[GRUB] How to create w/ KDE Part. Mgr. the initial, 1 mb unformatted partition that precedes the GRUB partition on a new SSD?

[RLynwood]

I want to partition a new, 1 T SSD for installing 23.10 with multiple fpartitions. I easily created the GPT table. But, though I've done it recently and many times before, I haven't been able to create that initial, 1 Mb, unformatted partition that precedes the 300+ mb GRUB partition, and I can't figure out what I've doing wrong or not doing. Help.

[claydoh]

Not doing anything wrong at all. The space is not needed by anything. That 1Mb is just leftover that didn't fit into any blocks, for whatever reason. The partition manager is just better at doing the math to use more of the space on the drive than some OS installer partitioning schemes. or the drive has the exact number of bits and sectors to not have any leftovers.

[oshunluvr]

You are using GRUB-BIOS (not EFI) booting?

Using gdisk, go to the expert menu, set the sector alignment value to 1, return to the main menu, create a new partition starting as sector 34 and ending with sector 2047, set the partition type as "ef02", done.

Not sure what a "300+mb GRUB partition is" or why you need that.

[RLynwood]

Thank you both. I'll see what I can do w claydoh's advice. I intend to use EFI. Any reason I shouldn't? That's what the 300 (minimum, I've readf) Mb partition is for. I'll try to see how to make a GRUB-BIOS partition.

[claydoh]

I *think* that the 1Mb can come from the GPT needing a small amount of empty space, and the leftover either rounds up or the alignment is different enough to make up 1Mb.

Not sure if any settings affect this

[oshunluvr]

Thank you both. I'll see what I can do w claydoh's advice. I intend to use EFI. Any reason I shouldn't? That's what the 300 (minimum, I've readf) Mb partition is for. I'll try to see how to make a GRUB-BIOS partition.

It's not a question of which is better. It's a question of which type of partition is needed. If you're using EFI you need a partition type of "ef00" not ef02.

And yes, from what I know, 300MB is more than sufficient for a windows and Linux dual boot.

[Schwarzer Kater]

[…]
And yes, from what I know, 300MB is more than sufficient for a windows and Linux dual boot.

Indeed it is (we had already discussed this elsewhere in the forum) - but nonetheless it would be wise to make the partition for EFI (also called the ESP = EFI system partition) at least 300MB in size these days…
One reason is that the Calamares installer (used by e.g. Kubuntu 24.04 LTS amongst others) will complain if it is smaller - so I recommend 304 or 320MB to be "safe".

[oshunluvr]

Did this change?

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/EFI_system_partition

See section 2.1

[RLynwood]

Schwarzer Kater, I do know that ESP = EFI. I assume you're "reminding" me of the archlinux system partition link. Thank you all, again. I'll check these out and see what I get.

[oshunluvr]

Maybe I was wrong. This from a Kubuntu 24.04 VM:

Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name
1 2048 4095 1024.0 KiB EF02
2 4096 1054719 513.0 MiB EF00 EFI System Partition
3 1054720 62912511 29.5 GiB 8300
​

[RLynwood]

Meaning that I DO need that empty, unknown 1 Mb partition? If we are all agreed that I do need that mini partition, that brings me back to my original question: using KDE Partition Manager, how do I create it? I've done it quite a number of times before, but I'm missing something now because I don't see how to do it. If I click New (partition), then make it unformatted, I don't see how to reduce the size to 1 Mb. I've already established the GPT for the entire disk.

[Snowhog]

Need? No. The installer will or will not create it. It isn’t something the user has to do.

[RLynwood]

The installer won't create it because I'm going to install two Linux OSs and separate the first OS partition from the /home partition. So I need to have all partitions established in order to install 23.10 manually. And I've found that simply creating the EFI partition does not create that mini partition first. I've tried that a few times.

[claydoh]

Did this change?

Um, no, I just missed adding context (another gif, lol) that I thought was humorous.
Along the lines of a lack of comprehension.
Now, the moment has passed.

[RLynwood]

Btw, this probably has something to do with the hardware. It's always been required on my regular SATA SSDs, but it was not required for the NvMe M.2 SSD in my laptop. Now I'm trying to partition a new, internal, SATA SSD.