Very Computer

I want to buy a large (12 Gb) IDE disk a put Linux on it.  Will I have any
problems?  I have already verified with Dell that my BIOS can support drives
this big -- some sort of LDA capability I think.

To use a drive this big, I may need to make up to 10 partitions -- 4 for swap
and 6 more for data.  There's no limit on number of partitions is there?

                                bob

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Thanks.

                                bob

Quote:

> I want to buy a large (12 Gb) IDE disk a put Linux on it.  Will I have any
> problems?  I have already verified with Dell that my BIOS can support drives
> this big -- some sort of LDA capability I think.

> To use a drive this big, I may need to make up to 10 partitions -- 4 for swap
> and 6 more for data.  There's no limit on number of partitions is there?

Do you really need that many partitions? As far as I know, Linux can handle
large partitions without any problems. Having 4 swap partitions sounds like
overkill to me, if the sole reason is the size of the hard drive. The BIOS
architecture may have problems handling this many partitions though... not
Linux's fault, just the way PC partition tables are designed.

T

Quote:

>I want to buy a large (12 Gb) IDE disk a put Linux on it.  Will I have any
>problems?  I have already verified with Dell that my BIOS can support drives
>this big -- some sort of LDA capability I think.

>To use a drive this big, I may need to make up to 10 partitions -- 4 for swap
>and 6 more for data.  There's no limit on number of partitions is there?

>                            bob

12 gig. no problem.

I think you mean LBA (logical block addressing)  it's a why to trick
* the bios by using a diffent block addressing formula to calculate
the cylinders, heads and sectors.

Just don't pay any attention to the number of c,h,s when partitioning.

Jay Daniels

Getting a big hard drive and partitioning it accordingly is a good practice.
I have two root partitions. Why? When you play with some system files
under /etc and the system's temper forbids you from logging in again,
you will be thankful you have a second root partition. When you upgrade
to glibc-2.0.7 and found out the installation proceeds just to the stage
that renders your system useless, you will be very happy that you have
a second root partition.

Technical points are not always sound points. The rise of packaging systems
like Redhat deprive yourself the thinking in managing the system. So
you throw everything in a big partition because Redhat's "user-friendly"
installation program did that.  The dumbing down process for the sake
of popularity is getting Linux into a forseable trouble in supports.

For all you newbies who are lucky to have huge hard drives, partition
your drive and arrange that well to save furture troubles. Put frequently
accessed files in lower-numbered partitions in order to accelerate
the access. For those who don't know what they are talking about,
please don't give out unsound advices that cause people to suffer.

REB

As for native linux partitions, multiple partitions are a good way of
organizing data, such separating /home, /root, and /usr partitions, but
it isn't a necessary thing to do. Other than that, I don't see how you'd
have any other troubles with the drive size (12GB) if BIOS doesn't cough
up a lung on you...

A. Lausin
Disgruntled Linux Users' Group

This sounds like a good idea, and is one I have considered after *many*
difficulties with resuce disks (following a slightly misguided
attempt to upgrade libc and ld.so...hint: if you are considering this
RTFM repeatedly. Do not try to guess your way around.  But I digress...)

Can you reccomend a specific way to do this?  Should I just tar
/bin, /sbin, /etc, /root, and / and copy them over to a new partition?

(Other, somewhat related question: my hda is hda1, /, and hda2, swap.
Can I decrease the size of hda2 without compromising hda1's data?
Thanks).

--
                                        --Sparty
web: http://upside.net/~sparty/

I just added a 10GB IDE, should work without a hitch for you.

On Thu, 09 Jul 1998 00:56:24 -0400, Anthony Lausin

Quote:

>i've routinely built 80-140GB single Linux partitions, so Linux
>doesn't have a problem with it.

>I just added a 10GB IDE, should work without a hitch for you.

Shade and sweet water,
Brian

jue
--
Jrgen Exner; jurgenex AT microsoft.com
Sorry for this anti-spam inconvenience

Quote:

>Most likely this is not an OS but rather a BIOS limitation.
>Maybe you can try to upgrade your BIOS

Shade and sweet water,
Brian

The other problem, is drive failure, most drives have MTBF's in the
hundreds of thousands of hours, but they still occassionally build duds.

I store a copy of the critical Linux stuff on my Winblows partition, and
a copy of the critical Winblows stuff on my Linux partition, because I
hope that both drives will not die at once.