A few months ago, my 12Gb Quantum IDE HDD broke down (bad sectors). While it was
being repaired by Quantum my computer dealer lent me an 850Mb one so I could
continue my work (though I had to really fight to keep the drive from filling
up totally). Now that my old HDD has been replaced by Quantum I have to swap
the 850Mb loaned drive for my 12Gb.
So here is my problem. The 850Mb drive has 2 partitions: hda1 for / and hda2
for swap. I need to transfer all my Linux data from one drive to another
without losing anything. My dealer has allowed me to keep the 850Mb
alongside the 12Gb until I have everything sorted out. To add further
complexity, I want to intstall Windows 2000 (just to try it out :-) on the same
drive and be able to choose what OS I want at bootup. So I need 3 partitions
(Does Win2K need a swap partition? I don't think so.): one for Win2K (FAT32 so
I can use it in Linux too) of about 8Gb (will clusters still be 4Kb at this
size), one for /, and one for Linux swap.
How should the drives be installed (which should be hda and which should be
hdb?)? How big should the swap be? I have 192Mb of RAM but I only rarely use
over 20Mb of swap. What would be the best ordering of partitions for maximum
Linux performance (Win2K performance is secondary)? How do I edit my fstab file
afterwards if I can't boot Linux since the partitions have changed?
What is the best way of going about all this? At my disposal I have
PartitionMagic 4 (which unfortunately cannot make Linux swap partitions of
over 133Mb) and Ghost (My dealer has it -- I'm not sure which version). I also
of course have the Mandrake partitioning tools.
I'm not sure if I'm making myself clear here. I can clarify things if anyone
asks.
--
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Sridhar Dhanapalan
Linux is like a wigwam...No windows, no gates.
Apache inside.
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