Ideal Partition Sizes

English Install/Boot/Login
#1

Background Information:
Usually I prefer to keep my operating system on a small partition (50 gigs or so), with the rest of my system on another partition.

Normally, with windows (don’t flame me for saying the W word!) a small OS partition makes sense… this way i can scan for viruses, or defrag quickly-- two non issues with linux openSUSE. (with windows, i never install programs on my C: either; this keeps the OS partition small)

One advantage at least on windows, with having a small operating system partition is that it’s really easy to backup & restore. If my system gets wiped out, I only lose the OS and if i have to re-install, all my personal files are still there.

Is This Done for Me Already With the Default openSUSE Partition Set-up?
I just got a new 1TB Seagate HD, which I’m going to use for development purposes in the openSUSE environment…

I’m wondering if I can somehow apply my methodology explained above to openSUSE (or if it even makes sense).

More Specifics:
Are the default LVM partitions ideal for a clonezilla back-up? (can I just backup my primary partition, on the second partition somewhere in case I really mess up my machine).

I’ve been using openSUSE for just a month now, and I’m really liking it (its my favorite linux OS now)… any advice on this long, drawn out question is appreciated!

#2

The default in openSUSE is to have a / partition of about 20-30GB and the rest goes to /home, unless your disk is very small. This makes it easy to upgrade OS versions without danger to the file in /home. But of course you should take regular backups of your home directories in any case.

#3

Thanks for such a quick response. It sounds like the default set-up perhaps does what I want in that case. Since home is put on a separate partition by default, the OS is already setting things up in a way that makes sense to me.

I have one more question.

I’ll be installing openSUSE on a 1 Terrabyte seagate drive… I wonder if it will still give the openSUSE operating system 30 gigs (or will it give more?)

#4

On 02/27/2011 11:36 AM, dirtydev wrote:
>
> I wonder
> if it will still give the openSUSE operating system 30 gigs (or will it
> give more?)

you have the chance to see what it suggests, and intervene if you wish…

have a walk through the install guide, here:
http://doc.opensuse.org/products/opensuse/openSUSE/opensuse-installquick/

that link and OTHERS are on the download page…those and these are
useful before you install:

http://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-technical-help-here/how-faq-forums/

don’t go crazy with a gigantic root directory…linux executables are
not as bloated as what you might be used to…

–
DenverD
CAVEAT: http://is.gd/bpoMD
[NNTP posted w/openSUSE 11.3, KDE4.5.5, Thunderbird3.0.11, nVidia
173.14.28 3D, Athlon 64 3000+]
“It is far easier to read, understand and follow the instructions than
to undo the problems caused by not.” DD 23 Jan 11

#5

Thanks for the additional information and links, I’ll look at them before I set things up.

#6

On 2011-02-27 10:06, ken yap wrote:
>
> The default in openSUSE is to have a / partition of about 20-30GB and
> the rest goes to /home, unless your disk is very small. This makes it
> easy to upgrade OS versions without danger to the file in /home. But of
> course you should take regular backups of your home directories in any
> case.

Another target for a separate partition, specially if you are going to do
development, is /usr/loca/l, because there is where typically your programs
will go to.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)

#7

I just create a directory called /home/local and change /usr/local to be a symlink to that. Saves having to decide on a separate partition. You can also use a bind mount if you don’t like a symlink for this.

#8

On 2011-02-27 14:36, ken yap wrote:
>
> I just create a directory called /home/local and change /usr/local to be
> a symlink to that. Saves having to decide on a separate partition. You
> can also use a bind mount if you don’t like a symlink for this.

True. I use that trick in the laptop with some dirs, saves space on /.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)

#9

That sounds like a simple but effective way to keep my programs outside the OS partition.

#10

For most 20-30Gb for / (root) is enough, 1-2Gb /swap, and /home (whatever). In your case you might allocate based on what you intend to develop.
In addition to /home, you might want to allocate partitions for /srv and /var if you’re going to do lots of GIT/SVN program development or run Apache, HTTP, Databases, Virtual machines, etc.
These are normally on / (root) and expand based on usage, ie, a very large database.

While I like the concept of LVM, IMHO, its overkill for a 2 HDD system, a bit harder to recover without experience if you make a mistake. Neither are you likely to add/remove drives on a regular basis. If you said you were going to link a few network or iSCSI drives to this system to provide 3TB of space I’d say LVM, otherwise IMHO don’t bother.

I dual boot Win 7/ openSUSE, but I have 2 partitions for Win 7 I use one for C the other for D.
D drive is the larger storage and install drive (for windows gaming).
Whenever it can be done I install programs to D\program files.

#11

I’ve got a dual boot as well, although I use few partitions for windows on two hard drives. I have openSUSE on my 3rd hard drive (which I’ll soon upgrade to 1TB).

With my version of windows, I have C:, and I install most programs on G: (a separate hard drive). MyDocuments actually rests on D: (a second partition on the first hard drive). Having the operating system on a separate hard drive from my programs does seem to speed things up a bit.

openSUSE is much more lean than windows, so I don’t think it will be an issue having everything on one hard drive. The other issue is going beyond 3x hard drives to 4x hard drives would probably add too much heat (I actually have some concerns about even a 3rd hard drive).

Putting SRV & VAR on separate partitions might make sense–thanks tararpharzon.

I’m getting a lot of good ideas here; thanks for all these great responses / advice.

#12

On 2011-02-27 19:06, tararpharazon wrote:
>
> For most 20-30Gb for / (root) is enough, 1-2Gb /swap, and /home
> (whatever). In your case you might allocate based on what you intend
> to develop.

Swap has to be bigger in some cases: if ram is scarce, increase swap, so
that the sum is about 4 GiB or more. The other restriction is that (free)
swap should be a bit more than the ram in order to be able to hibernate the
machine.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)

#13

On 2011-02-27 19:06, dirtydev wrote:

> openSUSE is much more lean than windows, so I don’t think it will be an
> issue having everything on one hard drive. The other issue is going
> beyond 3x hard drives to 4x hard drives would probably add too much heat
> (I actually have some concerns about even a 3rd hard drive).

If you have two or more disks, it also makes sense to distribute parts of
the system over them, because linux is capable or reading or writing on
several disks simultaneously.

The classical trick was to split /usr on another disk.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)

#14

I have (room for 8 total) 4 drives and a DVD in a mid-tower with 500watts, Hyper Tx3 cpu cooler, 1-80mm and 1-120mm case fans.
Main issue is keeping cpu and vpu temps down, case temps not so much.

In my case LVM, may make sense but Win 7 doesn’t have drivers to support SCSI drives.
My bigger problem is trying to identify duplicated files across the drives. ;):sarcastic:

#15

On 2011-02-27 21:36, tararpharazon wrote:

> My bigger problem is trying to identify duplicated files across the
> drives. ;):sarcastic:

Indeed! I know. Sigh…

I could write a program to look at all files, and compare checksums of all
of them having the same size. But I feel lazy about that.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)

#16

will i have this issue if i put USR on a separate drive?

#17

On 2011-02-27 22:36, dirtydev wrote:
>
> tararpharazon;2296112 Wrote:
>> I have (room for 8 total) 4 drives and a DVD in a mid-tower with
>> 500watts, Hyper Tx3 cpu cooler, 1-80mm and 1-120mm case fans.
>> Main issue is keeping cpu and vpu temps down, case temps not so much.
>>
>>
>> In my case LVM, may make sense but Win 7 doesn’t have drivers to
>> support SCSI drives.
>> My bigger problem is trying to identify duplicated files across the
>> drives. ;):sarcastic:
> will i have this issue if i put USR on a separate drive?

Which issue? Temperature? It is not related to what you put in them.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)

#18

I’m only concerned about OS / Software issues–I’ve got hardware under control.

I’m asking whether putting USR & other folders on other drives is what creates this duplicate file issue.

#19

To get back on Track for Ideal Partition Sizes one only need to look back at the worst case for disk usage by someone. My main computer, running openSUSE 11.3 which was installed nearly eight months ago is using 38 GB for “/” and 109 GB for “/home”. Each Partition is about is about 25% full and looks to last the lifetime of openSUSE 11.3. I have tried to live within a 40 GB total drive before, but found out quickly that lots of multimedia can fill up “/home” and too many kernel compiles can fill up “/”. With the very large hard disk sizes out there, a 330 GB drive could work well with openSUSE. It does depend on what you use openSUSE for as always.

Just one opinion among many.

Thank You,

#20

So far, all the comments are very helpful.

In some ways, I really prefer opensuse to windows, so thats why I’m thinking of making it my primary OS (with a 1 terrabyte drive, so i’ll have plenty of room for downloads etc).

In the past I used it as a development environment (under somewhat controlled circumstances).

I have set up an openSUSE dual boot that I used for about a month, but I’m going to wipe it out when I get the new hard drive.

I’ve been trying to figure out how to get an ideal setup that will run things optimally without running out of space or without causing other serious issues.

All the comments are helpful… insight from experienced users (like those commenting in this thread) can save me a lot of headaches. I know I could have tried to just google the answer, but I think I needed a bit more specific advice.

By the way, I’m really impressed with this forum. You have some very active users & knowledgeable (& professional) users here.