Parbreastion conundrum

PaulFXH

Hi;

FWIW - as long as you have 3 Primary + 1 Ext'd, you can have MANY logical drives within that *1* Ext'd parbreastion.

======================== Example =================== (view using a monospace font)

3 Primary-------+---------------+---------------+ Win Xpoop Dellio Diag. Linux (-) everything but swap) (hda1) (hda2) (hda3)

1st Logical 2nd Logical 3rd Logical (hda5) swap (hda6)home (hda7)var (?)

(Above uses "hda" as an example only -- it could be hdb, hdc, hdd, ...)

======================== End Example ===================

Now that said -- there is nothing wrong with the way you have it...Note my Debian install on *hdc* (an old 9.1GB Western Digital);

~$ sudo fdisk -ldev-hdc

Diskdev-hdc: 9115 MB, 9115361280 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors-track, 1108 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id Systemdev-hdc1 * 1 1058 8498353+ 83 Linuxdev-hdc2 1059 1108 401625 5 Extendeddev-hdc5 1059 1108 401593+ 82 Linux swap Solaris

I would be a bit careful, if you decide to remove the Dellio diagnostic (Fat16 32MB) parbreastion because;

1 It's a "hidden" parbreastion, which means only *something* in Dellio's BIOS(or chip) enables access to it. 2 It actually may be very difficult to remove (It may require you wipe the disk clean using the HDD manu utilities, such as MaxBlast(Maxtor), EZ-BIOS (WesternDigital(?)), SeaTools (Seagate)). 3 Without getting deeply technical: There's usually a "reserved" sector at the end of the 1st Cylinder of many HDDs, which is "unavailable" to an OS, or not used. If this is being used for access (somehow through BIOS code) to access the Diagnostics parbreastion, you may have issues when using Parbreastioning tools, (especially commercial ones like ParbreastionMagic , but also perhaps even the best Linux utilities GQTParted. I wouldnt even attempt to use the older command line Linux utilities (ala: csfdisk) for any NTFS resizing-removal.

See;

Most of 2 and 3 is very speculative on my part -- and I'm not exactly sure what's involved with these OEM manu "hidden" things..and each OEM likely uses a slightly different technique - think Compaq, HP, Sony, Toshiba...etc).

Just MAKE BACKUPS!! of Any-All Important data FIRST!!! (sorry - but it's important for me to shout that out ;-) ) This does NOT mean trying to make a Full backup of the entire XP OS install (especially not System Files and any Web Caches)...but using a GHOST (type app) -- one can perhaps be able to achieve close to it.

The more DIFFERING apps (especially for $$ - commercial apps) you insert to this mix, the more likely you'll end up in a HUGE mess.

If at all possible -- I'd recommend another Separate HDD to install an OS on... IOW: HDD1==Dell-WinXP HDD2==Linux HDD3==FreeBSD

Are you now using GRUB to Dual Boot? ..or ???

Having a separatehome parbreastion has it's advantages for sure...but for me - it's not a biggy right now -- learning how Linux works and why, and what does what is more important - then I'll end up moving the install over to a newer larger HDD, wiuth separate allocated parrbreastions for certain Dirs (-home,usr,var,boot, etc). I actually did that at first on my 1st ever Linux installation (1 80GB HDD, with win98 already on it)...what a mess it turned into - but then again, I like to break things, so I can figure out how to fix them :-)

hth

Regards