[E_man]

I'm wanting to test a few new operating systems on my netbook but it can't get the partitions working. Gparted let me shrink primary partition fine. However between mint, Arch, and their swaps I have 4 partitions. Neither Gparted nor the installer will let me make more than 4 primary partitions. Is there any way to get any new partitions to install some operating systems to test? I've got 4 OS's I'd like to play with, but any new partitions would be helpful. I'm assuming I'd need 2 new partitions per OS?

Sent from my phone. Forgive the typos.

 

[mushroomboy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by E_man;13064239
I'm wanting to test a few new operating systems on my netbook but it can't get the partitions working. Gparted let me shrink primary partition fine. However between mint, Arch, and their swaps I have 4 partitions. Neither Gparted nor the installer will let me make more than 4 primary partitions. Is there any way to get any new partitions to install some operating systems to test? I've got 4 OS's I'd like to play with, but any new partitions would be helpful. I'm assuming I'd need 2 new partitions per OS?

Sent from my phone. Forgive the typos.

don't do that, use logical partitions or w/e it's called. I would do a primary for Windows, then a primary for the multiple linux partitions all separated into logical drives. I use a primary if I have different systems, like windows, osx, and linux, but never for similar systems.

 

[Devoid]

Create whats called an extended partition. It can contain infinite logical partitions in which Linux operating systems can be installed. Note that Windows cannot be installed in a logical partition.

~Devoid~

Edit: Also, multiple Linux distros can share swap space, no reason to create more than one.

Edit Number 2: Forgot to mention, you will have to delete one of the primary partitions and make the extended partition. This is because you can only have 4 partitions total.

 

[Riou]

Hard drives that use MBR can only have 4 primary partitions. To get around this, the last partition should be an extended partition. Within this extended partition, you can create many logical partitions.

Hard drives that use GPT instead of MBR can have more than 4 primary partitions. However, only motherboards with UEFI can boot off GPT drives.

 

[EntTheGod]

windows needs a primary partition, and linux needs ONE primary partition...

in linux your partitions are noted as /dev/sda(partition number) such as sda1 sda2 sda3 sda4 for your four primary partitions, an extended partition has to lie within those four as well and all logical partitions will start at sda5

you can keep one windows on a primary partition, one extended partition, and one primary partition for your linux /boot mount point, at which point you can install all your linux distros in logical partitions (sda5+) as well as your swap file

leaving one primary partition available if you need it for another windows install or something else just as picky

SHOULD work like that

NOTE: ive never tried sticking a boot partition on a logical drive, but its not supposed to work... if it does some one correct me

another thing you can do with linux installs is LVM's which are basically like virtual logical partitions, you can stick them on a logical partition and its one partition to the hardware, but that partition is split up by software into small completely resizable partitions that give you more freedom with the system after the install

 

[error10]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EntTheGod;13069662
NOTE: ive never tried sticking a boot partition on a logical drive, but its not supposed to work... if it does some one correct me

This works as long as grub is installed in the MBR.

 

[thiussat]

Quote:

Originally Posted by E_man;13064239
I'm wanting to test a few new operating systems on my netbook but it can't get the partitions working. Gparted let me shrink primary partition fine. However between mint, Arch, and their swaps I have 4 partitions. Neither Gparted nor the installer will let me make more than 4 primary partitions. Is there any way to get any new partitions to install some operating systems to test? I've got 4 OS's I'd like to play with, but any new partitions would be helpful. I'm assuming I'd need 2 new partitions per OS?

Sent from my phone. Forgive the typos.

Hard disk drives wont allow more than 4 primary partitions. It is a limitation with the MBR on the hard drive itself. What you need to do is create one or two primary partitions and then create one extended partition and put as many logical partitions within that as you want.

 

[E_man]

So my best bet is to force both Arch and Mint to use the same swap, delete the extra swap partition, and create a partition with extra "logical" partitions inside of it?

I am not sure how to change the swap partition either OS uses, or how to create this partition to create new logical partitions. If anyone is able to help, that'd be great. I'd try googling around, but I'm cramming for an exam atm :/

 

[EntTheGod]

Quote:

Originally Posted by error10;13073757
This works as long as grub is installed in the MBR.

really? SWEET

how do i configure a grub.conf if its installed in the mbr though >_> just let it auto configure off a grub-install or something?

 

[mushroomboy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EntTheGod;13069662
windows needs a primary partition, and linux needs ONE primary partition...

in linux your partitions are noted as /dev/sda(partition number) such as sda1 sda2 sda3 sda4 for your four primary partitions, an extended partition has to lie within those four as well and all logical partitions will start at sda5

you can keep one windows on a primary partition, one extended partition, and one primary partition for your linux /boot mount point, at which point you can install all your linux distros in logical partitions (sda5+) as well as your swap file

leaving one primary partition available if you need it for another windows install or something else just as picky

SHOULD work like that

NOTE: ive never tried sticking a boot partition on a logical drive, but its not supposed to work... if it does some one correct me

another thing you can do with linux installs is LVM's which are basically like virtual logical partitions, you can stick them on a logical partition and its one partition to the hardware, but that partition is split up by software into small completely resizable partitions that give you more freedom with the system after the install

No, primary partitions are designated letters not numbers, such as:

Code:

/dev/hda
/dev/hdb
/dev/hdc

Secondary partitions get the numbers (Extended):

Code:

/dev/sda
    /dev/sda1
    /dev/sda2
/dev/sdb
    /dev/sdb1
    /dev/sdb3

You have it backwards.

 

[EntTheGod]

uhm... no

DRIVES are assigned letters... such as hda hdb hdc or sda sdb sdc

partitions are always assigned numbers, logical partitions are always 5 and up and primary/extended partitions are always 1-4

 

[chemicalfan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EntTheGod;13081432
uhm... no

DRIVES are assigned letters... such as hda hdb hdc or sda sdb sdc

partitions are always assigned numbers, logical partitions are always 5 and up and primary/extended partitions are always 1-4

This.

Kinda wish they'd be named after their mount points though, I always forget which number is which, lol

 

[EntTheGod]

Quote:

Originally Posted by chemicalfan;13082579
This.

Kinda wish they'd be named after their mount points though, I always forget which number is which, lol

hm... thought there was a way to do that...

WELL once you figure out which partition number it is you can always symlink it in the dev folder like /dev/windows > /dev/sda1

that way you can mount /dev/windows /mnt

drive letters will actually change if you put more drives in the system though so if you do that just pay attention if you change your set up

 

[evermooingcow]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EntTheGod;13093734
hm... thought there was a way to do that...

WELL once you figure out which partition number it is you can always symlink it in the dev folder like /dev/windows > /dev/sda1

that way you can mount /dev/windows /mnt

drive letters will actually change if you put more drives in the system though so if you do that just pay attention if you change your set up

You can do this dynamically with udev rules. You feed it some drive specific parameters (model number, manufacturer, etc) and it will create your specified symlink for you (you can do many other things too). Also depending on your kernel configuration /dev will be a ramdisk that gets recreated and populated during boot so links may not stick.

The easier way if you have Linux formatted drives is just to use partition labels. You can label ext2/3/4 partitions running

Code:

e2label /dev/sda1 name

Other filesystems including swap support labeling too using fs specific commands. Once labeled you can reference the partition as "/dev/disk/by-label/name" or "LABEL=name".

 

[kc-tr]

So there are some good ideas listed in this thread but they are all way to complex for the basic purpose of what you are trying to do. Just use LVM thats what it is for.

Here; a full guide on how to use it.

http://tldp.org/HOWTO/LVM-HOWTO/

 

[nathris]

So much bad information in this thread...

1. Windows requires a primary, Linux doesn't.

2. Letters denote physical drives, numbers denote partitions. /dev/sd*1-sd*4 are primary partitions, and /dev/sd*5 is your first logical, so even if you only have 1 primary partition, the first logical partition will still be /dev/sd*5

 

[EntTheGod]

Quote:

Originally Posted by nathris;13098892
So much bad information in this thread...

1. Windows requires a primary, Linux doesn't.

2. Letters denote physical drives, numbers denote partitions. /dev/sd*1-sd*4 are primary partitions, and /dev/sd*5 is your first logical, so even if you only have 1 primary partition, the first logical partition will still be /dev/sd*5

bad information thats been corrected 3 times over...

i believe i said all of that already just by myself, not to mention a couple other people chiming in... try READING the thread

 

[nathris]

Linux doesn't need a primary partition though.

The system needs one, but Linux doesn't.

 

[EntTheGod]

Quote:

Originally Posted by nathris;13105227
Linux doesn't need a primary partition though.

The system needs one, but Linux doesn't.

well if you dont have grub installed to MBR then you need a primary partition for /boot

 

[chemicalfan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by nathris;13105227
Linux doesn't need a primary partition though.

The system needs one, but Linux doesn't.

True, but kinda moot....