disk partitioning
From: paulm@waitrose.com Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2000 18:43:04 +0000 Message-Id: <E13vOrl-0005ld-00@sand6.global.net.uk> Subject: disk partitioning I'm just in the process of installing SuSE 6.4 on one of my machines. This machine already has two other operating systems (Win95 and OS/2). I have a reasonable amount of disk space for SuSE (around 8 GB), but the available disk space within the first 1024 cylinders is limited (less than 2 GB). As a result, I wanted to partition the drive to leave a relatively small partition below the 1024 limit, and split the rest of the system onto partitions further up on the disk. Can someone suggest a set of suitable mount points? I tried using one partition set as /, and another set as /usr, but this isn't a wonderful split - I've ended up with less than 100 mb on the / partition, but close to 1.6 gb on the /usr partition. What I'm not sure of is whether I should make more than 2 partitions, or whether there is a better split than the one I've tried. Any suggestions welcome... paul. ----------------------------------------------------------- paulm@waitrose.com Paul Marwick - Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, UK Marwick Computer Services - OS/2, LAN & general computer consultants -----------------------------------------------------------
Message-Id: <3.0.3.32.20001113144927.00fa58c8@popd.ix.netcom.com> Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2000 14:49:27 +0000 From: Samy Elashmawy <samelash@ix.netcom.com> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning At 06:43 PM 11/13/2000 +0000, paulm@waitrose.com wrote:
I'm just in the process of installing SuSE 6.4 on one of my machines. This machine already has two other operating systems (Win95 and OS/2). I have a reasonable amount of disk space for SuSE (around 8 GB), but the available disk space within the first 1024 cylinders is limited (less than 2 GB). As a result, I wanted to partition the drive to leave a relatively small partition below the 1024 limit, and split the rest of the system onto partitions further up on the disk.
Can someone suggest a set of suitable mount points? I tried using one partition set as /, and another set as /usr, but this isn't a wonderful split - I've ended up with less than 100 mb on the / partition, but close to 1.6 gb on the /usr partition.
You need a /boot partion under the 1024 cyl limit , and then you can set lilo to the MBRand use lilo to boot which ever system. You may be able to set lilo to /boot but this I do not know. I use the MBR an my dual boot pc. 1st partion /boot 2nd partion windows partion 3rd partion / 4th partion swap any more the 4 you will want to set up a logical drive(?) and then break that up into smalled partions. I have allways used the linux fdisk for this. A handy tool is partionmagic , and drive2drive which id a disk coping util. You can copy the partion magic dos utils to a floppy and run them from the flopy. <p><p>>What I'm not sure of is whether I should make more than 2 partitions, or
whether there is a better split than the one I've tried. Any suggestions welcome...
paul.
----------------------------------------------------------- paulm@waitrose.com Paul Marwick - Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, UK Marwick Computer Services - OS/2, LAN & general computer consultants -----------------------------------------------------------
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Message-ID: <200011131437260907.5E512BB5@exchange1> Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2000 14:37:26 -0500 From: "Tim Duggan" <tduggan@dekaresearch.com> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning Hi, On 11/13/00 at 6:43 PM paulm@waitrose.com wrote:
I'm just in the process of installing SuSE 6.4 on one of my machines. This machine already has two other operating systems (Win95 and OS/2). I have a reasonable amount of disk space for SuSE (around 8 GB), but the available disk space within the first 1024 cylinders is limited (less than 2 GB). As a result, I wanted to partition the drive to leave a relatively small partition below the 1024 limit, and split the rest of the system onto partitions further up on the disk.
OK, put a small partition below the 1024 boundary for /boot (only a couple of cylnders is fine as 8 meg will hold a couple of kernels). IIRC the newest lilo doesn't have a 1024 limit, but I don't think it was in 6.4.
Can someone suggest a set of suitable mount points? I tried using one partition set as /, and another set as /usr, but this isn't a wonderful split - I've ended up with less than 100 mb on the / partition, but close to 1.6 gb on the /usr partition.
What I'm not sure of is whether I should make more than 2
I'd set up a / and /home minimum (preferably on different disks, but...) to keep the system and data seperate in the event of some bad ju-ju, including planned and unplanned "upgrades" ;-) partitions, or
whether there is a better split than the one I've tried. Any suggestions welcome...
This, of course, depends on what you are using the system for. Optimal partitioning for a dedicated mail server will be substantially different from a programming workstation. Keep Ockham's razor handy, simpler is better. Salt and pepper to taste. Tim
Message-Id: <3.0.3.32.20001113144416.00faae58@popd.ix.netcom.com> Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2000 14:44:16 +0000 From: Samy Elashmawy <samelash@ix.netcom.com> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning WOW is this in the 7.0 ? This is great news as you can just doo away with the need to use partionmagic to shift up your windows partion by a cylender or two to make room for /boot so lilo can see it. That great as you can just add it up higher up tin the disk and not worry about it. <p>>OK, put a small partition below the 1024 boundary for /boot (only a
couple of cylnders is fine as 8 meg will hold a couple of kernels). IIRC the newest lilo doesn't have a 1024 limit, but I don't think it was in 6.4.
Message-ID: <200011140850200177.6239BD4A@exchange1> Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2000 08:50:20 -0500 From: "Tim Duggan" <tduggan@dekaresearch.com> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning Hi Samy and all, On 11/13/00 at 2:44 PM Samy Elashmawy wrote:
WOW is this in the 7.0 ? This is great news as you can just doo away with the need to use partionmagic to shift up your windows partion by a cylender or two to make room for /boot so lilo can see it. That great as you can just add it up higher up tin the disk and not worry about it.
I'm not sure what version is in 7.0, SuSE shows 21-133, freshmeat says 21.6 which came out 12 Oct. The earlier version which broke the 1024 limit was released back in April. Also note that there has been a numbering change since then (in April it was 0.21.4.2, so I'll guess that the one in SuSE is newer since it appears to be using the new numbering scheme). FYI 21.6 has added support for reiserfs users (doesn't need -notail option). For more info goto freshmeat and follow the links from there. http://freshmeat.net/projects/lilo/?highlight=lilo Later Tim
From: paulm@waitrose.com Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2000 00:28:46 +0000 Message-Id: <E13vUtr-00042b-00@sand6.global.net.uk> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning In <200011131437260907.5E512BB5@exchange1>, on 11/14/00 at 12:28 AM, "Tim Duggan" <tduggan@dekaresearch.com> said:
OK, put a small partition below the 1024 boundary for /boot (only a couple of cylnders is fine as 8 meg will hold a couple of kernels). IIRC the newest lilo doesn't have a 1024 limit, but I don't think it was in 6.4.
Thanks. I wasn't sure how big /boot should be, nor whether it could be set that way on its own. I've now repartitioned the drive, giving 20 meg to /boot (below 1024), and about 3 gb for / (above 1024). Seems to work pretty well. I've got a later copy of Lilo, so I guess I could install it, but this seems to do the trick.
I'd set up a / and /home minimum (preferably on different disks, but...) to keep the system and data seperate in the event of some bad ju-ju, including planned and unplanned "upgrades" ;-)
:-) Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. In fact, I think that is what I should have done. I installed Mandrake 7.1 as an experiment (I've tried it before, but ended up going back to SuSE every time). And its done something I've not seen since Red Hat 5 - when I rebooted to OS/2 to add the /boot partition to the OS/2 Boot Manager menu, Fdisk under OS/2 now traps. This is most entertaining, since one of the OS/2 defects team was trying to get me to reproduce this problem a couple of months ago. Naturally, at the time, I couldn't do it. So now, having accidently reproduced it, I'm going to have to wait until I've finished collecting results for IBM. Then I'll kill the partitions again and install SuSE - Mandrake is still no better than I remembered...
This, of course, depends on what you are using the system for. Optimal partitioning for a dedicated mail server will be substantially different from a programming workstation. Keep Ockham's razor handy, simpler is better. Salt and pepper to taste.
:-) Thanks again. For the moment, it'll be remaining primarily an OS/2 box. I wanted Linux on it so I can learn more about Linux use for the internet - the other box is only network connected, and I've not been entirely sucessful getting Samba to talk to OS/2. regards, paul. ----------------------------------------------------------- paulm@waitrose.com Paul Marwick - Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, UK Marwick Computer Services - OS/2, LAN & general computer consultants -----------------------------------------------------------
Message-ID: <3A10F214.3113259D@halenet.com.au> Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2000 18:04:36 +1000 From: Don Hansford <donh@halenet.com.au> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning paulm@waitrose.com wrote:
In <200011131437260907.5E512BB5@exchange1>, on 11/14/00 at 12:28 AM, "Tim Duggan" <tduggan@dekaresearch.com> said:
OK, put a small partition below the 1024 boundary for /boot (only a couple of cylnders is fine as 8 meg will hold a couple of kernels). IIRC the newest lilo doesn't have a 1024 limit, but I don't think it was in 6.4.
At work we have a lab that has two Win95 partitions (one hidden for IT use only), and I had SuSE installed above them. Then the Network teacher wanted to put NT on a few of the systems for his class. He had to trash a couple of my SuSE partitions to get NT below the 1024 cyl limit. He apologised profusely, then sat back stunned as I did an install of SuSE above the limit, set Lilo to the boot sector of the root partition, and config'd BootMagic (already installed on the first Win95 part.). He could not believe that any OS could live completely above the 1024 "limit". SuSE 6.4 can, so I assume 7.0 could too :-) I've also done a few installs as shared OS on 18 GB drives, where they wanted at least 10 GB for Win. On an existing Win system I generally use Partition Magic to resize, install SuSE, then put LiLo in the MBR, point it at /boot, (and mostly remember to tell it about Win). :-) Works like a charm!!!! -- This Email is 100% Virus Free! How do I know? Because no Microsoft products were used to generate it! Regards Don Hansford ECKYTECH COMPUTING/ SQIT Warwick <SuSE Linux 6.4>
From: Cliff Sarginson <cliff@raggedclown.net> Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2000 17:55:29 +0100 Message-Id: <00111517552904.02759@buffy> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning On Monday 13 November 2000 19:43, paulm@waitrose.com wrote:
I'm just in the process of installing SuSE 6.4 on one of my machines. This machine already has two other operating systems (Win95 and OS/2). I have a reasonable amount of disk space for SuSE (around 8 GB), but the available disk space within the first 1024 cylinders is limited (less than 2 GB). As a result, I wanted to partition the drive to leave a relatively small partition below the 1024 limit, and split the rest of the system onto partitions further up on the disk.
Can someone suggest a set of suitable mount points? I tried using one partition set as /, and another set as /usr, but this isn't a wonderful split - I've ended up with less than 100 mb on the / partition, but close to 1.6 gb on the /usr partition.
What I'm not sure of is whether I should make more than 2 partitions, or whether there is a better split than the one I've tried. Any suggestions welcome...
There are lots of religious beliefs about partitioning ! It depends a great deal on what you are going to be doing with the system. I find it very convenient to have my disks split up as follows /boot -- a few megs for kernel images and boot stuff etc / -- 250 Megs for root /usr -- Huge (!) since most interesting things get put under it /home -- seperate for easy NFS mounts etc, size depends on user population etc. /opt -- kde and some other stuff likes to use /opt /var -- a lot of temporary stuff like log files gets written here On some systems a seperate /tmp can be a good idea. It used to be a not uncommon UNIX system management practise to remake the /tmp file system on re-boot. Having said that, I use my systems for particular purposes and this arrangement suits me. For a lot of domestic setups perhaps a seperate /home and everything else under / is ok.. Seperating file systems can make a lot of sense if you have seperate disks..I would recommend at least that if you do have >1 disk to put swap devices on a disk other than /usr or /home. Cliff
From: paulm@waitrose.com Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2000 23:06:03 +0000 Message-Id: <E13wUfR-00019u-00@sand6.global.net.uk> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning In <00111517552904.02759@buffy>, on 11/15/00 at 11:06 PM, Cliff Sarginson <cliff@raggedclown.net> said:
There are lots of religious beliefs about partitioning !
:-) Yeah, I can accept that...
It depends a great deal on what you are going to be doing with the system. I find it very convenient to have my disks split up as follows
/boot -- a few megs for kernel images and boot stuff etc / -- 250 Megs for root /usr -- Huge (!) since most interesting things get put under it /home -- seperate for easy NFS mounts etc, size depends on user population etc. /opt -- kde and some other stuff likes to use /opt /var -- a lot of temporary stuff like log files gets written here
Great, thanks. I'll have to leave it alone for a little while (trying to get some data for an IBMer on what Mandrake's parititioning software has done to upset OS/2s FDISK), but once I can repartition it, that looks like a good split. I was far from sure what sort of space would be required by the various directories. That helps a lot.
disks..I would recommend at least that if you do have >1 disk to put swap devices on a disk other than /usr or /home.
Also a good idea. I do have another disk, but I'm going to have to get a bigger case before I can use it, I think. This one is getting a bit crowded - CD, Tap, floppy and hard drive only leaves one 3.5 slot and one 5.25, cuts down on airflow a bit more than I like... paul. ----------------------------------------------------------- paulm@waitrose.com Paul Marwick - Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, UK Marwick Computer Services - OS/2, LAN & general computer consultants -----------------------------------------------------------
Message-ID: <3A143626.E3B72513@suse.com> Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2000 20:31:50 +0100 From: Michael Hasenstein <mha@suse.com> Subject: Re: [SLE] disk partitioning paulm@waitrose.com wrote: ...
It depends a great deal on what you are going to be doing with the system. I find it very convenient to have my disks split up as follows
If you start with partitioning at all IŽd suggest you use LVM for all partitions but "/". This way you can later resize, e.g. if you find out youŽve reserved way too much space for /usr but are running out of space on /var, or if you have to add a disk. You can even grow a mounted reiserfs filesystem (shrinking works only unmounted, and ext2 resizing is all unmounted-only). SuSE Linux supports installation on LVM partitions. Do a yast1 installation, the LVM setup is part of the "Adjustments of installation" menu point and pretty easy. Afterwards you can install on the LVM logical volumes (LV) you just created.
participants (6)
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cliff＠raggedclown.net -
donh＠halenet.com.au -
mha＠suse.com -
paulm＠waitrose.com -
samelash＠ix.netcom.com -
tduggan＠dekaresearch.com