How to partition an old HDD with GParted?

[coldmonday]

Hi, first time here, and to make it worse a Linux Newbie.

Here is the situation.

I'm running Puppy from a CD on an old machine of unknown provenance.

The hard drive is a 155 GigB unit (aprox) and it is partitioned up into a small (4 GiB) section that is formatted in FAT32 and holds my XP system.

The remainder is 149.05 Gig . And i believe it is NTFS.

I wish to partition this up.

However. I ran GParted , clicked DEVICES.

I found

/dev/sda (149.05 GiB) unallocated.

/dev/sdb1 (Here is a lock symbol and a green square) File system fat32: Mount Point /initrd/mnt/dev_save : Size 3.73GiB: Unused 1.5 GiB: Used 2.22 GiB boot


All well and good.

However, I accidentally locked out the /dev/sdb1 partition when trying to work on the larger one. Forgot to switch GParted to /dev/sda .

So I can't access it. Sb1, sb2 and sb3 no longer show on the desktop and I can't boot my XP from the hard drive.



So, two things. How do I unlock /dev/sdb1

And how do I use GParted to actually partition the large partition /dev/sda .

The icons New, Delete, Resize/Move, Copy, Paste. Undo and Apply are all shaded and don't do anything.

Hope you can help.

Coldmonday.

[cthisbear]

coldmonday: a la Linux Newbie.

Mate I am just posting to say welcome to Puppy.

Others will be along soon to help you out on this question.

Hang in there till then.

"""""

Some starters.

Of course Puppy has GParted in it so no need for a new download.

How To Use GParted To Partition Your Hard Drive

https://www.lifewire.com/use-gparted-to ... ve-2205693

http://whirlpool.net.au/wiki/gparted

https://www.wikihow.com/Remove-a-Hard-D ... ng-Gparted

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQzi7epI70Q

Chris.

[bigpup]

What version of Puppy are you using on the CD?

Did you make a save on the hard drive when you shutdown running Puppy from the CD?

Do you want to still have Windows XP on the computer?

[greengeek]

However. I ran GParted , clicked DEVICES.
.

Hi, can you explain how you clicked "DEVICES" ? I have never seen this option.
cheers

[peterw]

If I am understanding and interpreting matters right that when you say you worked on sdb that you formatted it or took out the partition table by accident. And sdb contained your XP If that is the case then TestDisk is a tool that can recover the partitions, if you are lucky.

[Flash]

I seem to recall that a Windows XP installation disk can repair a borked partition table.

[coldmonday]

greengeek,

...Hi, can you explain how you clicked "DEVICES" ? I have never seen this option.
cheers

Hmmm, I wrote..


...However. I ran GParted , clicked DEVICES...




I have GParted open in front of me.

If I click the 'GParted' tab, top right hand side, next to Edit etc. There appears a drop down which gives you the choices

Refresh Devices Ctrl+R

Devices

This is where I clicked 'Devices'.

Or is it my use of the upper case you objected to mea culpa.

coldmonday.

[coldmonday]

bigpup,

I have version 5.2.8

I am running from a CD and have a USB stick plugged in to hold my details.

The hard drive.

I just managed to carve out another small partition using my XP. and partition Magic.

So I have

/dev/sda1 This is a 1 GigB , formatted FAT32 . spare file with nothing on it. Label SPARE1.

/dev/sda 149.05 formatted, I think, NTFS. This is unallocated.

/dev/sdb This is 3.73 GigB , formatted FAT32 and holds my XP . It is the partition I boot up from to work XP.


In 'Devices', this is the one that shows up as /dev/sdb1 with a lock symbol along side it. Plus it is the boot drive.

So I can't use it to boot XP or for any other purpose.

At the moment I am using the CD.

..Did you make a save on the hard drive when you shutdown running Puppy from the CD? ..

No. I was in the process of trying to make my hard drive bootable from Puppy when the problem occurred.

..Do you want to still have Windows XP on the computer?..

No. it will eventually be purely Linux.


coldmonday.

(Just found out my (the key to the left of 'W') has failed. as it's a laptop I'm using at the moment I will have to buy a USB keyboard.

[coldmonday]

cthisbear,

Hi, thanks. Nice to be here.

coldmonday.

p.s. Almost forgot, thanks for the links.

[coldmonday]

peterw,


Yes, that's about it.

Where can I find this 'TestDisk' tool ?

/dev/sdb1 is the bit that is showing the lock.

coldmonday.

[Mike Walsh]

Hi, coldmonday.

gParted really isn't the 'beast' many people seem to regard it as; in all honesty, once you've used it a few times, you'll wonder what all the fuss was about!

In addition to Chris's links to tutorials, I'm going to add one of my own. This really is the most comprehensive, and easy-to-understand tutorial on using gParted that I've ever come across. I used this quite a bit in my early Linux days, 3-4 years ago, before I moved over to Puppy full-time.

https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/gparted.html

Hope it proves as helpful for you as it did me.


Mike.

[Sailor Enceladus]

I think in one Puppy, Slacko64 or Tahr64, it just showed my entire drive as an unallocated sda rather than sda1, sda2, sda3 too.
http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic. ... 163#936163

Then I tried Slacko or Tahr 32-bit and it showed all the partitions correctly. I was somehow able to get the 64-bit ones to show sda correctly eventually as well, maybe by reducing the size of the ntfs partition in windows or in a puppy that worked then looking at GParted in the 64-bit puppy again afterwards, not sure. I guess what I'm trying to say is, I've seen the "only shows sda" bug in GParted too, and that this is not normal (I think) and it should show them as "sda1, sda2, sda3, etc." so maybe just keep trying different puppies until you find one where the GParted works with your HDD (showing sda1, sda2 instead of just sda). Tahrpup 6.0.5 32-bit was one that worked for me I think.

[peterw]

I am not certain about whether your Puppy version has the programme testdisk in its PPM, you will have to try it. If it does not then the gparted iso will have it or if you have an Ubuntu variant it will be in the repository. Instructions for using it are https://www.howtoforge.com/data_recovery_with_testdisk

[mostly_lurking]

(Just found out my (the key to the left of 'W') has failed. as it's a laptop I'm using at the moment I will have to buy a USB keyboard.

You mean the "Q" key?

If you are on Puppy, you can use the script below, which should remap your Q to the caps lock key (provided your caps lock has the keycode 66, else you'll have to edit it). Copy and paste that code into a text editor, save it, and make your new script executable by right-clicking it in the ROX file manager and choosing "Permissions", or by typing chmod 755 /path/to/your/script in a terminal. The change will only last for your current session, but you can make it permanent by putting the script into /root/Startup, so that it runs every time the X server starts up.

Code: Select all

#!/bin/sh

xmodmap -e "remove Lock = Caps_Lock"

# Map "q" to caps lock key. Of course, you could also choose another key.
# (Caps lock has keycode 66 on my keyboard. To find a key's code, run "xev" in 
# a terminal; a small window will open. Press the key you want to test.)

xmodmap -e "keycode 66 = q"	

# enable auto-repeat:

xset r 66

[greengeek]

If I click the 'GParted' tab, top right hand side, next to Edit etc. There appears a drop down which gives you the choices
Refresh Devices Ctrl+R
Devices
This is where I clicked 'Devices'.

Thanks for pointing that out coldmonday - i have never even noticed the Gparted menu before - let alone the refresh devices options

Whenever I use gparted I start it by going through the main puppy menu (Menu, System, Gparted) and that brings up an extra step which allows you to select your device before the main Gparted screen shows up. I think that is a much safer way to start Gparted, rather than using a terminal to start it.

[bigpup]

Is XP the original install when the computer was made or did you install XP?????????

/dev/sda 149.05 formatted, I think, NTFS. This is unallocated.

If it says unallocated it is not partitioned and formatted.

I am running from a CD and have a USB stick plugged in to hold my details.

The hard drive.

I just managed to carve out another small partition using my XP. and partition Magic.

I thought you said that XP was not working?

In 'Devices', this is the one that shows up as /dev/sdb1 with a lock symbol along side it. Plus it is the boot drive.

That lock symbol indicates the drive is mounted and being used. So, something on it is being used by the Puppy CD.
That is usually the Puppy save. You said the save is on the USB.

Usually you should be seeing partitions on the hard drive labeled:
sda1
sda2
sda3
etc......

The USB flash should be sdb1

So do this:
Have no USB flash or any other storage device plugged into computer.
Boot with the Puppy CD.
At the Puppy boot screen.
Hold down F2 key until:
The options window appears.
Enter puppy pfix=ram option.
Press enter.

This will make the CD boot not using the save, so it will look like the first time you ever booted it.
Do not do any setup.
All you need to do is run Gparted.

Gparted should only see one drive, the hard drive and it's partitions.
Nothing should have a lock symbol.

Note:
When shutting down the CD it will ask if you want to make a save.
Say no.
You said you already have one on the USB flash drive.

[coldmonday]

bigpup,

..I thought you said that XP was not working?..

It was, but now isn't.

Before I started on this conversion to Linux I used Partition Magic from my Floppy to make a small partition that I could use to carry XP. the idea being to be able to fall back on this if (when) things got tangled up.

Then I accidentally locked out this partition.

I wish to unlock this so I can get back to where I was in the beginning.

I also wish to avoid using DOS related programs (like Partition Magic) and learn to use their Linux equivalents.

coldmonday.

(In the beginning darkness lay upon the hard drive. And Partition Magic said 'let there be partitions')

[rcrsn51]

/dev/sdb This is 3.73 GigB , formatted FAT32 and holds my XP . It is the partition I boot up from to work XP.

No. Sdb should be your flash drive. Sda is your hard drive.

Here is what I think happened with sda. It had a corrupted partition table, so it showed as "unallocated" with no partitions. But XP was able to start anyway.

Once you started messing with the partition table, you broke the ability of XP to boot.

[greengeek]

Which is your boot partition/device? Do you have a menu.lst?

[coldmonday]

Progress note to all.

It seems the primary problem was caused by the flash drive.

So, following along with one of the tutorials, and with the flash drive removed.

Booted from cd.

Gone into GParted

I find..

/dev/sda (149.05 gIB) [tells me it is a 150 Gig (nominal) SCSI drive. primary Master.

The partition info ..

/dev/sda1 File System ext2: Size 1.0 GigB: Used 17.45 MiB: Unused 1010.11 MiB: Flags (nothing. Not a bootable partition)

tells me it is the first partition on on drive sda.

Unallocated 148.05 is the rest of the drive. As yet unused.

Onwards and upwards.

I'm assume the XP partition went to the flash drive. Need to check that

rcrsn51, I think this explains it. sdb has disappeared from the list now the flash drive is out. Noobie error.

coldmonday.

p.s. Stop me if I am reading this wrong.