Installing on the 5th partition

Jongi · 11-17-2005, 08:46 PM

It won't.

Master drive on fitst IDE:

hda1 - SUSE v9.3
hda2 - home/user
hda3 - swap
hda4 - NTFS / XP
hda5 - Supposed Mandriva space

But it just won't install on what should be hda5. Created just before I tried to install on it. In fact, I tried to resize hda4 before hda5 was created and install Mandriva on the created hda5 (10GB). It doesn't want to.

michaelk · 11-17-2005, 09:40 PM

Hard drive 101:
When hard drives were first introduced to the PC they could only have 4 partitions. As hard drive capacities became larger there was a need to create additional partitions. So the extended / logical format was developed. The original partitions are now known as primary partitions. A primary partition is created as an extended partition and in a nutshell is a container for logical partitions. So:
1-4 primary anything >5 is a logical partition.

Assuming that what you have posted is indeed how the drive is partitioned it is impossible to create additional partitions. You will have to delete one of the existing partitions and recreate it as a logical partition. Backing up data first of course. Recreate the now unallocated space as an extended partition. Then create as many logical partitions as desired. Then restore the data to the new partition and install Mandriva.

If hda4 is the biggest partition then your in a bit of a pickle because you will need to reinstall XP.

spitfire5c · 11-17-2005, 09:50 PM

Hi
You're going to have to supply a bit more info to get you on the right track.
First up, can you supply the partition info from fdisk?

Best to do this from within your WM (e.g. Gnome, KDE) so you can cut/paste the info from the console into your browser.
Here's a quick rundown of steps:
1. Open up a console (e.g Konsole in KDE)
2. type "fdisk /dev/hda" (w/out quotes) --- note you need appropriate priviledges to run this so "su" if not logged in as root
WARNING: fdisk is highly dangerous if abused so please take care !!!
3. Once you get the fdisk Command prompt, type "p" to display the partition table
4. Select all the text relating to the partition table and copy/paste it into this thread
5. Type "q" to quit fdisk

Back to you

Ian

Jongi · 11-21-2005, 10:39 AM

Bugger all 4 partitions are primary partitions

# fdisk -l

Code:

Disk /dev/hda: 81.9 GB, 81964302336 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9964 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda1               1        2611    20972826   83  Linux
/dev/hda2            2612        3264     5245222+  83  Linux
/dev/hda3            3265        3394     1044225   82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/hda4   *        3395        8690    42540120    7  HPFS/NTFS

If you do the maths you will see that there is about 10GB missing.

Jongi · 11-26-2005, 08:03 AM

Fixing up the partitions so that the NTFS one was the only primary patrition solved the problem.