Fedora core3 installation problem [ended up installing Mandrake instead]

[kantis]

Hi,

I'm having a problem with installing fc3.
I chose things I want to install and its says 3.2GB
total size, ok I push next. It starts to format partitions and when it's transferring the image to hard disk it gives error that I probably don't have enough hd space and quits.
I have following partitions:
/boot 100MB
/ 10GB
/usr 4GB
Swap 2GB
/var 1GB

What's wrong? Did I miss a partition or don't I have enough space

Please help!

TIA

.:tomi:.

[Choozo]

The partitioning seems OK.
Is this a consistent problem each time you try installing FC3? If so, you may have a hardware setup that disagrees with FC3 and may consider another distro?

I know there has been a lot of people here having problems with both Suse and Fedora lately, so another friendly distro would probably be Mandrake?

Cheers :)

[kantis]

Thanks Choozo,

Yes it's every time I try.
Mandrake is next one I plan to try.
I hopefully have a better luck with it.


.:tomi:.

[soulestream]

I dont see what should be a problem but you might try



making usr bigger FC3 puts alot of stuff in usr and it might need more space than the 3.2gb for installations(not sure)
I didnt do a full package install and my /usr is still like 3.1GB

2GB swap(wow) might wanna make that a little smaller


soule

you could try a default partitions and see if it still errors out

[kantis]

Thanks Soule,

As a newbie I checked the manual and find out that swap should be twice the memory installed so I decided to have a 2GB swap.

I thought FC3 installs programs etc. to / partition that's why it's 10GB and what comes to /usr I thought it's place where user specific files go like personal settings etc. that's why I thought 4GB would be enough.

Do I need /home partition?

I'm a little confused if installation program says I need 3.2GB for installation why shouldn't I trust it.

Or is it the laptop where I'm installing it to? Knoppix livecd gives a bios pnp
error. But there is no way I could turn off pnp.

TIA,
.:tomi:.
:confused:

[DrChuck]

I know there has been a lot of people here having problems with both Suse and Fedora lately
Actually, the recommendation is to stay away from FC3, which is a bit twitchy, especially in the area of hardware support. I've heard only good things about FC2 an duse it myself.

Try installing the whole thing in 1 partition first, and see if it goes - there might be something odd about how you have the disk diced up. I use a /home partition for all my documents, and have never needed a / partition bigger than 5GB.

Also, with 1GB of RAM, you shouldn't need a swap partition at all, but having one shouldn't hurt.

drChuck

[Choozo]

Having swap = 2xRAM was an old rule-of-thumb when you had 64MB RAM (and this is way back when that was considered 'hot'). If you have 1GB of physical RAM, you hardly need a swap partition, but its safe to create one 250MB swap partition.

Having a separate /home is a good thing when you eventually reinstall/switch distros, as you won't loose your personal data.

Following the above - and soules suggestion - try the following partitioning scheme:

/boot 100MB
/ 8GB
Swap 250MB
/home ~7GB (remaining space)

[kantis]

Thanks to You all,

to Soule,
Automatic partitioning gives also error.
I chose "keep all partitions and use existing free space" as I have Win XP pro on "hda1". I've leaved 17GB unpartitioned on my harddisk for linux.

to Choozo and DrChuck
I'm now giving a try with mandrake to see if it's fedora and not my laptop which gives me a hard time. But i'm keeping in mind Your suggestions how to make the partitions.

I'll let You know what's happening

Thanks
.:tomi:.

[kantis]

Thank You Choozo, DrChuck and Soule for Your efforts.
I just finished installing Mandrake linux and it was a picnic comparing to Fedora. Everything is now working fine.

Thanks again!

.:tomi:.

[Choozo]

Glad to hear it all worked out kantis :)