Large disk partition
Stephen Harris
I have a 650Mb disk at 1283x16x63. DOS takes up the first 1023 clinders
(the most it can have), leaving me 128Mb as a second partition. But when I
try mkfs it moans for greater than 64Mb :-(
So I now have 64Mb of unused disk (and unusable! Stupid idea of BIOS boot to
have each partition starting before cylinder 1024. means my last partition
MUST be at least 128Mb).
Alternatively, could I make this into an extended partiton, with 2x64Mb
in that, or even 1x10Mb (root+tmp), 1x12Mb(swap=3xRAM),1x64 (/usr), 1x42 (think
of something!).
If so, how? I've read the begineers guide, and the FAQ (Mar 29th) mentions
hda5 as extended partition with a warning, but I couldn't find any info
on how to create this extended partition (NOTE: Dos fdisk won't do it because
it is above the 1024 cylinder limit), nor how to make this as root partition.
Help please! I am on 0.95c (yippeee! I successfully managed to get Linus's
patches to work! Well the kernel boots :-) ).
Thanks in advance.
--
Stephen Harris
sw...@spuddy.uucp ...!uknet!axion!spuddy!sweh
* Meeeeow ! Call Spud the Cat on > +44 203 638780 < for free Usenet access *
Linus Benedict Torvalds
>Is it possible for Linux to use a disk partition greater than 64Mb ?
>I have a 650Mb disk at 1283x16x63. DOS takes up the first 1023 clinders
>(the most it can have), leaving me 128Mb as a second partition. But when I
>try mkfs it moans for greater than 64Mb :-(
Yes, the 64MB limit is still there in the filesystem: it seems the VFS
functions start to get complete soon, but I haven't written any actual
code for any other fs-type. I'll be adding an "extended-minix" type
soon - it will conform to the native-order-long minix filesystem type,
which allows bigger disks, but still has the 14-character name limit (in
case someone wonders why keep to minix types: it's easy to add, as I can
use most of the old routines anyway, and some misguided persons use
linux and minix side by side :)
>Alternatively, could I make this into an extended partiton, with 2x64Mb
>in that, or even 1x10Mb (root+tmp), 1x12Mb(swap=3xRAM),1x64 (/usr), 1x42 (think
>of something!).
As you report you have 0.95c running, it should be safe to use extended
partitions, but the old fdisk probably has problems with them still. At
least I haven't heard any reports of problems with extended partitions
yet, although I haven't heard any success-stories either.
There are other fdisks than the linux or dos ones - pfdisk etc is
reported to work. I haven't got any personal experience (I should be so
lucky to have the 1024-cylinder problem :). Anyway, linux 0.95c should
report any partitions it finds at bootup (along with some data on size
and position), and you should check the numbers before using extended
partitions the first time.
If the bootup-information seems to be ok, try out the extended
partitions (but back up just in case...).
>Help please! I am on 0.95c (yippeee! I successfully managed to get Linus's
>patches to work! Well the kernel boots :-) ).
Is everybody this surprised when one of my patches happen to work? :^)
Linus
Stephen Harris
>There are other fdisks than the linux or dos ones - pfdisk etc is
Obviously, I have pfdisk (from the 95a root disk), but I didn't think this
could create extended partitions. I'll recheck though. Thanks.
>Is everybody this surprised when one of my patches happen to work? :^)
Dunno about other people, but I was amazed that I had managed to put enough
stuff together in such a way that the patch procedure worked for me!
This is my first experience at beta testing, so everything I do correct is
amazing :-) Dunno why people make so much fuss about problems compiling
the kernel with gcc 1.40 :-)
david.a.cuka
>In article <1992Apr8.1...@klaava.Helsinki.FI> torv...@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds) writes:
>>There are other fdisks than the linux or dos ones - pfdisk etc is
>
>Obviously, I have pfdisk (from the 95a root disk), but I didn't think this
>could create extended partitions. I'll recheck though. Thanks.
I just repartitioned my HD last night. I used pfdisk to set up the
initial partitions for both DOS and linux. I used the following
configuration with pfdisk:
1 6 0 76 # 40Mb
2 5 77 153 # 40Mb
3 129 154 230 # 40Mb
4 129 231 307 # 40Mb
Something was not quite right because DOS formatted the first partition
to 75Mb iso 40Mb. To solve this, I deleted the 2 DOS partitions with
DOS 'fdisk' and recreated them. This seemed to work and the C: drive
formatted to the correct size. I then created a logical drive in the
extended partition and it also formatted correctly. LINUX happily made
file systems on both /dev/hda3 and /dev/hda4.
In the end, pfdisk works great for linux partitions and DOS fdisk worked
great for the DOS partitions. One interesting quirk with DOS; I had
to reinstall DOS from my original DOS 5.0 upgrade; even after format/v/s
the C: driver would not boot. Wierd.
>--
> Stephen Harris
> sw...@spuddy.uucp ...!uknet!axion!spuddy!sweh
>
> * Meeeeow ! Call Spud the Cat on > +44 203 638780 < for free Usenet access *
David Cuka