n00b alert!!!

[Black Hawk]

First time I'm really getting into linux. Red Hat was recommended so I downloaded 3 iso's. I've got a 80GB here ready to be partition for linux and 2k3 (I'll get that later). Anything I need to know for the partitions? How many do I need? Do I need a seperate partition for swap (if applies)?

[karatekid]

Well I don't know if this is the 1337 way, but it is the easy way. Just take your favorite partitioning program and make a portion of your hard drive unpartitioned. Then start Red Hat installation. When you get to the part about partitioning, just choose "Use Unpartitioned Space" and choose automatically partition. That does all you need. BTW, the partitions RH will make will be one small boot partition (under 50MB,) one swap partition, and one partition for everything else.

I assume you want to dual or triple boot with 2k3 installed. Here is a suggestion, install all other OSs first, then RH. RH will autodetect any other bootable partitions and add them to the boot menu, you shouldn't have to do a thing. Also, Grub (the boot loader) is realitively easy to configure anyway while a Windows boot loader seems like it would be a pain in the rear end.

[Black Hawk]

I plan on installing 2k3 later... :( So it creates 3 partitions or 2 and the 3rd is everything else? I just don't want it to use all my 80GB's =/

[Black Hawk]

Ok......

/me needs some help

Could somebody contact me via IM (contacts are in profile) so they can help me with the installation using Virtual PC (yes that's un1337 but I've never done this). Pretty please!!! :D

[Shorty]

BH....

Here's a safe way of trying RH 9...

Create 3 partitions with Partition Magic

80mb - Ext3 (label it boot)
1024mb - Linux Swap (label it swap)
Whatever you wanna give to Linux (15/20gb???) - Ext3 (label it root)

When you are in the install of RH9, when it comes to partition, select "partition manually with disk druid".

You will see the 3 partitions you have created and select each in turn and hit edit each time. On teh dropdown, you can select the type it is...

80mb - /boot
1024mb - leave it as swap
Other partition you made - /

Then when you get to installing a boot loader. Select no bootloader. You will need to make the rescue floppy disk later in the install when prompted. If you DON'T, you won't be able to boot into your system. Whenever that is the floppy drive, you can boot into the system, when it isn't... you can install other OS's (2K3) and boot them without interfering with Linux. Sure.. it will boot slower than if it was off the HDD.. but if you bork ya Linux.. PMagic them and start again, without having to rescue a later installed Windows master boot record.

Need more help, email me on the usual :)

[mmonnin]

Oh I installed RedHat the other day. I didnt do the auto partition and had some problems with it. I didnt know what to make the /root and it asked for a page file partition which I didnt have. It was already formatted as NTFS so that was my problem.

I have a 50mb boot partition at the from of my drive C: will it use that? Thats what I made if for after reading MMs HDD article.

So I should just leave it unpartitioned and let it do it all?

I couldnt see the partition once I botted up in my XP OS. I thought I clicked where they could both see all the files but I guess I didnt.

[Gargoyle]

Could the contents of the Rescue Floppy be put on a CD and Linux booted off that? Be a bit faster than the floppy.

[Shorty]

I believe it can be Gargy :D

Don't ask me how though :O best read one of those linux manual things :rolleyes: <---- semi n00b

[Black Hawk]

Ok, Red Hat installed fine on VPC but the video is all crappy. I guess bad drivers or something cause of VPC. On the list is my card so I guess it'll work when I install it "for real".

[Enverex]

Best thing to do is to select Auto Partition as it does what Shorty said, but without any effort.

My Card was also listed but it didnt work at all, so its all going to be fun fun fun by the look of things.

NS

[mmonnin]

Mine detect fine but I never booted into RH.

[Slick]

I just took my harddrive, made a swap partition, then I just alloted the rest of the drive to root. I couldnt think of any reason to make seperate partitions for any other directory. The only reason I could think of to use more than one is if you were using more than one harddrive, but I am only using one. Could someone please tell me the reasons to make more than one partition. What is the sence in letting /home have its own partition or what not. I don't understand it.

[Black Hawk]

The reasons for partitions atleast for me is cause the HDD is 80GB and I don't want Red Hat to use all of it. I also installed Windows Server 2003 on it with a partition for program for it too. Red Hat has 3 partitions and the rest of the drive (53GB) is for "Stuff" :)

[mmonnin]

Well I already have Windows across 110 of 120GBs across 2 drives. I have 10GB for a Linux partition I might use.

[Slick]

Go for it, and might I suggest, slackware :D. *please dont kill me, please dont kill me.....*

[CaffeineMe]

I'm not even close to being an expert, but the docs i have read in the past almost always suggest installing Windows first, then Linux. Linux SHOULD boot itself up, install LILO or GRUB and allow you to get back to Windows. Of course, I've also h0sed up partitions dinking with this stuff.

[mmonnin]

I didnt have to install LILO or anything else. I took the boot disk out and it went into XP. Never found out if RH worked tho.

[TheBaron]

partition magic seems to have no problem shifting partitions around on the fly. on my wd2000jb i moved 160 gigs from the front to back of the drive, took about 10 minutes. so any problem i have better not be partition related...

[Straight_Man]

Ok, here is what I would do if you have just stuff (where operating systems are NOT stuff) and want Linux also:

First, only way Linux will get to the stuff right is for it to be in FAT32 file system. In theory you will be able to red NTFS but not write to it, so easiest thing is this:

Stuff gets moved to a logical drive in a secondary partition, then converted to FAT32 if needed.

Open up space toward beginning of drive.

Essentially you will need to do soemthing RedHat does not like newbies to do-- manually set up the parts in the RH installer, as below:

/boot 256 MB -- first partition.
(leaves room for alternate kernels later, among other things-- my boot has 2 enterprise, 1 SMP, a Win4Lin, etc in it right now)
SWAP , 2 times RAM in computer, second partition
/
(no, nothing after) remaining open space between end of SWAP and beginning of Extended partition.

The way RH will then install is that /boot will be happy and in first 1024 portions of HD that it favors, SWAP will then never run very low even if you game in Linux while surfing and doing webdev and editing graphics at once, and / will hold whole rest of file system until you outgrow the harddrive or move your stuff off HD to make room for more Linux.

Mandrake will take this part structure and live with it also. I have not tried to see what the best sizes are for Slack yet.

[Straight_Man]

It will be if you maintian your linux parts with PM. With RH on the drive.

Because Linux likes to know what part number has what data on it. RH and PM number the extended part different. If you keep Linux in primaries then you can have no issues with part number getting changed by PM. If you ever set up new parts, numbers change.

CD 1 of Mandrake and RH are also rescue disks.

You can boot from them, go into Linux single mode, mount your /, go to /etc/fstab and change to match new numbers, your linux will then find what it needs and boot fine. (That is the way out of that number thing, the easiest one.). Boot from CD1 of distro you installed, and if get into that fix of Linux not being able to find anything but /boot then ask before trying as the details are longer to post.

[TheBaron]

ageek you are the man

[Slick]

Yea, well im TheGeek, so what up now cuz?

[mmonnin]

Well for some of us that set up is NOT an option. XP is main installed OS and will stay that way. I have a 50mb C: which is what RH wanted, not 256mb. And I have 10gb which it cannot go out of.

Any way to keep RH only to those 10gb? All other drives are NTFS so I cannot go back to FAT32 and keep my XP boot files on C:.

[Slick]

I am not exactly sure what happen. It might have wanted space on C: to stick lilo in the master boot loader, but isnt that outside of the windows partition?

You should just alot about 500 -1000 mb of linux swap in your 10 gb area depending on how much physical memory you have. Then (as I did it), make the the rest of the 10 gb area /, the root directory.

The thing I don't understand, and someone could probably answer this for me. When you are partitioning your disks with a tool like cfdisk. You have a windows partitoin first and you leave it untouched, then just play around with the end of the disk which is still RAW. You write the table, does that rewrite your windows table, thus deleting all the information, or does it only add the tables at the end of the disk?

[Straight_Man]

Actually, it can be done the way I said:

Linux has lilo or grub. Both can go to a second bootloader-- second bootloader can be XP's bootloader. XP cannot see Linux. XP does not KNOW it is not on C if the other parts are not a file system XP can see(and XP does not know that Ext2 or Ext3 are valid file systems).

mmonnin, you are simply incorrect.

[Slick]

XP must be installed before linux. I am not sure if that is what you are arguing about but I have tried installing windows after linux, it doesnt work, it says both harddrives are not compatible wiht windows XP, you delete linux, oh lookie there, both drives are compatible.

[mmonnin]

Thats because the format Linux installs to is not NTFS or FAT32 or FAT16.

[TheBaron]

does anyone know where i can find a bootloader that will actually WORK with winXP Pro / Redhat 9? i'm fairly confident that otherwise i have setup the bootloader correctly, and it loads using a boot disk, so ... ?

tried grub and lilo already, no go

[Slick]

mmonnin said
Thats because the format Linux installs to is not NTFS or FAT32 or FAT16.

Actaully, the slave drive was totally clean and RAW. It wouldn't install to slave, oddly enough, if you clean off linux it will install to the master. I did not want it on my faster harddrive though so I switched the drives around. It again worked with master and not slave. I think microsoft will not settle for anything but a primary master harddrive.

PS I am pretty sure linux can use FAT32 and FAT16

[Straight_Man]

Linux can use FAT32 and FAT (16 and 8).

To get a Linux boot loader to work you use an 'other' stanza to point to the Windows XP boot loader, or point the XP boot. ini to lilo on the other drive. Chaining the bootloaders is the easiest way with XP.

Here's a helpful place for those wanting links to bootloader docs.
http://www.rocklinux.org/people/ripclaw/links/boot.html

The GRub manual is here:
http://www.gnu.org/manual/grub/index.html

LILO Basics are here:
http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/mini/LILO.html

For a FUBARed install of a bootloader, decent info is here:
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/other-formats/html_single/LILO-crash-rescue-HOWTO.html

Yes, XP wants primary master drive, BUT it need not have the primary partition to run-- I have done otherwise 10-15 times on my and other friends systems. Typically, the easiest way (to fool 2000 and XP as to which physical drive is which, if you want to have Linux on all of the primary master drive and another O\S elsewhere) is a BIOS code swap of HD orders in bootloader-- done as needed.

Linux can be quite happy on a slave drive if you tell it where to install at install time or make a boot floppy, move drive, and edit /etc/fstab and possibly /etc/mtab (depending on how your distro scripts changes in /etc/fstab to /etc/mtab) from a rescue boot.

[Straight_Man]

Linus is one of TheGEEKS. The profs at MIT in AI are some more. Ain't no The (as in one and only) Geek. Periodo.

[mmonnin]

I have had XP on a slave on both my computers. It was the only drive on that cable. It was set to CS and just happened to be on slave connector so I had no primary master but all the rest were filled.

When I installed RH it made it some other format. XP could not see it at all. It was prolly my mistake at changing it, or not making it FAT32.