Arch Linux

John Karahalis

Member

Registered: 2009-01-27

Posts: 17

Questions Regarding Partitions

I'm going to install Arch very soon, but I have some newbie questions about how I will partition my system.

1. The root partition will be ext4. Apparently GRUB 0.9.7 cannot work with ext4, so maybe I will need to create a separate /boot partition. Does anybody have a good tutorial on setting this up (the best filesystem to use, the size it should be, the fstab, etc)?
2. cfdisk allows me to specify where a partition should reside (Beginning / End). What order should I place them in?

Thanks in advance!

Last edited by John Karahalis (2009-02-27 22:09:04)

ataraxia

Member

From: Pittsburgh

Registered: 2007-05-06

Posts: 1,553

Re: Questions Regarding Partitions

1. Arch's GRUB works fine with ext4. I'm using it now. You don't need a separate /boot unless you want one.

2. I usually put swap at the beginning since traditionally that was the fastest part of the disk. With current hardware, the disk is probably fast enough that it won't matter anyway. Order your partitions however you want.

John Karahalis

Member

Registered: 2009-01-27

Posts: 17

Re: Questions Regarding Partitions

Thanks for the info. I took a look into the ideal location for the swap space. As you say, most people think it doesn't matter, but it' s interesting to see why some people think it should go up front.

As far as GRUB, I was not able to make my version (0.9.7) work with ext4. As I understand it, GRUB 2 will support ext4, but it is not stable yet. I have heard that some people put /boot on its own ext2 partition, but I haven't found much good information on setting it up.

Edit: The reason I can't boot might be related to VirtualBox. It's hard to say. Doesn't much matter, as I'm just using VirtualBox for testing purposes.

Last edited by John Karahalis (2009-02-27 09:23:46)

Inxsible

Forum Fellow

From: Chicago

Registered: 2008-06-09

Posts: 9,183

Re: Questions Regarding Partitions

I set up a separate /boot partition only because I think that /boot does not have much writes to it. So there is no need for a journaling filesystem. I think adding journaling and extents(from ext4) is an overkill for that particular partiton. That's why I use ext2.

But having said that, you can use ext4 on /boot and disable journaling and extents -- thereby effectively giving you an ext2 filesystem. I just find it to be too much trouble to go thru all that when you already have another filesystem (ext2) available.

But these days, people simply prefer not to have a separate /boot, as having it to be a different partition doesn't give any more advantages than the fact that you can have a separate partition. I would however advise you to have a separate /var partition with reiserfs filesystem on it.

Last edited by Inxsible (2009-02-27 14:23:47)

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John Karahalis

Member

Registered: 2009-01-27

Posts: 17

Re: Questions Regarding Partitions

Thanks for all the responses. I have tried putting /boot on the root partition and on a separate partition.

Neither seem to work with VirtualBox. Before even getting to GRUB, VirtualBox says "FATAL: Could not read from the boot medium! System halted." I'm just not sure if this is a VirtualBox issue or if it's related to the way I installed Arch. I'm not so much concerned about getting VBox working, I'm just using it to see if I can install without a problem.

Edit: I got it working. Originally, I installed the bootloader to the root partition. Reinstalling and choosing /dev/sda for the bootloader fixed the problem. Thanks for all the insight everybody!

Last edited by John Karahalis (2009-02-27 23:41:26)