Forum Moderators: bakedjake
I want linux to be able to get all the information from the C: drive. How?
# mount -t vfat /dev/hda1 /mnt/windows/
And the c: disk can be accessed at /mnt/windows. You can add an entry to /etc/fstab to make it automatically each time the system goes up.
If you are using IDE drives, then the drives will all start with '/dev/hd'. 'a' is the master drive on the primary IDE controller. 'b' is the slave drive on the primary IDE controller. 'c' is the master drive on the secondary controller, and 'd' is the slave on the same. If there are more controllers, it keeps going up like that.
Lets assume for the moment that you now know the drive is /dev/hda. That device name is for the whole disk, from beginning to end. Even if there is only one partition on the drive, you still need to know which partition it is. This part is pretty easy. 1 is the first partition, 2 the second, etc. If you have an "extentded" partition that contains "logical" partitions, then those "logical" partitions are numbered starting with 5. (Because there can be up to four "primary" partitions, of which the "extended" partition is one.)
Most likely, the partition Windows calls "c:" is the first primary partition on the master disk of the primary controller. I believe that Windows reserves "a" and "b:" for floppys, and starts numbering hard drives at "c:". If I remember right, Windows starts with the primary partitions on the master drive on the primary controller, numbering them in the order that they appear on the disk, then primary partitions on the slave, then on the master of the secondary controller, and so forth until it runs out of primary partitions. Once letters have been assigned to all the primary partitions, I think it then starts again on the primary master numbering the "logical" partitions. Partitions that are marked as being a file system that Windows can't read will be skipped.
The previous paragraph should be taken with a grain of salt. It's been a while since I worked with Windows much, and I may have forgotten a detail or two. To me, the linux system is far more meaningful (and sane). If you know which partition you want, you can specify it. No need to keep the whole partition structure of ever drive on your computer in your head just to figure out which letter to use.
