Reformatting: partition suggestions

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2004-05-29 09:28pm

Well reformat season has come around, and bart is going to start on a clean slate in a few days. I've pondered adding a small Linux partition, and I know that some people make a little partition for Windows (the OS only) so they can wipe only that section when reinstalling Windows.

So, what do people suggest? What is working for you? Keep in mind that I have only a singel 60GB drive. I tend to run at about 80% full.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-05-29 11:12pm

I thought you couldn't just nuke windows completely and reinstall, keeping apps intact, since windows apps like to write into the damned registry, which gets nuked along with windows?

Anyway, read this thread: http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?t=46209. Anyway, a linux install (programs) shouldn't take any more than 10GB (then again, I may have more than that. I suggest 10GB Linux ReiserFS or XFS (you can grow them in the future if you need, 30GB for Windows NTFS, and 20GB for excess data once Windows becomes full and slack space if you resize Linux to be larger or smaller.

For partitioning, I recommend using parted+cfdisk or fdisk+mkfs.* for partitioning or formatting available on Knoppix, since they provide more flexibility, and are faster.

How will you keep your data if it's 80% full with it cleaned though?

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2004-05-29 11:26pm

It's not 80% full when cleaned. It's 80% right now.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-05-29 11:46pm

Then reformatting/repartitioning is not recommended... Sure you can use parted or Partition Magic, but you can lose data by accident that way.

Tolya · Post by **Tolya** » 2004-05-30 10:23am

I would like to point out one thing with the NTFS: it's not compatible with DOS, meaning if you want to do all your formatting maintenance from pure DOS (like I do), then you won't see your NTFS partitions. I had a small accident, when I wiped out my entire backup partition by mistake. Main partition was NTFS, while backup was FAT32. Go figure.

Just something that has happened to me, maybe you'll find it useful.

Hamel · Post by **Hamel** » 2004-05-30 11:44am

Linux can read/write to FAT32 partitions, right? RIGHT?

aerius · Post by **aerius** » 2004-05-30 11:56am

Pu-239 wrote:I thought you couldn't just nuke windows completely and reinstall, keeping apps intact, since windows apps like to write into the damned registry, which gets nuked along with windows?

You can, if you make regular backups of the registry onto another partition. The biggest problem I've found is all those stupidass .dll files that get dumped all over the place, some go in the systems directory, others in the program files, tracking them is damn near impossible.

I'm not much help since all I have is a 6.5GB drive on this computer with minimal programs so I just use a single partition. There's less than 1.5GB of data on this computer.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-05-30 05:44pm

Hamel wrote:Linux can read/write to FAT32 partitions, right? RIGHT?

Of course. Not NTFS though. I don't have a problem since I don't use Windows (at all currently), and people like Wong store data on a seperate fileserver.

Emkay, that's why you do formatting under Linux (for FAT32... you have to use the windows installer to format NTFS, though you can partition it under Linux). 'mkfs.vfat' works nearly instantly for formatting, while 'format' takes agges. Of course, you better know which /dev/hd* device corresponds to what partition, and make sure they are set in order so you don't mix up.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2004-05-30 07:58pm

Don't use FAT32! God man, don't do it!! Get a version of Fdisk (like, any of the non-MS ones) that can see NTFS parts!! Just... don't use FAT32!! You'll go BLIND!

Alferd Packer · Post by **Alferd Packer** » 2004-05-31 12:01am

Go 10 gigs for Linux, 40 for games/mp3s etc, and 10 for just Windows and a swap file.

Or maybe you should put the swap file on a fourth partition. I forget.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2004-05-31 12:35am

Personally, I usually go with 20GB Linux and 60GB Win2k/NTFS on an 80GB drive, but all of my computers are always networked to a dedicated Linux server so filesharing between the two operating systems is not an issue.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-05-31 12:39am

You need FAT32 for sharing data between the two OSes... ya know, lowest common denominator. Besides, what's really wrong with FAT32? I've only rarely used NTFS (then again,

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-05-31 12:42am

Alferd Packer wrote:Go 10 gigs for Linux, 40 for games/mp3s etc, and 10 for just Windows and a swap file.

Or maybe you should put the swap file on a fourth partition. I forget.

You don't need a swap partition. A swapfile will do, just slower.

My setup is 30GB Linux XFS, 500MB swap, and 9.5 of what used to be Windows(now empty ReiserFS partition).

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2004-05-31 12:44am

Darth Wong wrote:Personally, I usually go with 20GB Linux and 60GB Win2k/NTFS on an 80GB drive, but all of my computers are always networked to a dedicated Linux server so filesharing between the two operating systems is not an issue.

Please explain this system in greater detail. It was sorta what I had in mind, save the server bit.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2004-05-31 01:00am

Howedar wrote:
Darth Wong wrote:Personally, I usually go with 20GB Linux and 60GB Win2k/NTFS on an 80GB drive, but all of my computers are always networked to a dedicated Linux server so filesharing between the two operating systems is not an issue.
Please explain this system in greater detail. It was sorta what I had in mind, save the server bit.

It's easy, I partition the first 60GB of the drive as a standard Win2k NTFS partition, and leave 20GB totally unpartitioned and unused. Then, I install Win2k.

Step 2: Install Linux, and tell it to "auto-allocate" the 20GB of free space for itself. It will allocate roughly 6GB for the root directory (which holds the operating system) and leave the rest for the /home partition, which is where you store working information etc. (one nice thing about Linux is that you can completely reformat and reinstall the OS without touching your home directories and their associated work and personalization data).

The caveat: this works great, except that it's hard to transfer files back and forth between Linux and Windows using this scheme. The Linux OS can read but not write the NTFS partition, while the Windows OS can't see the Linux partitions at all. That's why I mentioned my fileserver; it allows me to eliminate this concern by moving files to the server when I want them to be available to both operating systems.

Without a fileserver, this wouldn't work as well. You would have to transfer files by moving them onto some other format such as a ZIP drive or DVD-RW disc.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-05-31 01:36am

There's an Ext2/3 reader for Windows, and maybe one for ReiserFS.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-05-31 01:48pm

Mike, have you tried using the Linux tool that uses the native Windows NTFS driver to mount the partition? You get read/write access that way.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2004-05-31 01:55pm

phongn wrote:Mike, have you tried using the Linux tool that uses the native Windows NTFS driver to mount the partition? You get read/write access that way.

No, I didn't even know about that. But my fileserver eliminates that requirement for me anyway. In Howedar's case, that could be a big help.

Tolya · Post by **Tolya** » 2004-05-31 05:25pm

Could anyone explain why NTFS is great and FAT32 sucks ass?

I use FAT32, used NTFS previously (Windows XP Pro), never noticed the difference. Should I?

Also, Im not a very hardcore computer user, so bear that in mind.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2004-05-31 06:38pm

Darth Wong wrote:
phongn wrote:Mike, have you tried using the Linux tool that uses the native Windows NTFS driver to mount the partition? You get read/write access that way.
No, I didn't even know about that. But my fileserver eliminates that requirement for me anyway. In Howedar's case, that could be a big help.

Could someone elaborate? I must confess I'm about as clueless WRT Linux as they come.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-05-31 07:00pm

http://www.jankratochvil.net/project/captive/ for the NTFS driver

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-05-31 09:31pm

EmKay wrote:Could anyone explain why NTFS is great and FAT32 sucks ass?

If your power goes out, the chances of you losing data or having a corrupted HD is much greater with FAT32 as opposed to NTFS. In addition, NTFS has a more efficient layout than FAT32.