From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Sun Sep 4 22:03:08 2005 Return-Path: X-Original-To: questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 9A40B16A41F for ; Sun, 4 Sep 2005 22:03:08 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from garys@opusnet.com) Received: from opusnet.com (mail.opusnet.com [209.210.200.6]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 33B9A43D6D for ; Sun, 4 Sep 2005 22:03:07 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from garys@opusnet.com) Received: from localhost.localhost [70.98.246.232] by opusnet.com with ESMTP (SMTPD32-8.05) id AF17769B00B2; Sun, 04 Sep 2005 15:03:03 -0700 Received: from localhost.localhost (localhost.localhost [127.0.0.1]) by localhost.localhost (8.13.3/8.13.3) with ESMTP id j84M4hf9014670; Sun, 4 Sep 2005 15:04:43 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from garys@opusnet.com) Received: (from jojo@localhost) by localhost.localhost (8.13.3/8.13.3/Submit) id j84M4XDe014669; Sun, 4 Sep 2005 15:04:33 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from garys@opusnet.com) To: bob self References: <431B4463.5060400@charter.net> From: garys@opusnet.com (Gary W. Swearingen) Date: Sun, 04 Sep 2005 15:04:33 -0700 In-Reply-To: <431B4463.5060400@charter.net> (bob self's message of "Sun, 04 Sep 2005 15:00:51 -0400") Message-ID: <38br38h4lq.r38@mail.opusnet.com> User-Agent: Gnus/5.1007 (Gnus v5.10.7) XEmacs/21.4.17 (Jumbo Shrimp, berkeley-unix) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Cc: questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: How should I partition 2 80 gig drives? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 04 Sep 2005 22:03:08 -0000 bob self writes: > I want to set up FreeBSD 5.4 Release to fully use 2 80 gig hard drives. I'm not sure how I > should set these up in disklabel editor. I just want to use this as a general purpose machine. I've been happy giving my two 80 GB disks 4 equal-sized primary partitions so it's easy to back one up, esp. before doing an upgrade, etc. Or use one or more for extra storage, etc. Maximizes flexibility and I seldom fill one anyway. I only regret that I let the first pri.part. be oddly sized because it can't have the first track. I told myself I'd use those for Linux or data. I've always tried to partition on cylinder boundaries, but the partitioner didn't obey for the first pri.part. I plan to try partitioning my next disk on track boundaries, with all four the same size. As for FreeBSD divisions, I have something like: subpart Cyls Approx MB Use a 16 125 / b 70 549 swap e 70 549 /var f 1138 8926 /usr g 1138 8926 /home /: I'm using 71 MB on / with by far the biggest user being three versions of /boot/kernel/, so 125 seems about right. swap: Swap should be big enough to hold all the programs you plan to run at the same time, minus your RAM size. Except, if you plan to make OS "crash dumps", swap should be at least as big as your RAM and another MB might be safer. 500 MB - RAM seems a good minimum these days, except the installer probably requires >0. (I seldom use any swap with 512 MB RAM, but xosview can show a broken program filling it up, so it's good to have more than the minimum.) /usr, /home: Use your own judgement on the size ratio. I'm using 3 GB in /usr and I've got a lot of stuff not needed for ports and system re-building. /tmp: Maybe have the following in /etc/fstab so /tmp files are kept in RAM. (Use /var/tmp for files you don't want to go away when OS halts.) md /tmp mfs rw,-s128m 0 0 With a similar setup, I've tried mounting "/" read-only and observed no problems.