Ideal RAID Volume Size for OS
 

Hi,

Question is during my RAID setup, I'm asked to specify my Boot partition size. How big shold this be?

Thanks in advance.

It depends on how many kernels you intend to install in /boot. Generally, 100MB should be plenty. I've never had a /boot get over 100MB and it's usually under 50MB.

That was what I chose with RAID 6.

On a side, looks like my post broke the damn forum... welcome back all!

Each kernel image will take several mb's *at most*, usually it will be around 2,5-5mb for a 2.6.x kernel. 2.4 kernels are smaller though most distros don't use them any longer. If you also store the system.map files that will add around 1.5mb for each kernel you install.

So, 100mb is plenty if you are careful enough (or your package manager) to uninstall those kernels that you will no longer use. When updating a kernel it's always a good idea to keep at least another one that you know is working, just in case that the new kernel doesn't boot for some reason. Some people use different kernels for different purposes as well (real time stuff, experimental patchsets, testing, etc).

Wait, what do you think RAID 6 has to do with the size of your /boot partition?

And thanks a lot, jerk. I was in the middle of a thread when that happened. :/

Re-reading this thread has me making a few clairifications.

To start with, I was setting up new RAID volumes on the on the server, wanted to keep the OS on it's own. My question was in relation to the volume that would be used to boot the OS; for the OS and core server software. This volume is 100GB and I left the remaining space of the array not initialized (for now). I was figuring that the WebServer and DB's would be installed in the Uninitialized space when I get there.

When I installed RHEL 5.3 Server, the boot partition on the first volume (VolumeGroup00) was left at the default 101MB, the rest is where I installed and patched the OS.

Does this make more sense now? Am I heading the right direction with the configuration?

*gently clicks "Submit Reply" in hopes of not bringing down the forum again*

All sounds good to me; was just wondering what you meant by that since RAID operates totally underneath the filesystem. 101 MB should be fine; my /boot's 200 MB but only using 22 MB right now. Assuming Red Hat has the same stuff as Fedora (reasonable), it'll automatically trim you to the current and past two package management-installed kernels, so it should never get anywhere near capacity.

Please, no name calling.

No harm on this end - he was joking when calling me a jerk after I said I crashed the forum earlier...lol

And thanks to you karamarisan for the clairification.