Considerations before you install

[Wh1sper]

Hello All readers of this thread.
I'm really welcome fred's suggestions as they compare with my experience in many installations -- mostly.
The best way for Gamers might be an extra partition /usr/local for installation.
I really surprised that this Partition is not mentioned by anyone else.
Most, if not all Games which comes with installers -- as they are commercial or free -- recognize if they do have write permission to
/usr/local In Ubuntu and Linuxmint, the normal User does not have write permission to it.
So I am changing this with a simple sudo chmod -R bed:bed /usr/local/. (bed is my login name)
This is not recommend for a multiuser system but for a Desktop PC I think this security downgrade is bearable.
Now, the games will be installed in /usr/local/games and make a link to /usr/local/bin/gamename.
So what is the plus for my approach?

Code: Select all

 /          --> 12 G
/usr/local --> 90 G
/home      --> 90 G

• This meet fred's suggestions to use more smaller partitions.
• A new Linux Installation does not imply new Installation of Games in /usr/local (ever installed UT2004 twice?)
• Now in /home there is private stuff only, no Games

Just my two cents

[Fred]

Wh1sper,

Greetings Sir,

Your suggestion is a reasonable one for a serious gamer. Actually, the recommendations here are for basic first or second time GP installs and do not take into consideration the many special needs of some users, gamers being one of them.

I would only make one suggestion in your case. Go one step further and change the permissions for the /games folder only, instead of the whole /user/local folder.

Wow! 90 Gig of games! You must really be into games.

Enjoy life,

Fred

[big_dog1968]

Fred,
How can I label the partitions for easy reference? In XP you had a volume label. These are NTFS drives created in gparted. There may be something simple I am missing, but so far I have not figured out how.

[Fred]

big_dog1968,

There are a couple different ways, but it would probably be the easiest to do it with the latest stable version of Gparted live cd, which can be found at the link below. It is a good idea to have a Gparted live cd around anyway so it won't really be wasting a cd for this one task.

http://sourceforge.net/project/showfile ... _id=271779

There is an option available to label the partition without doing anything else to it. It will change the UUID if you are still using UUIDs however.

Fred

[big_dog1968]

big_dog1968,

There are a couple different ways, but it would probably be the easiest to do it with the latest stable version of Gparted live cd, which can be found at the link below. It is a good idea to have a Gparted live cd around anyway so it won't really be wasting a cd for this one task.

http://sourceforge.net/project/showfile ... _id=271779

There is an option available to label the partition without doing anything else to it. It will change the UUID if you are still using UUIDs however.

Fred

Thanks again Fred. I downloaded gparted live and it worked like a charm.

[fabb]

For this purpose, there is no need for the swap partition to be over 256 KB at most.

this is a bit few, don't you mean 256 MB?

ah, i see the 4gb limit you suggest comes from the 32 bit limit.

[Wh1sper]

Sory I've made a typo:

sudo chown -R nathan:nathan /usr/local
is better
Sorry!
And Yes
sudo chown -R bed:bed /usr/local/games
sudo chown -R bed:bed /usr/local/bin (here in bin comes most start links for games, so enabling writing is good, also)

is smarter

[Wh1sper]

Hello All readers of this thread.
I'm really welcome fred's suggestions as they compare with my experience in many installations -- mostly.
The best way for Gamers might be an extra partition /usr/local for installation.
I really surprised that this Partition is not mentioned by anyone else.
Most, if not all Games which comes with installers -- as they are commercial or free -- recognize if they do have write permission to
/usr/local In Ubuntu and Linuxmint, the normal User does not have write permission to it.
So I am changing this with a simple sudo chown -R bed:bed /usr/local/. (bed is my login name)
This is not recommend for a multiuser system but for a Desktop PC I think this security downgrade is bearable.
Now, the games will be installed in /usr/local/games and make a link to /usr/local/bin/gamename.
So what is the plus for my approach?

Code: Select all

 /          --> 12 G
/usr/local --> 90 G
/home      --> 90 G

• This meet fred's suggestions to use more smaller partitions.
• A new Linux Installation does not imply new Installation of Games in /usr/local (ever installed UT2004 twice?)
• Now in /home there is private stuff only, no Games

Just my two cents

[redneck]

As a newbie to Linux in general and Mint in particular, this post intrigued me as I have lost some data due to a not very good user (me). I must admit that I haven't read all the posts contributed, as some of them are a bit above me (sorry).

After following the post and partitioning as follows:
swap
/
/usr
/home
I reinstalled Mint.

When the installation completed the partitions looked like this:
swap = 1.91gb
/./dev/.static/dev = 9.54gb I assume that this is just / with a different name (I hope so anyway)
/usr = 11.4gb
/home = 19.07gb

If I read the post correctly (and the dual booting one), I can now install mint without losing all my settings, is this correct. How does Mint install without destroying all the data? I would like to know how this arrangement (and I hope I got it right) works. In other words, where does mint install itself, and are the partitions I`ve done big enough and O.K..

Replies and information are most welcomed.

[CodeMaster.Rapture]

Hi there,

I too am a newbie to Linux (toyed around with Ubuntu & OpenSUSE a bit), and I'm wanting to make a transition from WinBlows to Linux. I do have some questions about partitions, but before I get into that, let me explain my hardware:

Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe (nForce4 Chipset)
AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 Socket 939 (Dual Core, OC'ed to 2.73Ghz)
2x1GB Kingston ValueRAM (My OCZ died on me and this stuff works better at 1/4 the price!!!)
eVGA GeForce 8800 GTS '92 (640MB edition)
2xWD 120GB SATAII Drives
Plextor 750-a DVD Mutli-burner (Dual-Layer! wewt)
D-Link WDA-2320 WiFi 802.11abg (I hate this damn thing)

On my first HD, I've got Vista Ultimate x64 and XP x64 (60gb each). On my second HD I've got Ubuntu 8.04.1. I'm wanting to do 2 Linux OSes (Prolly Slack & Mint). What I'm curious about is:

1.) I've read a bit about ReiserFS vs. Ext3. Does it really matter which I use? ReiserFS is what my Ubuntu and it seems a bit snappier than Ext3.
2.) Do I need 2 swaps or can I get by with one 4GB swap?
3.) With a Dual-Linux config, what would be the best partition setup? I'd like to have an NTFS swap and Linux Swap(s?) close to the edge.
4.) How do I prevent the second Linux OS from overwriting the first during install?
5.) Is it possible to Quad-Boot everything from Grub without the Vista loader? Grub is just awesome-sauce. (Links please?)
6.) If I decide to do a multi-OS shared partition, does it matter if it is FAT32 or NTFS? NTFS seems to handle large files better...
7.) Finally, even though I'm not at 4GB of RAM, are there any other benefits to 64-Bit Linux OSes?

Thanx in advance.

[Fred]

CodeMaster.Rapture,

I'll take your questions one at a time but won't repeat them for the sake of space.

1.) Ext3 is safer. Not as fast but safer.

2.) One swap is sufficient, however, two small swap partitions on separate drives will be faster than one larger swap. The sum of your physical ram plus total swap should not exceed 4 Gig. You can't use but 3.5 Gig total memory at most in standard Mint or 32 bit Ubuntu so any more than that is just wasted space. Also, there is no need in your swap being more than twice your physical RAM, even if that puts your total well below 4 Gig.

3.)I would need more information about your system, partition table, installs, intended use, etc. to give an intelligent answer to this one. Go back to the beginning of this thread and read my first post. This might give you a little direction.

4.) Download and burn the latest stable version of Gparted Live cd. Do your partitioning with it. Then during the install use the manual option and assign the partitions you have premade for the install.

http://sourceforge.net/project/showfile ... _id=271779

5.) Yes. The Installer is pretty good at picking up the other installs during installation.

6.) NTFS is your better option here. Mint 5 recognizes and enables read/write to NTFS partitions out of the box.

7.) Depends on your intended use. For most general purpose desktop uses, I would say it is probably more trouble than it is worth. It is faster but it also requires more RAM overhead for the same program load.

I hope this was somewhat helpful to you.

Fred

[CodeMaster.Rapture]

Thank you for your responses!

I'll be using my Linux OSes for learning and some programming. I was going to stick with ReiserFS which improves compile times by quite a bit. Using Slackware 12.1 and Ubuntu 8.04.1, I compiled 57MB of C++ code in 23:03 using Ext3 and in 14:31 using ReiserFS. I'm impressed. I don't think I'll be worried about losing any info on those partitions anyways.

So, given my system, I was thinking of doing one 1GB swap on hd0 and one 1GB swap on hd1. Does this seem reasonable? Keep in mind I'm going for speed and will be using quite a bit of RAM during compilations. I might toy around with some video editing too. Here is the partition plan I have in mind:

hd0:
Primary: Linux Swap (1.00 GB)
Primary: NTFS (55GB, Vista x64 Ultimate)
Primary: NTFS (55GB, XP x64 Pro)

hd1:
Primary: Linux Swap (1.00GB)
Primary: NTFS (6.00 GB, Swap) ;Vista is such a pig... 4GB wasn't enough before...
Extended: ReiserFS [/boot] (Mint, 1.00-2.00 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [/boot] (Slack, 1.00-2.00 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [root] (Mint, 10.00 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [root] (Slack, 10.00 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [/tmp] (Mint, 5.00 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [/var] (Mint, 5.00 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [/home] (Mint, 20 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [/tmp] (Slack, 5.00 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [/var] (Slack, 5.00 GB)
Extended: ReiserFS [/home] (Slack,20 GB)
Extended: NTFS [OS Shared] (~31 GB, rest of the drive)

But, this brings up an interesting set of questions as I couldn't find specific answers through documentation.

1.) Do I have to have 3 Primary partitions before I can do an extended?
2.) How many extended partitions can I have?
3.) What's the difference between Extended and Logical?
4.) Is there a way to hide partitions from each other? Hide the NTFS OSes from each other and the Linux OSes from each other. If so, how?
5.) I may be adding Mac OSX to the equation later (Multi-platform apps, yay!), are there any special types of filesystems I need for that and can GParted do it?

Thanx again.

[james]

phonicboom,

If you are asking for my advice.

2gb swap | the rest as / and /home combined

Definitely not.

2gb swap | 20gb / | 20gb /home | the rest

This is the best and simplest one to install that you are considering. I would suggest that you trim your root back to 10 - 12 Gig. however. I have everything but the kitchen sink on my install of KDE, which is larger than Gnome, and my / weighs in at 7 Gig. Unless you are going to do a lot of development work and compile very large programs, you will never use 20 Gig. You are just slowing your install down for no good reason. You can add to your partition later from your unallocated space if you find that you need it.

If you are doing a lot of development work, none of the partitioning schemes in this thread would be appropriate for that kind of work.

Fred

Hello Fred,
How do i trim my root back to 10 - 12 Gig at the monent it is 18 Gig and swap is 2 Gig, i am useing mint 5 the kde version.
I very new to linux so i don`t understand most of technical language.

[teaumaz]

Maybe a silly question, but I just partitioned like this on my 40 gig harddrive

/ -> 10000
/home -> 28000
/swap - 2000

Are there really compelling reasons to put my swap first? Apologies if this has been answered already before. I read this topic and read that partitions on the outside are faster than partitions on the inside (bottom of the list). Is that the reason?

Basically, should I redo my installation, or am I good to go the way it is at the moment?

[thetank]

I tried to do this but mint wouldn't install... seems it will only work with auto partioning and formating

[tawan]

Are there really compelling reasons to put my swap first? ... I read this topic and read that partitions on the outside are faster than partitions on the inside (bottom of the list). Is that the reason?

Basically, should I redo my installation, or am I good to go the way it is at the moment?

that is the reason but there is not much need to reinstall unless you depend heavily on swap and notice a speed issue. If you have plenty of ram then swap will barely get used.

if you want to redo it then yes swap first is to place it on the faster part of the disc.

[switch-blade]

I have read all the posts, and I understand much better what's going on. But I have a question about hidden folders. Can I make a separate partition for the hidden ".mozilla-thunderbird" folder?

Every time I have to install/reinstall a linux distro, I copy the contents of this folder (I have lost my wife's email data more than once). Doing this is a hassle. Would it work to make a separate partition for this data? Or would this data get overwritten (separate partition or not)?

[Husse]

switch-blade

That's how I have it - rather in my data folder which is a partition mounted in home I have a folder which contains the profile for Thunderbird.
When you make a fresh install you have to use the profile-manager to use the old profile folder - google for thunderbird and profile-manager and you'll find info on how to do it

[switch-blade]

Thanks for the reply Husse. I the intervening time, I was googling for some solutions (possibly on other forums). I found this page on the Mint wiki. It talks about changing the profile.ini file in the (hidden) .mozilla-thunderbird folder to point to the copy in the Data folder that you create during the process.

It wasn't much of a stretch for me to figure out that I could make a folder (which I called "tbird") in my /home/x/ directory. I copied the data from /home/x/.mozilla-thunderbird to /home/x/tbird, and I changed the profile.ini in /home/x/.mozilla-thunderbird to use the data in /home/x/tbird/.mozilla-thunderbird -- which has an original copy of the .ini file that points the data in the newly created directory. I then made a copy of the modified .ini file so that when I do a fresh install, I can copy the modified .ini back to the fresh /home/x/.mozilla-thunderbird folder.

Once I move my newly created tbird folder to its own partition, I won't have to copy this data anymore.

This is great because the biggest annoyance with fresh installs is copying data, and restoring Firefox and Thunderbird. I have a handle on FF via extensions that back up my settings. Now TB won't be an issue. Sweet!

Of course I could make my life even more simple by getting my wife to use web-based mail instead of TB -- but she's not amenable to that...

[Husse]

And I don't trust web based mail one bit - all your personal correspondence collected somewhere you have absolutely no control over, and in many cases (hotmail gmail) in the US which as a government that could block anyone's access in the name of the war against terror or some such
But perhaps I'm overly paranoid