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Yeah, I was going to say I didn't get it, either, but was going to let somebody else post first. *g*
I think he was saying he tried formatting and couldn't. Not sure what the problem is, but I don't trust extended partitions. If you've only got two primaries, why not make a third? I'd just delete the unformatted extended, recreate it as primary, and then try formatting that.
Wait... there is that. If it's an extended, shouldn't it be /dev/hda5? I think that might be what fdisk is complaining about - it sounds like it wants to reorder and rewrite the table, because it's messed up. I don't know.
Like I say, I'd either change the flag to make it 83, or just delete and recreate as 83. Hate extended partitions.
Hm. Well, if it was DOS, he'd need to create logical drives inside the extended. They'd get labeled D:, E:, etc. But in Linux, I think the extended's just the extended, and begins numbering from hdX5. I've been able to avoid the extended/logical stuff in Linux so far, so I'm not sure. So his table should read
/dev/hda1 83 Linux
/dev/hda2 82 Linux swap
/dev/hda5 5 Extended
and then, yeah, maybe he would need to create an 83 inside the 5? I dunno. But it wouldn't be /dev/hda4. It'd just be a subset of 5, I guess.
Or it should read
/dev/hda1 83 Linux
/dev/hda2 82 Linux swap
/dev/hda3 83 Linux
Originally posted by rusium
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 2550 20482843+ 83 Linux
/dev/hda2 2551 2677 1020127+ 82 Linux swap
/dev/hda3 2678 4865 17575110 5 Extended
---
mkfs.ext3 /dev/hda3
mke2fs 1.32 (09-Nov-2002)
/dev/hda3: Not enough space to build proposed filesystem while setting up superblock
/dev/hda3 2678 4865 17575110 5 Extended
I think he's trying to format an extended partition ext3. That's not allowed. The next partition, the logical one, should be /dev/hda4. I think.
What do you think?
I like the idea of getting rid of the extended the best, though. Use that scheme above, I think.
L8TR
An extended partition in simple terms is a place holder for logical partitions. You don't format it.
Use fdisk to create a logical drive and then format as you wish. It will be /dev/hda5 as stated above.
FYI
Primary partitions are 1-4. An extended partition is a primary.
Logical partitions are 5-64.
Getting rid of the extended would limit your self to only one additional partition since there are only 4 primaries allowed. Some like to use different partitions for /, /home, /boot, /var etc. which can be more than 4.
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