Partitions RAID LVM Disk Druid
 

Hi everyone.

"RAID stands for "Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks." (...)
for owners of just one, even huge, hard drive, RAID is absolutely useless."
http://linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/tutorials/4349/1/

"LVM (Logical Volume Management) partitions provide a number of advantages over standard partitions. (...)An administrator may grow or shrink logical volumes without destroying data, unlike standard disk partitions."
http://docs.fedoraproject.org/instal...oning-lvm.html

"Select this option to set up LVM on your Fedora system. First create at least one partition or software RAID device as an LVM physical volume, using the New dialog."
http://docs.fedoraproject.org/instal...isk-druid.html

I am installing Fedora 8.
I choose to partitioning the disk manually because I want to create a multiboot system. To set up LVM partitions because of their flexibility why do I need to create at least on partition or software RAID (I only have one HDD!)? Is it really obligatory? What is the recommended size? Can I create LVM without RAID? What is the function of a RAID partition?
What is the relation between LVM and RAID?

Thanks Advance.

it says you need to create a partition *OR* a raid instance. just like any normal filesystem, LVM uses a partition.

Acually "RAID stands for " Redundant Array of Independent Disks"
But is aften called Inexpensive.

LVM and Raid are two totaly different things, Raid is for disk managment and LVM allows you to manage partitions.

Logical Volume Management = LVM

PV = Physical Volume...This would be the hard drive, a physical volume can not span multiple hard drives. if you have more than one hard drive you will have more than one Physical Volume.

LVG = Logical Volume Group...The LVG can consist of more than one Physical Volume so if you have multiple drives, lets say two, your LVG will or could be setup using both drives or only one if you so choose.

LV = Logical Volume The Logical Volume Group is divided into Logical Volumes these are simalar to partitions but a little different. Each LV will be like a partition as in one will be for / one for /home swap and so on. And free space so that you can grow a LV if needed.

Yes
That will depend on how much you would like to give each OS.

10gb is more than enough for most Linux Distro's with a partition set aside for storage or to share between OS's.

Lets say you have one hard drive of 100GB

Partitions

/boot = 100mb classic primary partition, this will be your boot partition, it is NOT part of the LVG. If you plan on having more than two distro's you may want to make this a little bigger.

LVG = Take all the remaining space for this.

LV = This is ware you will divide the LVG into partitions for /, /home, swap, make sure you leave free space for growth.

Lets say for install Fedora.


/ = 20GB for Fedora

20GB for future distro.

swap = 512mb

maybe 30GB to share file between OS's

The rest free space for growth.