Hard Drive Partitioning Questions

[LaneLester]

This topic is related to Kubuntu only because I'm planning to install it after I get these questions answered.

My #1 hard drive has four partitions:

• 1: Some kind of FAT32 recovery partition for Windows
• 2: The main Win XP partition that came with this computer
• 3: Mepis Linux (an old experiment)
• 4: Currently my main system: Ubuntu Feisty

I want to go all-Linux by replacing my XP with Kubuntu Feisty. I started to do that tonight, but I started getting some funny error messages from the installer.

Partition hda2 (where I want to put Kubuntu) is a primary NTFS partition. If I delete it and create an ext3 partition in its space, will it disturb the logical partitions hda3 and hda4? I don't want to take a chance with my main workhorse on hda4.

Lane

[penguin.ch]

Re: Hard Drive Partitioning Questions

To replace speculation by ignorance a look at your system's feedback to the console command fdisk -l ("fdisk minus el") would be a great help ...

You should, however, grab a copy of the GParted liveCD in order to prepare your harddisk - the "partition editor" included in Kubuntu's installer is a dangerous piece of crap (further reading).

[LaneLester]

Re: Hard Drive Partitioning Questions

To replace speculation by ignorance a look at your system's feedback to the console command fdisk -l ("fdisk minus el") would be a great help ...

Thanks for the tips. Here's the output; see anything scary?

Disk /dev/hda: 160.0 GB, 160041885696 bytes
240 heads, 63 sectors/track, 20673 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 15120 * 512 = 7741440 bytes

  Device Boot   Start     End   Blocks  Id System
/dev/hda1        1     843   6373048+  b W95 FAT32
/dev/hda2  *     844    17097  122880240  7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda3      17098    18451  10236240  83 Linux
/dev/hda4      18452    20673  16798320  83 Linux

I don't really understand the connection between primary and logical partitions; can you delete and re-create a primary without harming the logicals that follow it?

You should, however, grab a copy of the GParted liveCD in order to prepare your harddisk - the "partition editor" included in Kubuntu's installer is a dangerous piece of crap (further reading).[/quote]
Thanks again for the two links. I just installed Kubuntu Feisty on my wife's laptop; fortunately it went without mishap. I sure don't want to take chances with my main machine... well, I must not mind taking some chances, since I'm installing Feisty.

Lane

[penguin.ch]

Re: Hard Drive Partitioning Questions

Here's the output; see anything scary?

There are no "logical" partitions on your harddisk - not yet

I sure don't want to take chances with my main machine ...

There is no point in relying on BETA software releases!

Having said that, I'd recommend to launch GParted and replace the NTFS partition by an extended one and split the latter e.g. in swap, root (= system) and home partitions; later on, you may as well want to replace e.g. the Mepis partition by an extra data partition (further reading).

[LaneLester]

Re: Hard Drive Partitioning Questions

There are no "logical" partitions on your harddisk - not yet

Perhaps I didn't use the right words: primary/extended/logical. As I said, I'm not clear on the difference between partition types.

Having said that, I'd recommend to launch GParted and replace the NTFS partition by an extended one and split the latter e.g. in swap, root (= system) and home partitions

While I was waiting for your above reply (I'm not very patient), I decided to go ahead and install KF on hda4 in place of Mepis, without making any changes in the drive. The install hung on me twice yesterday, but today after running Ubuntu for a while, the KF install went without a hitch, and I'm now tweaking KF to my preferences.

I didn't give you the full story on my current layout. In addition to the hda, I have an hdb:

Disk /dev/hdb: 122.9 GB, 122942324736 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14946 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

  Device Boot   Start     End   Blocks  Id System
/dev/hdb1        1    1216   9767488+  c W95 FAT32 (LBA)
/dev/hdb2      1217    12524  90831510  f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hdb5      1217    2432   9767488+  b W95 FAT32
/dev/hdb6      2433    3648   9767488+  b W95 FAT32
/dev/hdb7      3649    4864   9767488+  b W95 FAT32
/dev/hdb8      4865    5124   2088418+  6 FAT16
/dev/hdb9      5125    7296  17446558+ 83 Linux
/dev/hdb10      7297    8571  10241406  83 Linux
/dev/hdb11      8572    9846  10241406  83 Linux
/dev/hdb12      9847    11121  10241406  83 Linux
/dev/hdb13 *    11122    12396  10241406  83 Linux
/dev/hdb14     12397    12524   1028128+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris

In terms of setting up separate partitions for different uses, that has been my use for hdb. The FATs are for data (docs, pics, music, archives) that I've shared between Windows and Linux distros. And I have one of the Linux partitions for /opt, stuff I don't need to reinstall between Linux distros. I haven't been in the practice of sharing /home's since they tend to get gunked up with stuff. I just copy the good parts over to a new install.

I'm thinking of copying the good stuff on hdb to an external 160 GB drive and swapping them. Linux reports something bad about hdb1, and it's making me nervous, although I've not had any real problems with it.

Lane