complete newbie...my partitions correct??

[BonzoMontro]

I bought Mandrake 7.2 and installed it on the same hard drive as Windows 98, and it seems to be running ok. I just wanted to see if my partitions are set-up ok because sometimes Linux seems to stop running/crash or whatever, none of the commands from within KDE will work (it says "coundn't run konsole, draknet, etc.")

My hard drive is only 6 GB and i have it set 3GB for windows and the rest for Linux. The Linux portion is divided into 30 MB for the swap and the other 2.8 GB is just one big partition for the files. The manual seems to say that this configuration is ok, but it would be better to have the linux portion divided into 4 partitions, one each for / (root?), /usr, swap, and /home. Is this configuration better, and what should the sizes be? Also are all these partitions primary?

Also i was wondering if I could have Linux boot straight to the console instead of going to KDE?

Thanks for any help!

[thescribe7]

Some may disagree with me but personally I would make the swap much bigger, although I don't know that this is what is causing your locks.
As far as the partitionin in one big one. I never done it. All my friends and may others warned me against that. I've always set the partitions or use the installers recommended setting when it auto allocates.
Try that and see ifyour erformance is any better. Couldn't hurt.
Craig Mcpheason, srike,x_consul, or f-bot would know better what the issue for the locks may be. They've helped me A LOT!
:D

[EyesWideOpen]

I agree with thescribe7, you'll probably want swap space that is at least equal to the amount of RAM that you have (some say double the amount of RAM) though this (http://www.linuxhq.com/guides/SAG/x1546.html) says otherwise.

Having just one partition shouldn't be causing your problems I don't think. One of the advantages to having separate partitions is so you don't lose everything if something goes wrong on a certain partition.

To boot straight to the console instead of into KDE you should edit your /etc/inittab file. You should see a line like this:

id:5:initdefault:.

You'll want to change the 5 to a 3 like this:

id:3:initdefault:.

This will cause your system to boot to the console instead of into an X session.

[X_console]

It is better to have multiple partitions as it limits the chances of having all your files damaged should one partition become corrupted, as well as prevents denial of service attacks. Here's how I would lay it out for you on your 3GB Linux partitions:

/ = 100
/home = 1GB
/tmp = 140
/var = 140
swap = 120 (or varies)
/usr = everything that's left

If you want to save space, you can swipe of /tmp and then just symlink /tmp to /var/tmp Just make sure /tmp and /var are on their own partitions. You can increase /home since that's where you'll be saving your MP3s and other stuff depending on what you plan on using Linux for. /usr should be the largest since that's where your third party programs will normally be installed in.

I am not sure why you're getting locks. I would assume this is a problem with KDE or Mandrake. I would suggest that you reinstall and use separate partitions (you'll benefit in the long run). If you still get lock ups, we'll investigate further.