A few questions before I install mandrake

[wolfman8k]

This is my first post on these forums, but I have been browing here for a while reading the threads.

I'm about to install Linux Mandrake 8.1 on my computer. I have the 3 cd set. My computer specs:

ECS K7S5A
AMD Athlon TBIRD 1200MHZ
512MB DDR RAM
Inno3d Geforce 2 Pro 64MB
40GB Hard Drive

My previous experience with linux:
A while ago I bought Redhat 6.1, installed it and used it for a while.
I installed Linux Mandrake 8.1 on two other computers in expert mode, but used it for only an hour.

Now, a few questions I have before I install:

1) Partitions
---------------------
I have a 40GB hard drive. Currently I have C:(Fat32) which is 2gb and D:(Fat32) which is 28gb. Windows XP Proffesional is installed on C:. I plan on installing Mandrake on the 10gb of empty space.

What partitions should I have?
A) I have 512MB of ram. How big should I make the swap partition?
B) Can I just make / for a filesystem? I heard lots of different stories on how I should have a seperate filesystem for /home and for /var. Is this really nescessary?
C) What kind of filesystem? Should I use ReiserFS or something like that or just stick with ext2?

2) Nvidia OpenGL Drivers
-----------------------------

Should I follow the instructions at evil3d.net(http://www.evil3d.net/articles/linux/howto/nvidia/mandrake8/) in order to install the drivers for my geforce 2? That article is written for mandrake 8.0 and I will be installing 8.1

Also, in that article they use the 1.0-1251 drivers, but at Nvidias website(http://www.nvidia.com/view.asp?PAGE=linux) I see that the latest drivers are 1.0-1541. Can I follow the instructions at evils site while using the new drivers or should I use the old one that they used?

Also, I want to get the graphics card set up first thing, before internet so is it ok if I download the drivers through windows?

And what's the name of that gears program? What framerate should I get with it with my computer about?

------------------------------------

Thank you very much,
wolfman8k

[scanez]

I don't know much about those Nvdia drivers so I can only help with your first question. Swap is up to you. With 512 MB, I'm not sure how much you would actually need, or if you even need any. Some suggest not creating a swap partition and creating and using swap files as they are needed. I have 160 MB of ram with 200 MB swap and it works great for me. But I think that with my next PC, either 512 MB or >1 GB RAM, I won't have a swap parition but will just use swap files. Maybe start with a swap partition of 200 MB if you want one and see how it works for you. Your choice.

You don't need seperate partitions, you could only have /. But this is not recommended because then other people can fill space up quickly. Like if you are running a server, people can fill /var up quickly so if you don't have /var as a seperate partition, there is no limit to how much they can put on there. If you have other users, making /home its own partition might be good to control how much space they can have. Making /home its own partition is also a good idea because then if you upgrade or change distros, you can keep what you have in /home. There are some NHF's on this site about that (I think) and a bunch of other docs floating around on the web. Check them out.

Ext2 is the standard, but checks run slower on it since it's not a journaling filesystem. Reiserfs is pretty good and usually runs faster than ext2, there are other filesystems as well. Check the web for information on them all. Decide what suits you best.

Have fun and good luck
SC

[Eroberer]

Hey, I'm a newbie, so go with anyone elses info first, but I've at least done some reading on all of this.

For a swap, I would make it no more than 500MB. When I was looking around for a good WindowsME disk cache size I found that no one would put it over 400, and every place said basically 2x RAM size, up to a point where 2x 256MB is ridiculus. Every place for Linux still only said 2x RAM with no limit, so I decided I'd just go with 500MB with my 256MB RAM, and I doubt I will run into problems.

Making different file systems depends primarily on the use. There's a good article on the first page of linuxnewbie.org, which basically says you CAN do whatever you want. For example, servers may fill up the /var directory quickly, and if /var is on it's own partition, all that happens is you can't write to /var anymore, but if it's on your root directory then bad things can happen. Read that article, as I said, I'm a newbie. I have /usr, /, /var, and /home partitions in that descending size order.

ReiserFS is a journaling file system, which basically logs every transaction with the file system, and can thus restore a system that has incomplete transactions, i.e. crashes. Go with that. I can't think of any reason to go with Ext2 unless you feel like learning the ins and outs of fsck, which I didn't. I guess I missed that era of Linux.

I skimmed over that site, and it doesn't look nearly as complete as the one that I used to install drivers for my nVidia card. Try here (http://maxpro.org/sections.php?op=viewarticle&artid=4).

[ 29 October 2001: Message edited by: Eroberer ]

[Eroberer]

Can anyone tell me if ReiserFS is the exact same as .ext3? The Mandrake install said implied that it was somehow, but obviously I'm not so sure.

[scanez]

Originally posted by Eroberer:
<STRONG>Can anyone tell me if ReiserFS is the exact same as .ext3? The Mandrake install said implied that it was somehow, but obviously I'm not so sure.</STRONG>
No, it's not at all. They are both journaling file systems, but are indeed different.

SC

[wolfman8k]

Thanks for the help.

Is it hard to set up swap files? Maybe I just make a root partition? Or should I just make a 512MB swap partition?

I guess I'll use ReiserFS instead of ext2 then. Will I have any problems or anything?

And thanks for that link for installing nvidia drivers on drake 8.1. I'll follow those instructions.

Thanks again

[edit: typos]

[ 30 October 2001: Message edited by: wolfman8k ]

[X_console]

A) I have 512MB of ram. How big should I make the swap partition?
Swap is generally twice the size of your RAM.

B) Can I just make / for a filesystem? I heard lots of different stories on how I should have a seperate filesystem for /home and for /var. Is this really nescessary?
Yes, if you want to run into less problems. If you have just one partition, and it gets corrupted, then it's over. Having multiple partitions will save your skin in the long run. Here's what I recommend:

/ = 80-100MB
/var = 100-200MB
/tmp = 100-200MB
/usr = 5GB &gt;
/home = 5GB &gt;

/usr and /home can be as large as you want. /usr is where your third party programs will go, so it should be huge. /home is where you'll be keeping all your files (mp3s, documents, etc) so it too should be large.

C) What kind of filesystem? Should I use ReiserFS or something like that or just stick with ext2?

ext2 is extremely stable but you might run into problems if Linux isn't properly shutdown. ReiserFS isn't as mature, but so far seems to be stable. I haven't had problems with ReiserFS, so I suggest giving it a try.

[wolfman8k]

Ok, this is what I'm going to do:

Partitions:
[swap] - 512MB
/ - 150MB
/var - 250MB
/tmp - 250MB
/usr - 6GB
/home - 6.5GB

And I'm going to use ReiserFS.

If anyone thinks I should change something please post quickly because I'm going to install in half an hour(12:30gmt)

Again, thanks for all the help!

[Eroberer]

Yup, in retrospect, I wish I had made a larger /home partition. StarOffice 6.0 beta seems to want to install there or not work at all. :rolleyes:

[sasKuatch]

you should be okay with just / for the fs, it eliminates problems with predicting disk usage and free space, as for me, i have 256 megs of ram, no swap file, but it works fine, even running UT and a whole bunch of apps at the same time. i'm using 8.1 too, so you should have no problems with 512 megs

[scanez]

Originally posted by wolfman8k:
<STRONG>Ok, this is what I'm going to do:

Partitions:
[swap] - 512MB
/ - 150MB
/var - 250MB
/tmp - 250MB
/usr - 6GB
/home - 6.5GB

And I'm going to use ReiserFS.

If anyone thinks I should change something please post quickly because I'm going to install in half an hour(12:30gmt)

Again, thanks for all the help!</STRONG>
Looks pretty good. /tmp might be a little large but I don't know what you are going to be using the machine for. A large /tmp is generally good if you are going to be doing things that require a lot of computation such as science, math intensive programs and what not. I run some math programs and stuff and my 100 MB /tmp has worked well so far.

Just a suggestion
SC

[archimon]

HI!

I tried creating /temp under ResierFS with Mandrate 8.0..but I cannot find /temp...
how can I do it?