What is the OPTIMUM HARD DRIVE SETUP for Puppy?

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aahhaaa
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What is the OPTIMUM HARD DRIVE SETUP for Puppy?

#1 Post by aahhaaa »

I've just found another old 10 gig HD in my stuff... :D
...but...
After reading a couple posts about NTFS & FAT32, I know less than I thought I did.

For a purely Puppy machine, what are the considerations between FAT32 and NTFS? (Seen some posts about problems reading NTFS, but usually related to dual boot.)

If NTFS is really the better choice, it has allocation options of 512, 1024, 2028, & 4056 for block size. Does Linux have a favored size?

On an HD this small, any real reason to partition the HD at all?

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rarsa
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#2 Post by rarsa »

For a pure Linux computer you must not use NTFS. It just does not make sense. NTFS support is read only. How good is a file system you can only read from?

And there is no real reason why to use FAT32.

Your best bet is using ext2 or ext3 (ext3 is the same as ext2 plus journaling which makes the file system more resilient) more info here

I am a simple man so I prefer to have the least number of partitions.
Of course the partition distribution depends 100% on your requirements, so here are two alternatives to use as a base:

If you don't have much ram (less than 128MB) Full HDD installation :
- A swap partition according to your RAM (the recommendation is twice as much as your ram)
- An ext2 partition 1GB for Puppy
- An ext3 partition on the remaining disk.

I would separate the OS installation from the data so if you corrupt the installation you can easily reinstall to that partition without worrying for the data.

In any event, I would still do all my testing using the liveCD and a pup001 file (yes, both can coexist)

This one can work even in computers with very low RAM (32 MB).

If you have enough RAM, a type 1 installation:
- A swap parition according to your Needs. After 256 MB, the more RAM the less need for swap. Of course this depends on the applications you want to run, although never more than the available RAM, if you need more you'd be well advised to get more RAM.
- An ext2 partition on the remaining of the disk where you will put a 1 GB pup001 file.

I would put all my data outside the pup001 file so I can interchange pup001 files without compromising the data. Again, If I corrupt the installation, I can just replace the pup001 file.

This last one would be my preferred one as it would be faster.

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aahhaaa
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#3 Post by aahhaaa »

thanks rarsa; I knew even less than I thought :oops:

wasn't getting that ext2 & 3 are filesystems not partitions of an underlying filesystem; didn't think it thru...

for a really 'clean' machine, would you recommend running Puppy, using it to do the prep work, or something else first to wipe/pre-prep the drive?

jcagle
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#4 Post by jcagle »

I acutally liked using ReiserFS in SuSE...don't know how well that works with Puppy yet. I know ReiserFS recovered faster from errors than ext2/ext3 did in my experiences with it.

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Rhino
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#5 Post by Rhino »

I have used qtparted in Knoppix to partition my laptop with a "dual boot" XP/Live CD Puppy system. I did have FC4 for a true dual boot, but Puppy is simply better so I reformatted over it :-)

I have 2 partitions, one formatted with NTFS and the other ext3 for Puppy.

Puppy will write the pup001 file to the ext3 drive...it may have to be flagged as bootable (I think). I use my USB key to save my personal files.

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aahhaaa
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#6 Post by aahhaaa »

Most HDs ship these days with a utility like Western Digital's Data Lifeguard, Maxtor's MaxBlast, or Seagate Zero- disc-based formatting/checkdiscing/ partitioning/cloning tools; but only for Gates OSs. (why is that?)

Isn't there a similar tool utility for Linux? Or are there just too many flavors of filesystems?

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rarsa
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#7 Post by rarsa »

aahhaaa wrote:For a really 'clean' machine, would you recommend running Puppy, using it to do the prep work, or something else first to wipe/pre-prep the drive?
I was going to recommend a full zerowrite and HDD check with the tool provided by the HDD vendor.
aahhaaa wrote:Most HDs ship these days with a utility like Western Digital's Data Lifeguard, Maxtor's MaxBlast, or Seagate Zero- disc-based formatting/checkdiscing/ partitioning/cloning tools; but only for Gates OSs. (why is that?)
Actually those disks does not require a particular OS. They are bootable floppies for the most part. (At least the ones I've used).

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rarsa
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#8 Post by rarsa »

jcagle wrote:I acutally liked using ReiserFS in SuSE...don't know how well that works with Puppy yet. I know ReiserFS recovered faster from errors than ext2/ext3 did in my experiences with it.
ReiserFS is a newer file system so in many circumstances will be better than ext2/ext3.

I thought about all the different FS before responding to aahhaaa. My conclusion was that ext2/ext3 are almost universally supported by all Distros and third party utilities.

jcagle
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#9 Post by jcagle »

Yeah, good reason to go with ext2/ext3 there.

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Ted Dog
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my setup and why

#10 Post by Ted Dog »


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