.net/mtobler/mjt_linux_page.html ///
A lot of people are afraid of heights. Not me.
I'm afraid of widths. - Steve Wright

[Stefan]

Mike Trozzo on Tuesday 07 October 2003 08:19 wrote:
 

This partitioning is working? I mean everything boots up, etc? You've
got to have the partitions numbering wrong, if it does.
 

hda5 can ONLY be a Logical.
 

hda3 and 4 can ONLY be Primary.
 

Also, Logical partitions can only be part of an Extended partition,
and an Extended partition "runs" on a Primary partition. You can have
only ONE Extended partition per hard drive.

There can ONLY be 4 Primary partitions -- hda1,2,3, and 4. Logical
partitions are hda5 and higher.

In a terminal, enter the command 'df' (without the single quotes).
What's the output? Or use Linux fdisk and enter the command 'p' to
list the hard drive's Partition Table.

If you haven't set up this partitioning scheme, yet, DON'T! It won't
work. Or if it does, there is something dreadfully wrong.


--
Stefan Patric
com

[mjt]

Stefan Patric wrote:
 

..... uhhhh. this person is throwing out ideas, not hard facts
of some existing system
..
--
/// Michael J. Tobler: motorcyclist, surfer, skydiver, \\\
\\\ and author: "Inside Linux", "C++ HowTo", "C++ Unleashed" ///
\\\ http://pages.sbcglobal.net/mtobler/mjt_linux_page.html ///
Logic is a little bird, sitting in a tree; that smells ____ awful*.

[Eric]

> put the fat32 partition up just after the ntfs partition. for a simple 

That depends. If you ever which to re-install, this is the easiest
way to keep your /home intact.
 

Why separate /boot ?
I can see no good reason for it. Especially if it is located this
far back in the chain. (unless you prefer to mount it read-only)
 

It's more than that. You are limited to only 4 primary partitions.
This limit is not there for logical. Keep as much of your space inside
the extended partition. That easies things a lot if you ever decide to
split some partitions.

Eric

[Mike]

Thanks a million for the help, Michael and Eric!


Can I have /boot in a logical partition? Also, do I need to worry about
/boot being outside the first 1024 cylinders (since the XP partition is
quite a bit over the 8.2 gig limit)? I´ve read that it isn´t really an
issue with more recent BIOSs, but there´s still a glimmer of doubt in my
mind. I've decided to use grub as my bootloader BTW.

I'm also leaning towards separating out a /home partition just so I don´t
toast my configuration if I reinstall (or switch distros(?))


// this is from Michael's post, although both of you rightfully nailed me to
the wall on this one.
 
>
> this is incorrect. hda5 would be an extended, which takes
> up one of the primary partition slots. all after hda5 are
> then logicals. hda1-4 are primary partitions
>[/ref]

<homer>D'OH!</homer>
*as the light bulb of recognition goes on above my head* :-) I hadn´t
realized that the numbering was laid out as such.


Anyway, here´s my revised layout:

P hda1 NTFS 15GB WinXP
P hda2 extended
L hda5 FAT32 8.5GB (shared Win/Linux)
L hda6 swap 500MB
L hda7 / 3GB
L hda8 /home 3GB

but contemplating whether or not to drop in a 100MB /boot partition right
behind the FAT32 slice.

Do you guys think it looks better now?

I´m almost ready to do this...I have the chicken ready to be sacrificed
(nothing sinister, it´s just dinner..the chicken is already roasted).

Thanks again,
Mike

[Eric]

> Can I have /boot in a logical partition?

Yes you can, but there's no need
 

no problem for grub, nor for recent BIOS-es
 

a wise decision I'd say.
 

nah. you can if you want to mount it read-only. Otherwise don't bother.
 

I do.
I'd give one more gig to /, as I've got my 3G almost filled
up completely

Eric

[mjt]

Mike Trozzo wrote:
 

.... yes
 

.... depends on the bios - should be okay with modern h/w
 

.... that's fine.
 
 

.... your call
 

.... looks fine to me
..
--
/// Michael J. Tobler: motorcyclist, surfer, skydiver, \\\
\\\ and author: "Inside Linux", "C++ HowTo", "C++ Unleashed" ///
\\\ http://pages.sbcglobal.net/mtobler/mjt_linux_page.html ///
Expense Accounts, n.: Corporate food stamps.

[mjt]

Eric Moors wrote:
 

mtoblerstimpy:~> df
Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/hda19 17678956 9591364 8087592 55% /
.... :)