Problem partitioning disk for Linux

My hard disk is divided into three partitions right now: hda1, hda3, and hda5, or so the Disk Druid program on my Red Hat Linux installation disk tells me. Windows ME corroborates, telling me of C:, a backup partition, and a partition I created with FIPS it can’t access. I wish to delete hda3 and install Linux on it. When I do, I have to add a /boot partition so the / partition can access all of the disk I want it to be able to. / and /boot can co-exist just fine, but Disk Druid won’t let me make it happen without having a swap partition, too. When I add the swap partition, the program shoots an error message my way, saying that the / partition is unallocated for the following reason: ‘No free primary’.

I’m stuck. Will I have to delete two partitions, instead of just one? Can I work around this?

And I just ran FIPS like a pro, too… :frowning:

It could be a problem with your LILO version in RedHat; Redhat fixed some problems of LILO dealing with large partitions (LILO boot files could be in a high cylinder position)in version 7.0 so you may have to upgrade. What release of RedHat you have?

No such luck: I have Red Hat 7.1.

Oh, does that mean I don’t need a /boot partition, then? I posted before I really thought about what you said.
(Hopeful :))

Have your read the Linux Partition Mini-Howto?

http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/mini/Partition/index.html

You list hda1, hda3, and hda5. I assume that hda2 is your extended partition and contains hda3 and hda5. (And where is hda4?) You don’t mention what you intend hda5 for.

Suggestions:

Kill all unnecessary partitions and reboot. Check your partition table. Make sure you have good contiguous space.

Don’t use fips for partitioning if you can. It seems to cause a profound number of headaches. Other options include Partition Magic (pay) and the new Gnu (free!) partitioning program. You can do this from Dos.

Figure out ahead of time how much of your unused space you will allocate to /, /boot and swap. When partitioning specify the size of the first two you set up. The third takes up the rest. (So a good order is: /boot, swap, and /) Reboot.

Check that you have the correctly sized partitions, etc. Note the new /dev/hda* names for each.

Start your install. Tell your installer where each mount point is. If the installer wants to reformat an empty partition, let it if it makes it happy.

Note: There is exactly an x% chance you will hose your disk and need to restore from backups. I can’t tell you what x is for your system, but it is surprisingly well above 0.

FtG

Not yet. Thanks.

I have no idea where hda2 and hda4 are. To my knowledge, I have no extended partitions on my disk. All I know is that Disk Druid does not show any partitions with those names and Windows ME makes no mention of them, either.

hda5 is Windows ME’s backup partition. It contains some programs and files I assume are of a diagnostic and reconstructive nature. It isn’t very large (2805 M).

Now you tell me! :smiley: FIPS was a very straightforward, well-behaved program that did precisely what I wanted it to do: Resize my main partition without destroying any data. I created hda3 out of a part of hda1 with FIPS.

And that’s where my problems have begun. I create /boot and the swap partition, and they work just fine, but when I try to make /, the error message mentioned in the beginning pops up. The order I make them in matters: The last one I make is the one it can’t find any ‘free primary’ for.

I understand the risks inherient in messing around with partitions. Perhaps I’m just arrogant enough to think I can anyway. :smiley: