aru Posted January 14, 2003 Report Share Posted January 14, 2003 reverend_d Frequent user Joined: 03 Jul 2002 Posts: 36 Location: Dallas,Texas Post Posted: Mon Jul 08, 2002 2:40 am Post subject: Which HD are your programs on????? (partitioning tip) _________________________________________________________________ Here is a little something I learned today after installing Mandrake. Be carefull where your HD's and partitions are. Allow me to explain. I have 2 HD's in my system, an 8G and a 40G. The 40G has 5 partitions. Drive letters and names as follows: C: Windows E: Swap F: Documents G: Programs H: Work I believe you can tell from the anmes what each partition holds. A vast majority of you will notice something odd..... Where is drive D? Drive D: is my other HD, the 8G. So heres what happens...... I installed Linux on drive D:, that way it wont interfere with the Windows Drive. I think it is a good move. Problem.... After Linux is installed on drive D:, windows no longer recognizes drive D: as drive D:. So guess what happens, Windblows Smile automatically readjusts all drive letters, meaning.... C: Windows (hasn't changed) D: Swap (swap file no longer present here) E: Documents (look, a swap file, but no documents) F: Programs (look, all my documents, what happened to all my installed software?) G: Work (um... my software.. where is all my work????) H: hmm..... 0 bytes free, 0 bytes used.... *must be linux* Very Happy Now... all my links are looking to G: for my programs.... Windows is looking to E: for my swap (which now I have 2 of them, one just not being used) and so on and so forth... So what is the moral?? Before you install linux on a partition or an a second HD in your system... changes the drive letters so it is the last one on the line. Don't do like I did and have to uninstall half a dozen programs and fix all the links to the other ones. I hope this helps someone out there just getting ready to switch to linux like I did. (Linux Newbie 38Hrs Smile ) Let all your newbies know. Your good Reverend here blessing all RPM's and praying to root. May all your sessions be productive sessions. ShavenYak Newbie Joined: 15 May 2002 Posts: 13 Post Posted: Mon Jul 08, 2002 2:56 pm Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ It's been a long time since I've used it, but there's a program that comes with Partition Magic for Windows that will scan the Windows registry and .ini files, replacing all occurences of one drive letter with another. I think it was called Drive Mover or something similar. It worked great for situations like this. Of course, now that I use an OS that handles disk drives in a sensible manner, I'll never need it again. Very Happy Glitz Senior user Joined: 02 May 2002 Posts: 507 Location: The Great White North Post Posted: Tue Jul 09, 2002 3:47 am Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ You could also have shrunk the D: drive to minimum size (<1MB?) and then put a second partition on it for linux. Glitz. reverend_d Frequent user Joined: 03 Jul 2002 Posts: 36 Location: Dallas,Texas Post Posted: Tue Jul 09, 2002 1:58 pm Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ That was my plan. Its an 8G drive, so I used all of it except 250Megs, but I used linux to partition it and left the fat partition on the end. I think that is what screwed it up for me. Smile I will know better enxt time. compufig Frequent user Joined: 02 May 2002 Posts: 50 Post Posted: Tue Jul 09, 2002 8:42 pm Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ if you want to load linux on that 8 gig harddrive you should never let windows get is hooks in it. i think you dont really understand partitioning and that is your problem. if you want some help tell us more details about your patitions, like which ones are primary and which ones are logical in an extended partition. the version of windows you are using would be helpful to. also what software are you partitioning with. i load duel boot on the the computers i do with no problems at all. i know i sound like a dick but so be it i guess im a dick, but i can help. Evil or Very Mad Glitz Senior user Joined: 02 May 2002 Posts: 507 Location: The Great White North Post Posted: Tue Jul 09, 2002 11:37 pm Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ reverend_d wrote: That was my plan. Its an 8G drive, so I used all of it except 250Megs, but I used linux to partition it and left the fat partition on the end. I think that is what screwed it up for me. Smile I will know better enxt time. If the fat partition is now a logical partition (not a primary partition) then the fat partition will appear only after all your primary partitions in windows. Windows first assigns drive letters to primary partitions and then to logical partitions. You should have shrunk the partition and kept it as the first primary partition on the drive. Ah well... Glitz. reverend_d Frequent user Joined: 03 Jul 2002 Posts: 36 Location: Dallas,Texas Post Posted: Thu Jul 11, 2002 11:18 pm Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ compufig Quote: if you want to load linux on that 8 gig harddrive you should never let windows get is hooks in it. Lesson Learned. Smile Quote: i think you dont really understand partitioning and that is your problem. I thought I did, Linux has taught me a few things about it though. Embarassed Quote: i know i sound like a dick but so be it i guess im a dick, but i can help. No worries. I get what your saying. Glitz Quote: If the fat partition is now a logical partition (not a primary partition) then the fat partition will appear only after all your primary partitions in windows. Windows first assigns drive letters to primary partitions and then to logical partitions. That would explain why the 8G drive is now lettered D: and H: with two partitions. Well, here is what I have done. Just so ya know. I removed the 40G drive, Set the 8G as master and FDisked with 2 partitions. Installed windows on the first partition and installed a data recovery prog. Reconnected the 40G as a slave and recovered all neccessary data (4Gigs - didn't know it was that much) to the second partition. Set 8G as slave, set up 40G as master, boot to floppy, Fdisk to 4 partitions and format. Set primary for C: on 40G and formated first partition on 8G to prevent windows install from insatalling on D: (which is now the 8G). With windows now on the 40G I can transfer the recovered data to the 40G drive and I now have the 8G with 2 partitions, one 500M and one 7.5G. A lot of (prob) useless work, but the outcome has been what I needed. Now, I did not realize about windows setting drive letters to primary partitions first, which is why my 8G drive is listed as D: and H:, which is not what I want. So I am now guessing that with FDisk I should make the first partition on the 8G not a primary drive, thus causing windows to move the drive letter to the end (since I can't reconfigure the drive letters throug windows)? If that is so, then it will prob take caree of any probs I had. I don't think I will be installing linux back on the win box, since most of my work is there in win progs and I really don't want to take the chance with it again untill that isnt my primary work computer. I will however install Linux on my laptop and let it have the full HD. That way if I screw up the laptop, nothing else is lost. Smile But for you compufig, here is my info in case you have more info I may put to ready use. HD1: 40G w/4 Partitions (15G, 5G,5G,15G) C:(primary), E:, F:, G: (E-H logical) HD2: 8G w/2 Partitions (500M, 7.5G) D:(primary), H: (1Meg in Bad sectors Smile ) DVD-Rom and CD-RW (I: and J Smile Running Win98SE (looking for 2K or XP Corp) FDisk for partitioning I usually run GoBack but I wont install it again with a linux duel boot until windows no longers recognizes the Linux Drive. After linux has taken over and win no longer displays that drive in the explorer, then I will. Comp Info: (if desired) 400 PII w/319M Ram ATI Rage Pro 8M coupled through an STB VooDoo2 Accelarator 16M. Ensoniq Sound Basic WinModem (no problems in Linux with it, have Cable, wont mess with modem Smile ) (shitty) HP DVD (which is about to go bye-bye if it crashed windows again) 32x10x40 CD-RW (and a 4x2x24 CD-RW currently not connected) LinkSys 10/100 Ethernet LAN Card I think that is about it. I have had more stuff in and out of this computer............ If I know I can put linux back on this comp w/o worry of data loss, then I will do it again, but I either need to find a way to make cheaper back-ups or have a safe guard against my malfunctions (and I mean me, not the computer). I know windows well enough to tweak just about every registry string blindfolded, but I don't like windows and the ever present BSOD's. If I had a nickle for every blue screen of..... wait, I think Bill Gates gets a nickle for every blue screen of death. That would explain it. Smile Anyways, thank you all for the info you have provided, and hopefully soon I will be back on the road to Linux. Glitz Senior user Joined: 02 May 2002 Posts: 507 Location: The Great White North Post Posted: Fri Jul 12, 2002 7:17 pm Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ reverend_d wrote: Well, here is what I have done. Just so ya know. I removed the 40G drive, Set the 8G as master and FDisked with 2 partitions. Installed windows on the first partition and installed a data recovery prog. Reconnected the 40G as a slave and recovered all neccessary data (4Gigs - didn't know it was that much) to the second partition. Set 8G as slave, set up 40G as master, boot to floppy, Fdisk to 4 partitions and format. Set primary for C: on 40G and formated first partition on 8G to prevent windows install from insatalling on D: (which is now the 8G). With windows now on the 40G I can transfer the recovered data to the 40G drive and I now have the 8G with 2 partitions, one 500M and one 7.5G. A lot of (prob) useless work, but the outcome has been what I needed. Well, it builds character Laughing I think partition magic could have saved you a lot of grief. Quote: If I know I can put linux back on this comp w/o worry of data loss, then I will do it again, but I either need to find a way to make cheaper back-ups or have a safe guard against my malfunctions (and I mean me, not the computer). I know windows well enough to tweak just about every registry string blindfolded, but I don't like windows and the ever present BSOD's. If I had a nickle for every blue screen of..... wait, I think Bill Gates gets a nickle for every blue screen of death. That would explain it. Smile Anyways, thank you all for the info you have provided, and hopefully soon I will be back on the road to Linux. Well, let's see. If win98 cost you $200 (assuming you didn't upgrade) then at $0.05 a BSOD that would allow you 4000 BSODs. And if we further assume that you have on average one BSOD every day then you paid for just under 11 years worth of BSODs. Hmmmm, and since win98 is now officially unsupported by microsoft, (just shy of 4 years) that means in fact that you actually paid for 4 years worth of BSODs ($73) and the actual operating system only cost you $127. How do you like that! Laughing I think we've figured out microsoft's master plan! Laughing But seriously, if your data is very important, I would advise either backing it up (twice) or else don't mess around with your partitions until you do. Glitz. bil2 Newbie Joined: 18 May 2002 Posts: 24 Post Posted: Sun Jul 21, 2002 1:45 am Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ Yep. Partition Magic has Drive Mapper as well. Unfortunately P M does not recognize Rieserfs but will recognize ext2 &3. You have to really watch the drive letter thing or you will not boot an OS and the P M rescue floppy is no help either. compufig Frequent user Joined: 02 May 2002 Posts: 50 Post Posted: Sun Sep 08, 2002 3:42 am Post subject: _________________________________________________________________ I know this thread is old but im going to finishing adding to it. You wrote: "HD1: 40G w/4 Partitions (15G, 5G,5G,15G) C:(primary), E:, F:, G: (E-H logical) HD2: 8G w/2 Partitions (500M, 7.5G) D:(primary), H: (1Meg in Bad sectors " First you have to stop thinking of your partitiions as letters. You get 4 primary patitions and thats it. One of those partitons can be a extended. So you can have 3 primary partitions and 1 extended partition. Inside of that extended partition can be as many logical drives as you like. Ok now linux see's your drives like this. First Primary partition=hda1 Second Primary partition=hda2 Third Primary partition=hda3 Fourth Primary partition=hda4 First logical drive in extended partiton=hda5 all logical drives are labeled 5 and above. Then of course for the sencond drive would be hdb1...2...4...... and so on. The way i load my system is like this. hda1=windows partiton(what will become you c drive in windows) then i use a extended partition to house my logical drives for linux. hda5=root hda6=swap hda7= home the rest of the space on the drive is partitioned fat32 into one or two more primary partitons. These drives are for data and backup that both windows and linux use. For me i need those partitions to be primary so that i can write ghost files to them to back up windows. I also write my partimage files for my linux backup to one of those primary drives. To start my installs i start with no partitions. I use the windows installer to make one partition for my windows install whatever size i want. Once windows is installed i use the disk manager in windows to make the rest of my partions leaving the extended with no logical drives. If you are using windows 98 you really need a couple of partition magic boot disks to partition. Then i boot to mandrake and make my root, swap and home partitions(i like home in its own partition) where i left that empty extended partition. I load the boot loader in the mbr. I then use ghost to backup windows and partimage to do linux. Then i can just clone a partion back into place in about 10 minutes. The boot record stays in place and i can just replace windows and linux as a please from my image files. Editor's note: This thread was originally posted at the old MUB (Mandrake User Board at club-nihil). This post is the result of a 99% automatic backup, so due to its nature some text may be lost (improbable but possible). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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