Re: Fedora newbie question

["Robert G. (Doc) Savage" <dsavage@peaknet.net>]

On Sun, 2006-04-09 at 09:50 -0600, josh@unified-tech.com wrote:
> Mornin' Y'all.  I hope everyone is having a good weekend.
> 
> So I'm trying to dual-boot my XP laptop with Fedora Core 5.  I used Knoppix
> ntfsresize to shrink down the NTFS partition and am now having problems
> partitioning the drive.  It's a 60 gig drive with 20 allocated to the XP
> installation and presumably 40 free.  I'd like to devote 20 to Fedora and the
> remainder to a FAT32 partition.
> 
> I've tried installing using all of the available options and have listed error
> messages below.  When I choose Create Custom Layout, it reads the NTFS
> partition as 57232 megabytes.  Does this mean that the resizing of that
> partition was unsuccessful?  When I boot the Windows installation it is showing
> 20 gigs.
> 
> I have no problems with re-installing XP and creating a 20 gig partition from
> the get-go.  Is the path of least brain damage to install XP or Fedora first?
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> -Josh
> 
> Use Free space on drive selected drives and create default layout>Could not
> allocate partitions as primary partitions>You have not defiend a root partition
> (/), which is required for installation of Fedora Core to continue.  This can
> happen if there is not enough space on your hard drives for the installation.
> 
> Remove linux partitions on selected drives and create default layout.  Could not
> allocate partitions as primary partitions>You have not defiend a root partition
> (/), which is required for installation of Fedora Core to continue.  This can
> happen if there is not enough space on your hard drives for the installation.
> 
> Use free space on selected drives and create default layout.  Could not allocate
> partitions as primary partitions>You have not defiend a root partition (/),
> which is required for installation of Fedora Core to continue.  This can happen
> if there is not enough space on your hard drives for the installation.

Josh,

The rule is to always install the [stupid|arrogant|monopolistic|...]
Microsoft product first, followed by the [intelligent|cooperative|
capable|...] Linux distribution with its multi-booting loader. Because
of its many limitations, the Microsoft product should also be the first
OS on the first hard drive. The Linux products can be installed
anywhere.

Early in the FC5 installation you'll be greeted by a GUI partitioning
tool that should be fairly intuitive. What you'll want to do is tell it
to automatically partition the remaining 40GB of space. It should do so
by creating one small primary /boot partition and one large Logical
Volume Manager (LVM) partition that will contain the root (/) and swap
partitions. Then...

Now you'll want to edit and shrink the size of that LVM to about 20GB
before proceeding, and use that freed up space to create a 20GB fourth
primary partition. Tell the partitioning utility to format this as
FAT32, but not to mount it anywhere. (That part will come later.)

Now continue with your FC5 installation. It will overwrite the Windows
loader in the boot sector with Linux's Grand Unified Boot Loader (GRUB).
Once booted to Linux you can change the default OS that GRUB will boot
by default if you don't select another from the opening menu.

IMPORTANT NOTE: You may already have a hidden partition on your hard
drive that contains a "plow it all under and start over" image you could
use to blow everything away and reload Windows XP exactly the way it was
the day you bought your laptop. If such a hidden partition exists, it
will be one of the four primary partitions permitted on a hard drive. XP
will be another. The /boot and LVM partitions are also primary
partitions. See the problem? If you have a hidden partition, you won't
be allowed to create a fifth primary partition for FAT32 or anything
else. 

-- Doc
Robert G. (Doc) Savage, BSE(EE), CISSP, RHCE | Fairview Heights, IL
Fedora Core 5 kernel 2.6.15-1.2080_FC5 on a P-III/M IBM Thinkpad A22p
            ** Bob Costas for Baseball Commissioner **


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