The binary CD uses the normal resc1440.bin to boot. The source CD uses the boot disk with the tecra patch Depends on what your system needs.
I would suggest that one partition is OK if you are having an initial play with Linux. You will probably make several installs before you start to use GNU/Linux seriously. The Debian FAQ (on the binary disk) has good advice on how to partition a HDD. There are probably as many partition schemes as Debian users. On Tue, 8 Dec 1998, Kent West wrote: > On Tue, 8 Dec 1998, KTB wrote: > > > #1. Ok I'm not getting very far. First of all I want to make sure I am > > using the right disk. I have Debian 2.0 official, both the Binary and > > Source disks say the same thing when I boot them up and try to install > > from cdrom. Can you use either, or? > > I'm fairly new myself, so don't take my responses as gospel. I'm not sure > if you can use the Source CD for an initial install; I think you want to > use the Binary. > > > I went through the steps and > > everything seemed to go ok until I tried to partion the drive. I > > followed the instructions in the book. I select [New] and [Primary] > > then I can't change the size of the partion, it lets me make a 6149.89 > > MB partion but then can't go on to make a swap partion. The 6149.89 MB > > is my whole HD so maybe that is why I can't make another. At any rate I > > noticed the numbers lock isn't on and the numbers just don't work. I > > entered [US] when choosing a keyboard. > > I haven't yet figured out how to get the numlock to default "On" (that's > low priority for now). You can us the numbers above the qwerty keyboard, > or just press the NumLock key to turn on numlock. > > I don't think I'd use one partition for the system, although the system > doesn't really care. It's just that later you might find it more useful if > you've "modularized" the system some. I'd probably allocate 200MB for the > root, maybe 300 if you want to be generous. Then maybe 64 or 128MB for the > swap (you can't use more than 128MB for a single swap partition, I > believe, and I think 64 would be more than adequate). The rest of the > drive I'd probably evenly divide into partitions for /usr, /tmp, /var, and > /home. Others would probably say this is overkill. > > If you have [an] existing partition[s], you may need to delete them first > to make room for the scheme mentioned above (or whatever scheme you decide > on). Be aware that partitioning will clean your drive of any existing > data. > > Then when you create a new partition, don't let it use the entire space. > One of the questions that cfdisk (or fdisk) asks is how big you want the > partition (it automatically puts in 6149.89M for you, assuming it should > use all the available space. Erase this and type in the size you want > (such as 200M). I believe you can specify the size in megabytes by typing > a number followed by M, but I'm not sure of the exact syntax. I think the > on-screen hints will indicate how to do that. > > Once you've got the partitions created, you'll need to choose the Write > option to actually write the changes to disk. > > > #2. While I'm at it. I have a blank 6.4 gigabyte 2nd IDE HD that I am > > trying to install Debian on. Most of the literature I have read talks > > about partioning in limited space. I was thinking I could make the 1st > > partion (root) 1000 MB and the swap 100 MB, I have 64 MB Ram. Does this > > sound reasonable? Will that make the rest of the HD dead space? > > Thanks, > > Kent > > > > I'm not sure what you're referring to, but again, a root partition of > 1000MB seems awfully large. > Philip Charles; 39a Paterson St., Abbotsford, New Zealand; +64 3 4882818 For Debian GNU/Linux CDs see http://crash.ihug.co.nz/~philipc