Now, I only created ONE partition with win98's FDISK - gave it 75% of my 120 Gb drive and let Linux automatically sort out the other 30-odd Gb for itself. So any extended partitions belong to Linux. Should I let Partition Magic mark this partition as an extendedX partition or just leave it?
Please advice me.
Thx in anticipation, Allan
From: Felix Miata <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [Cooker] ldm_validate_partition_table - what's that?
Date: Wed, 15 Jan 2003 11:32:43 -0500
Pixel wrote:
> Ron Stodden <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> > Pascal Cavy wrote:
> > > I suspect diskdrake to have a bug in certain conditions. I have noticed
> > > several mdk installations where fdisk or cfdisk complains about overlapping
> > > partitions, or partitions not ending on cylinder boundary (for ex the first
> > > primary ending on 788 for exemple and the extented partition starting at 788
> > > too !). It was the case on MDK90, I dont know if it's still true on MDK9.1B1
> > > ?
> > All logical partitions must be in cylinder order in the various MBRs along the extended chain
> > for Windows. Partition Magic does this.
> "must be" is truly wrong. There's no such things as a specification
> for this.
Not a specification, a tradition. DOS & DOS-heritage partitioning tools
typically fail if they find the logical chain order doesn't match the
physical placement order.
> windows tools do create non-ordered logical-partitions linked list
I've yet to see one.
> > On the other hand, Linux utilities create MBR entries in order of partition
> > creation time.
NAICT, they, as well as most others, create MBR table entries in order
of availability (FIFO). If previously created were primaries A, B & C,
using table positions 1, 2, & 3, after which B was deleted, most
partitioning tools will reuse table postition 2 when primary partition D
is later created even though physically placed beyond C.
> > This is true for fdisk and cfdisk, to my knowledge. Windows cannot handle
> > this.
> wrong. AFAIK windows doesn't (didn't?) like many things, esp. when
> there is more than one primary partition (why??)
M$ programmers with blinders that don't foresee *and* accomodate the
possibility of more than one OS installed per device or system.
> > Accordingly, Linux-created partitions cannot be guaranteed to be acceptable to
> > Windows.
Usually this happens only when a partitioning tool creates a partition
that does not start on a cylinder boundary. I'm not aware of any
non-Linux tools capable of such behavior.
> you mean FAT partitions created under linux?
Regardless whether any format at all.
> AFAIK there's a pb regarding the boot code which is not written
> correctly when windows is installing on a linux-pre-formatted
> partition.
> > The best solution I know is never to create partitions except with Partition Magic (which
> > does not support ext3, Reiserfs, etc.) or you must dedicate a hard drive to Windows
> > partitions only if you need to double-boot with Windows. You could also choose to
> > dedicate an entire machine to Windows only.
The best solution short of separate disks is to use a tool that
understands multiple formats. The more formats the better. Generally
this means just about any tool that is *not* distributed with any OS,
and includes Partition Magic among many others. Understanding formats is
independent of partitioning, and really just a convenience to the user
of the partitioning tool. A partition can be created without any real
format, having the "format" merely designated in the table but not in
the partition's data area. Once in the table, any smart formatter can
change the table entry to match whatever format is actually applied to
the partition's data area.
> > Yes, you can also use cfdisk etc very carefully, making sure that all
> > partitions are created and exist in start cylinder order.
> wow, i wonder why you write "very carefully" since it's the default
> behaviour, unless you mess around quite a lot with your partitions.
Maybe by carefully he means avoiding Linux fdisk, which throws out table
entries beyond hdx16. ;-)
> as for me, i think diskdrake is powerful enough
As pertains to its use during installation, I certainly don't. It needs
to be smart enough to create HPFS fstab entries when type 07h partitions
are in fact formatted HPFS, rather than useless NTFS fstab entries.
--
"There's nothing so absurd that if you repeat it often enough,
people will believe it." William James
Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409
Felix Miata *** http://members.ij.net/mrmazda/partitioningindex.html
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