Jamey Patrick wrote:
> You all are going to laugh at me for doing this or asking this but, I need
> some kind of software to COMPLETELY erase all my partition info. Some how i
> manged to screw it up, My hdd is 3.2gb's and i meant to give half to linux
> and the other half to windows. Well some how i manged to give only 900megs
> to windows and the rest to linux, so i downloaded a programed to resize it.
> But somehow it screwed my whole hdd up and now i only have a 900meg hdd! Ive
> tried Fdisk and it doesnt even show anything! If anyone could help me i
> would be more than grateful to you! Sorry for such along message. Thanks
What did you use to run fdisk when it didn't show anything? Were you able to
login on your Win partition and that's where you ran fdisk? If yes, and I
think that this is what you did, then I believe dos fdisk still doesn't see
Linux partitions.
If you can see your first dos partition of 900MB, with dos fdisk, then you
could run that fdisk again, and create another dos partition for the remainder
of that half of the hdd, or split that portion into two additional dos/win
partitions (logical drives). Create the second and possibly third dos drive(s)
and format. Then, do your Linux install, which will provide you with an
interface at some early point to create Linux partitions, and complete the
install on the second half of the hdd.
If you want one single partition for dos/win, then delete the 900MB one and
recreate with the size you want. I don't know why you'ld want one single
partition for dos, though. You can create additional logical drives, which
will provide long term flexibility.
Also, I don't know which OS you plan to work with the most, but you might want
to consider allocating more space for Linux, maybe 1GB for dos/win and the rest
for Linux; or even less for dos/win, but 2GB for Linux is a nice size for
someone starting out.
If you only have one hdd and don't plan on purchasing another to add a second
hdd, then you might find it worthwhile to get a reliable disk partitioning tool
which supports resizing partitions without losing the data on targeted
partitions (as well as others of course).
Otherwise, you might or would eventually find it preferable to not have created
one single dos partition taking up half the disk. If you used half the hdd for
dos/win and created two or three different dos partitions, or logical drives,
and you ever find yourself needing more space for Linux, then you'll have an
easier time of getting that space. If you use one partition for dos/win and
use half the disk, then you won't have this capability, not without a
partitioning tool which supports resizing without losing data (e.g., Partition
Magic), or creating backups and recreating your dos/win partition in a more
tedious manner, requring use of fdisk and reinstalling your dos/win
configuration from the backup(s).
How many HDDs do you have on your machine? Do you foresee adding another one
within the next year? How many applications and what applications do you plan
to use on your dos/win partition? Do you plan on developing on one and porting
to the other, such that you'ld need about equal space for both systems? What
are your plans?
If you only plan to use dos/win for MS Office, for example, then you don't need
to create a large dos/win partition for this. 300MB would likely be more than
ample for total dos/win configuration.
You could consider something like the following scheme or schema (total 3.2GB):
2GB - main Linux configuration
1GB - all dos/win partitions (or dos/win configuration)
.2GB - a "rescue" Linux configuration, very base/minimal install
If the above 300MB condition would suit your needs on the dos/win partition,
then you could add this to Linux, and instead of creating a .2GB rescue Linux
configuration, create a 900MB to 1GB one for testing new packages and software
builds, before installing on your primary Linux configuration.
It's not a bad idea to have a second Linux configuration for testing new
installs or upgrades and software builds, before making the changes to the
primary Linux configuration. This way, if such a test ends up screwing up the
system, then you can always boot into the primary partition to work on
recovering the test/build configuration, for example.
Adding another hdd of similar or larger capacity would also be useful,
eventually anyway.
Just some ideas.
mike
