Suggestions for partitions

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Puppy_Ninja
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Suggestions for partitions

#1 Post by Puppy_Ninja »

System Pentium 2 400MHz, currently 128M RAM (16M used for video card), with a 40G hard disk.

Currently I have it partitioned as 100M boot partition (old computer so GRUB needs to be here in a small partition) 256M swap partition, the rest is EXT2

What I need are suggestions as to the partitions for the drive. I wish to install several packages,

Puppy installed to the hard disk in such a way that I can replace Puppy (currently 2.13 but would want to replace it when 2.14 is released and the next and the one after that ...)

wine and wxDev-C++, so I understand from an earlier post that I need a separate NTFS partition so that both Puppy and Wine can access the file data

Puppy development software devx_213.sfs, which I understand will also need updating with the expected move to 2.14 (2.15 ...) as well as the dotpup wizard etc.

I suppose I am basically looking for suggestions as to recommended sizes for different partitions. I am a newbie as far as Puppy in particular (and Linux in general) goes, but I assume there are others here who have been in the same position before me, who have learned by trial and error or by the good will of previous users.

I am still not quite up on all the files and folders, so a couple of ideas as to the ratio of partition to partition would be good.

I have looked but in my search I haven't come across anything that looks anything like a shopping list of Puppy Partitions.

Unfortunately I don't have the luxury of time to read up on everything I would like, which is why I ask for suggestions.

thanks in advance

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DC
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#2 Post by DC »

Hi Puppy_Ninja,
One idea for you. A separate partion just for data. All the important stuff that you don't want to loose. I also have my email and internet down loads in there as well.
The reason when you start playing and reinstalling / upgrading either you erase the os partion or mange to accidentally erase it.
My data partion is 2 gig on a 40gig drive.
Put it as near to the front of the drive as you can so that its HDa number does not change if you add / change partions after it.

DC
a little bit of knowledge and I'm dangerous

GeoffS
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#3 Post by GeoffS »

Puppy_Ninja,
Just to echo DC - put your data in its own partition then you can mess around with the rest of the disk. Another BIG advantage is that a backup of that partition is all you need to keep your data safe.
It is the way the commercial IT world has worked since long before the term IT was invented!
Cheers
Geoff

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DC
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#4 Post by DC »

Hi Puppy_Ninja,
Seeing as how you've not had much response I thought I'd tell you my set-up to give you some more ideas.
Having a 40 gig hard drive gives you lots of space to play in.
1st partion - 3gb this is my main puppy. Version 2.13 with Opera, Thunderbird and open office. This is my everyday puppy which has to be reliable so not much playing.
2nd partion for you a swap file. I don't need one as I've got a enough ram.
3rd partion - 2gb for Data as mentioned previously.
4th partion - 15gb for Media - Ogg's (MP3's), movies, photo's etc. Again like the data drive if you break you OS partion then you don't loose your music.
5th partion - 2gb puppy 2.13 for playing with stuff I'm learning / installing etc.
6th partion - 2gb puppy this one is star lite which I'm slowly adding software too. Making my own puppy version.

I have not filled any of the above puppy drives yet. With your 40gig hard drive and the small foot print of puppy and other software I don't think you will come close to filling your hard drive.
One last thought if you don't know. If you do break the OS or Grub your data will still be sitting on the hard drive just fix with a CD boot. I've not lost anything by doing daft things in puppy. Previously in windows I've had to reinstall many times!

DC
a little bit of knowledge and I'm dangerous

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Flash
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#5 Post by Flash »

My two cents worth: to make it easy to upgrade, don't install Puppy to the hard drive at all. Boot it from CD or USB flash memory, if at all possible. Puppy was designed to run from CD and seems to work best when used that way.

How to partition your hard drive depends on what you're going to use it for. If you want to dual-boot Windows for instance, the first partition must be given over to the Windows installation, either NTFS or FAT32, and should be small enough to easily back up. I use 4.7 GB so it will fit on one DVD. If you then want a partition that Windows and Puppy can share, it will also have to be a NTFS or FAT 32 partition. I don't know that WINE needs a NTFS partition; that was just a suggestion I thought might work. I don't think he ever said whether it did any good.

If you had a lot of RAM, as I have, and don't intend to do anything involving large files, such as editing video or audio, you wouldn't need a swap partition at all. In your case though, 128 MB is marginal for Puppy and you should create a Linux swap partition as the second partition on the hard drive. (Hard disk partitions start from the outside of the disk, because reading and writing is faster out there than in toward the center of the disk. However, the difference is not much, so don't fret over it.)

The size of the swap partition seems to be a matter of religious preference. :lol: Seriously, it depends on what you're going to do with Puppy. In your case, assuming the usual applications will be run, 250 MB should be plenty..
[url=http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=69321][color=blue]Puppy Help 101 - an interactive tutorial for Lupu 5.25[/color][/url]

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Fiberflinger
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More questions on partitions

#6 Post by Fiberflinger »

First, DC what type are the partitions you have? You did not mention this.

Secondly, I have a a fairly large system, 120G on hard drive 1, 250 on hard drive 2, and 250 on hard drive 3. 1500 mg RAM. Fat 32 and NTFS windows XT are on 1 and that is where I edit my films in Adobe Premiere 6.5. I store the films on NTFS hard drive 2 which is 2/3 full at present. I recently purchased HD 3 for more film storage, but got side tracked by the aspect of Puppy.

I did not want to fool with constantly loading from a cd so I installed Puppy on HD 3 (hdd1) in its own 10G partition. and Grub in the MBR.

Now I am looking out for the future so I guess my specific question is. . . What do I do with all this space!? I need plenty of film storage area and I do not know if I can edit in Puppy with Premeir, or if Premeir is only good in NTFS. And what type partitions I should be putting the films in for storage. God forbid I loose them, they are not anywhere near an OS.

Bunny
the Fiber Flinger

Puppy_Ninja
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#7 Post by Puppy_Ninja »

Thanks for the replies, and sorry that it took so long to respond.

I am unable to burn a cd at the moment, and so I am using my mp3 player to install the OS on my computer. Currently having a problem getting puppy to see my CD, which is why it took me a while to reply.

I don't want to dual boot windows, I only need wine so that I can run wxDev-C++ (until we produce a Linux equivalent at which time I will remove wine)

So to cut a long story short, something like what DC suggested is OK?

1st partition +- 3GB puppy EXT3 (or would ext2 do?)
2nd Swap 2*RAM
3rd +- 2GB NTFS data for wine/wxDev-C++
4th the rest for Linux data and mp3's video files and such
5th +- 3GB (possibly needed should I decide at some point to run a different version of Puppy)

I also wish to run a web server from my computer, would it be prudent to have a separate partition for this (it might get a bit large, but probably would fit in a 2 GB partition, and if so, how do I point the server software to this location as the location of my web files?

GuestToo
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#8 Post by GuestToo »

you could install Xampp ... just unzip it anywhere, everything is all in one folder, then drag the folder to /opt to create a symlink ... that's all you need to do

Puppy_Ninja
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#9 Post by Puppy_Ninja »

GuestToo wrote:you could install Xampp ... just unzip it anywhere, everything is all in one folder, then drag the folder to /opt to create a symlink ... that's all you need to do
Sounds easy enough for even me to do.

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Flash
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#10 Post by Flash »

Your proposed partitioning scheme looks like it would work fine. I think Barry has said he sees no reason to use ext3 instead of ext2 in general, but I might be wrong about that.

Anyway, partitioning a hard drive and installing Puppy will go so fast that you can easily redo it if you don't like the way you started out. So stop worrying and just go for it. :)

Server questions are out of my league.

GuestToo
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#11 Post by GuestToo »

ext3 is ext2 with a journal ... a journal is a backup of what was happening, so if the system crashes, the file system check program can quickly and easily fix the file system

advantages of the ext3 file system:

1) if Puppy crashes (or is shut down improperly) the file system check (scandisk) when Puppy boots can be much faster, and more likely to fix a corrupted drive without problems

2) the ext3 file system might work a little bit faster

disadvantages of the ext3 file system:

1) it takes a little bit of space for the journal, so there is not quite as much space on the drive

also, supposedly journalled file systems like ext3 are not supposed to work well when loop mounted

i have crashed Puppy fairly often ... usually my own fault ... and certain movies crash Puppy when i play them in Puppy 212, 213 ... they play ok in older versions of Puppy

anyway, not once have i ever had any trouble when Puppy fixed the file system when it booted ... i suspect that the ext3 file system works perfectly well whether mounted on a loop device or not

it might be possible that if you had an encrypted file system, and you crashed, then booted Windows and defragged the drive, which moved the pup_save file, and then booted Puppy, that the file system check might not repair the file system properly from the journal ... i have never had a problem with repairing the file system from the journal

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