Partitioning question
 

I'm trying to install Slackware on my D: drive.

It was one big partition, so I resized it (so I didn't have to delete the files already on there) down to a 4gb from a 40gb (Leaving me with 36gb of space for Linux)


When I went to install, only my C drive (120gb) would show up. Being the newbie I am, I tried to do cfdisk D: which gave me "Unable to open drive D:"

It might be worth noting that with that 36gb of free space, I left it completely untouched. It's unallocated. (But wouldn't the rest of the D: drive still show up? The part I still have windows stuff on?)



Also, I'm using Partition Magic, so I CAN just create the partitions from that. But then my newbie side kicks in.


Do I want Linux ext2? or ext3? Do I want it to be a logical or primary? And then something I have absolutely no clue about what so ever: How vital is it to have this partition start before the 1024 boundry? It gives me the warning that anything beyond might not be bootable. Is it required to be bootable if I'm dual booting?


And how would you guys split it? I only need two parts, right? The Linux partition and the Linux Swap? Maybe 34gb Linux and 2gb swap?

D is how windows will see it. Linux probably thinks of it as /dev/hdb. Try cfdisk /dev/hdb. I can't check if this works as I've only got 1 drive, /dev/hda

Re: Partitioning question
 

/dev/hda Primary master
/dev/hdb Primary slave
/dev/hdc Secondary master
/dev/hdd secondary slave

Probably 'cfdisk /dev/hdb'

I use reiserfs. But between the two, you definitely want ext3. Might as well be primary. 1024 doesn't matter anymore. Two parts minimum, sure. 2GB swap is almost certainly too much. I have 512MB RAM and 512MB swap on this box and never really touch swap. I have one Slack running on 256MB RAM and *no* swap (long story) and it's okay, though I'm on the command line all the time there. Point is, unless you're running an industrial strength server or modelling orbital trajectories to Mars or something, that's too much. Won't hurt, but it's wasteful.

While you can just have one / partition, having a separate /home is always a good idea. Maybe /usr/local, too. Then maybe /var and /tmp. Then maybe getting real creative. It's up to you. Whichever you'd prefer to deal with.

Is there a special way of going about that? Or are they just blank partitions for the sake of being a little more organized?

Were you asking me or Andrew? I don't understand what you're asking. :)

Sorry, I was asking about that.

Oh. Still not sure I understand :) but they wouldn't be blank. After you create the partition with (c)fdisk, you'd go to another stage of the install which asks where you want them mounted. So say you create three primary partitions - you have /dev/hdb1, hdb2, hdb3. You assign one to swap and it doesn't appear in your filesystem as such. But you assign one to / and the other to /home. So when you list the root directory, you see a single filesystem which includes the /home directory. But that's where all your personal files are/will be stored. And that way, if your system gets fubar'ed, you can blow it out without touching /home. So, after a reinstall, your home directory will still be sitting there safe and sound. Whereas, if it was all on one partition, /home would get overwritten if you had to reinstall. For instance. Is that anywhere close to what you were asking? :)

That's exactly what I was asking, thanks.



Time to try again..