Which partition is which Linux and which windows
I have on my PC two partitions one Windows vista (which I can't boot into but is there but that is another story) one Oracle Linux.
I want to replace Oracle Linux with Mint. When I try to install it it tells me this is the current set up /dev1/sdb1 65.8 Mb /dev1/sdb2 10.7 Gb /dev1/sdb3 243.9 Gb /dev1/sdb5 745.5 Gb The Mint installer wants to reduce /dev1/sdb3 to 148.4 Gb and make the rest Linux Mint. However I want to completely replace Oracle Linux. How can I tell which sdb3 or sdb5 is windows and which Linux? |
In Linux, run "fdisk -l" as root.
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sdb5 is not your Windows C: partition. If you have a Windows D: partition, that might be sdb5, but sdb5 is not C: sdb3 could be C: (I don't know that it is, but it could be). It is better to take a good look (with some tool such as acid_kewpie suggested) and see the partition types to have more confidence which is which. But if you know that the Windows partition you are trying to identify was C:, I'm sure your C: was a primary partition, while sdb5 is a logical partition. |
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Disk /dev/sda: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes Thanks for the quick reply. |
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Since sdb5 is the biggest of those, that is a reasonable choice if you want the new Linux in a single place and don't mind trashing the old Linux. But it might be cleaner to delete all of sda5, sda6 and sdb5 before installing a new Linux, so you don't have fragments of the old one lying around. However, it also looks like your two drives were at some point a RAID1 and that you have messed with the partition tables in Linux while Linux did not understand the nature of that RAID1. If Windows continues to see the two drives as RAID1 (so both sda3 and sdb3 are your Windows C: partition) while Linux doesn't understand the RAID1, you will be at risk for some very strange malfunctions. Quote:
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In case anyone is interested I installed Oracle linux because I wanted a new Oracle R12 test system but a) it is has stopped working and b) I don't need it any more (I know R12) and c) Oracle Linux is not really any good as a sole distro - too difficult to install software etc. Thank you for all your help. |
You haven't commented on the RAID1 part of your problem. Did you understand that your system has two hard drives that were paired into RAID1? Do you understand that this is now messed up? You do not now have a working RAID1.
Do you want to try to salvage the RAID1? For Windows alone or for both Windows and Linux? Or would you prefer to finish splitting up the RAID1 so you have twice as much disk space, but lose some insurance against hardware failure? I think finishing splitting them would be easier than salvaging the RAID1. I'm not sure exactly how to do either. I don't think it is wise to leave the problem unresolved. |
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I think I want to salvage my RAID1 for both windows and linux but have no idea how to. |
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That would be very slow if it is there, but I think might be the best starting point. If you could back up elsewhere, or lose, all your data, then I'm sure there is a BIOS option to destroy the RAID1 and then recreate it. If you destroy and recreate the RAID1, it would be simplest to reinstall Windows before Linux, and it would be nice to figure out how to tell the Windows installer how much of the drive to use vs. leave unpartitioned for later Linux install. Once you either repair or recreate the RAID1, when you use a Linux liveCD you should ignore (and not try to use) sda and sdb. Some other dev such as dm-0 should have a valid partition table and that is the dev onto which you should install Linux. Either the main BIOS or some extra BIOS has a menu to look at and manipulate the RAID. If it is a secondary BIOS, probably during boot it flashes on the screen for a moment which keys you need to cord at that moment to get access to the RAID configuration. Once you see what kind of RAID it is (brand and model of RAID "controller") post that in case it lets someone give you more specific advice. |
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