Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

msl · 2011-03-31 22:25:23

I'm just about to install Arch (and hopefully leave Windows for good).

I know partitioning varies and everyone has their opinion, but I just want to check if this looks somewhat OK and won't cause any problems.

Will boot from gparted and make these using GPT before installing Arch.

SSD (64 GB):
sda1 1mb ef02
sda2 /boot 100 mb ext4
sda3 /swap 4 GB
sda4 / (root) ext4 the remaining space

HDD (750 GB):
/var 5 GB reiserfs

+tmp loaded in RAM.

/boot in case I will encrypt the SSD and some people prefer to have it.
/swap since I will use hibernation.
/var on HDD for reducing writes and having it on a separate partition.

I made the sda1 because GRUB2 will take over soon. Might as well just have it there now since it's required?
Will gparted work fine for making the GPT partitions (instead of gdisk)?

graysky · 2011-03-31 22:32:57

Swap on the SSD will be a major write job if you have 4 G of RAM - probably faster on the HDD and better too? I wouldn't use gparted personally. It should work but I dunno about alignment. Using gdisk is easy. See the SSD wiki article. Why no separate /home?

My suggestion:

SSD (64 GB):
sda1 1mb ef02
sda2 /boot 100 mb ext2
sda3 / (root) ext4 15 GB
sda4 /home ext4 rest of your space

HDD (750 GB):
/var 5 GB reiserfs
swap if needed

Last edited by graysky (2011-03-31 22:33:45)

msl · 2011-03-31 23:01:15

I have 8 GB of RAM. The wiki mentioned you could put it on the SSD, but guess I can change it to the HDD.

About gparted. The thing is both the drives are new. Don't I have to do this before installing Arch (?). I didn't see any bootable gdisk. Or maybe I can first boot using a live disk?

About separate /home. I was thinking of not having it because of the small size of the disk, but guess I should have one.

I will be installing one or more virtual machines. Should they be stored on the SSD or HDD?

Last edited by msl (2011-04-01 01:13:07)

graysky · 2011-03-31 23:14:29

I keep my vdd_hdds on the HDD. Don't you need 8 G of swap if you have 8G of RAM for hibernate?

msl · 2011-04-01 00:21:21

I found a source saying 4 GB should be enough, but that must have been without hibernation maybe. Will go for 8 GB.

Concerning the partitioning I found PartedMagic which has gdisk. Will use it first to do the partitioning.

Last edited by msl (2011-04-01 00:28:51)

graysky · 2011-04-01 00:35:30

...just use gdisk! No need for a GUI.

skunktrader · 2011-04-01 00:40:07

msl wrote:

About gparted. The thing is both the drives are new. Don't I have to do this before installing Arch (?). I didn't see any bootable gparted. Or maybe I can first boot using a live disk?

Instructions for creating a bootable image with gparted are here http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php

msl · 2011-04-01 01:14:58

Thank you, but it was a typo from me. I meant bootable gdisk configurator.

JokerBoy · 2011-04-01 02:02:18

oh .. why not simply use Arch livecd and "pacman -Sy gptdisk"?

msl · 2011-04-01 02:49:26

Thought it would be somewhat difficult to set up the network and didn't know you could use pacman before partitioning and installing.

I will try the netinstall then.

skodabenz · 2011-04-01 11:52:31

Newer GParted and GNU Parted (libparted>=2.3) perform 1MiB parttition alignment which is ideal for any sector sizes. Even gdisk defaults to 1MiB alignment for newer partition tables.

graysky · 2011-04-01 12:19:27

gdisk uses 2 MiB on my SSD:

Disk /dev/sdb: 156301488 sectors, 74.5 GiB
Logical sector size: 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): ED01C970-8CAB-4F71-9FF9-AD93EB615452
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 156301454
Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries
Total free space is 2014 sectors (1007.0 KiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1            2048        18876415   9.0 GiB     0700  Linux/Windows data
   2        18876416       156301454   65.5 GiB    0700  Linux/Windows data

JokerBoy · 2011-04-01 12:26:05

2048 sectors = 1 megabyte.

graysky · 2011-04-01 12:44:29

JokerBoy wrote:

2048 sectors = 1 megabyte.

My bad.

msl · 2011-04-01 15:42:57

So it's okay (and even better) to use GParted? Then I will just go with my original plan and use the bootable GParted and do it GUI style.

caxap · 2011-04-02 08:49:39

suggest to use 8Gb swap (you usually will want at least the same size of swap as your RAM size is) on ssd partition as it will speed up hibernation.
using gparted is ok if you understand what you are doing
also you will certainly need separate /home partition but it is for you to decide where to create it. I would probably use ssd.

graysky · 2011-04-02 09:44:02

Perhaps 1/2 off topic but why use hibernation? Is suspend not good for you?

Arch Linux

#1 2011-03-31 22:25:23

Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#2 2011-03-31 22:32:57

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#3 2011-03-31 23:01:15

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#4 2011-03-31 23:14:29

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#5 2011-04-01 00:21:21

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#6 2011-04-01 00:35:30

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#7 2011-04-01 00:40:07

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#8 2011-04-01 01:14:58

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#9 2011-04-01 02:02:18

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#10 2011-04-01 02:49:26

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#11 2011-04-01 11:52:31

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#12 2011-04-01 12:19:27

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#13 2011-04-01 12:26:05

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#14 2011-04-01 12:44:29

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#15 2011-04-01 15:42:57

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#16 2011-04-02 08:49:39

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

#17 2011-04-02 09:44:02

Re: Partitioning laptop with an SSD + HDD

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