Partitioning a 350GB HD

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#1

My PC has two SATA HD drives. On the SATA 1 HD Windows Vista HP is installed, and on the SATA 2 HD openSuse 11.1 (64-bit) was installed on the entire disk.

The SATA 2 HD has a storage capacity of 350GB. I would like to install another 64-bit linux OS (Fedora 10) on it, but I do not know the appropriate partition sizes and types (primary, extended, logical) that should be assigned for these two 64-bit linux OS using Gparted, the Gnome Partition Editor.

Your kind assistance will be highly appreciated.

#2

You will only use logical drives if you decide to use LVM.

The partitioner will tell you which are primary and which extended partitions.

You can only have four primary partitions on a single hard disk; so Linux normally uses one or more extended partitions.

You won’t need another swap partition; so the question is whether you set up separate /home partitions for each distro or just a separate / partition. The problem with different distros is that they access users by numbers and some start at 500 and others at 1000; so you can get problems if you try to use the same /home with two different distros.

#3

On 2009-02-25, john hudson <john_hudson@no-mx.forums.opensuse.org> wrote:
> You will only use logical drives if you decide to use LVM.
Logical drives, yes. Not logical partitions.

> The partitioner will tell you which are primary and which extended
> partitions.
Yes, and usually, there is only 1 extended partition, in which onee then
creates logical partitions.

> You can only have four primary partitions on a single hard disk; so
> Linux normally uses one or more extended partitions.
Nope, one or more logical partitions. In the one extended partition.

In short, if you need 4 or less partition, make 'em primary.
Otherwise, make 0 to 3 primary, then allocate the rest of the drive to the
extended partition, in which you create logical partitions.

> You won’t need another swap partition; so the question is whether you
> set up separate /home partitions for each distro or just a separate /
> partition. The problem with different distros is that they access users
> by numbers and some start at 500 and others at 1000; so you can get
> problems if you try to use the same /home with two different distros.
Exactly.

–
Elevators smell different to midgets

#4

[Rikishi42]

You wrote, “In short, if you need 4 or less partition, make 'em primary. Otherwise, make 0 to 3 primary, then allocate the rest of the drive to the extended partition, in which you create logical partitions.”
However, you did not mention the sizes of the partitions. Could you please give an idea of the sizes for the primary and for the logical partitions?

I ran Gparted (the Gnome Partition Editor) Live CD and it reports that on the 350GB HD there are the following partitions:

/dev/sdb1 … … Linux swap … … 2.01GB
/dev/sdb2 … … ext3… … … … … .20.00GB
/dev/sdb3 … … ext3… … … … …257.47GB √

Since it does not seem safe to alter the first two partitions but rather deal with the last one, how might it be resized more or less? Will a combination, let’s says, like:

Primary … 0 … 40.00GB
Primary … 1 … 40.00GB
Primary … 2 … 40.00GB
Extended…137.47GB split later into
Logical…34.00GB
Logical…34.00GB
Logical…34.00GB
Logical…35.47GB work for two linux OS?

Your kind feedback will be highly appreciated.

#5

On 2009-02-26, sfzab <sfzab@no-mx.forums.opensuse.org> wrote:

> You wrote, “In short, if you need 4 or less partition, make 'em
> primary. Otherwise, make 0 to 3 primary, then allocate the rest of the
> drive to the extended partition, in which you create logical
> partitions.”
> However, you did not mention the sizes of the partitions. Could you
> please give an idea of the sizes for the primary and for the logical
> partitions?
>
> I ran Gparted (the Gnome Partition Editor) Live CD and it reports that
> on the 350GB HD there are the following partitions:
>
> /dev/sdb1 … … Linux swap … … 2.01GB
> /dev/sdb2 … … ext3… … … … … .20.00GB
> /dev/sdb3 … … ext3… … … … …257.47GB √
>
> Since it does not seem safe to alter the first two partitions but
> rather deal with the last one, how might it be resized more or less?
> Will a combination, let’s says, like:
>
> Primary … 0 … 40.00GB
> Primary … 1 … 40.00GB
> Primary … 2 … 40.00GB
> Extended…137.47GB split later into
> Logical…34.00GB
> Logical…34.00GB
> Logical…34.00GB
> Logical…35.47GB work for two linux OS?
>
> Your kind feedback will be highly appreciated.

Before you worry about what partition type to assign what type, first ask
yourself what you want to realise.

If I remember, you have an existing Linux, and want another asside it?
What will you do with it? Just some testing, to see if you like it?
In that case, you might not need to have two partitions, but just one. You
might have enough with very little volume (even as low as 10 GB).

Let’s assume you have a main system, and a main, and you don’t want to
change anything about the existing one.
Call the production Linux LinuxP, and the testing one LinuxT
What about:

/dev/sdb1 2 GB swap (for both Linuxes)
/dev/sbb2 20 GB / (for LinuxP)
/dev/sdb3 300 GB /home (for LinuxP)
/dev/sdb4 28 GB / (for LinuxT)

This keeps the swap and existing Linux / partition intact. It gives you a
very nice size /home for your ‘real’ Linux. It also gives you a adequate
size for your testing, in which you don’t need to separate / and /home in
different partitions. And when you’re done testing, you can allways delete
/dev/sbd4 and grow /dev/sdb3 to add the 28 GB.

Since you don’t exceed 4 partitions, you can make them all primary.

Don’t just accept this layout, think about it. You know what you want to do
with this system. Just ask questions, someone (maybe me?) can come up with
another list.

–
Elevators smell different to midgets