drive partitions

new to this

[click watcher]

having just got new computer with a large hard disc,

am wondering about partitioning it and i've got a couple of newbie questions about it...

i thought a partition was a "closed" system but it seems to me you can share files or copy files between different partitions - is this right?

say you had 2 windows os partitions and one became infected with a virus would the other be immune?

does each partition need an os installed in it or can it just store files??? (i've a feeling this is a pretty dumb question, but i've learned its better to ask than be too embarrassed to)
- so could i have one partition for mp3 files for instance and access them from other partitions??

i want 3 os in all win2k win98 and linux (mandrake i think just to see what this linux stuff is all about) ... i assume that i install one OS first and then partition the hd from that then install the other 2 into the empty partitions. is any particular sequence easier, given that i have partition magic for windows and i believe mandrake comes with something similiar for linux

any guidance gratefully recieved, as new waters always seem so scary till you dive in - and right now i'm still standing on the shore just looking.

[oilman]

drive partitioning can best be thought of as converting one hard drive into more than one hard drive. You do not need to install an OS on all your partitions but if you are doing the multiple OS route it's a pretty good idea to put them onto thier own partitions. Windows NT/2000 uses and NTFS file system and W9x uses Fat32 - they have to be on different partitions. (Windows 2000 can be installed as Fat32 - but we won't worry about that for now.)

Yes you can share files across partitions. Think of each partition as just another folder if that works for you.

Here's an example of how I have my system set up on 2 40gig hard drives:
Drive 1:
c: Win98
d: W2K
e: work/data
f: mp3
g: games

Drive 2 is an exact mirror of Drive 1 for backup purposes.

Hope that helps.

If you're gonna take a run at this I'd recommend using some software like Partition Magic [powerquest.com]. It's a lot easier to understand than the good old MS Dos Fdisk utility.

[click watcher]

yes thanks oil...

so i can share files even when the file system is different on different partitions eg FAT32 or NTFS for instance???

[oilman]

>>so i can share files even when the file system is different on different partitions

oh - sorry - missed that point. The short answer is no you can't. Win98 doesn't even recognize NTFS partitions. I install W2K as FAT32 even though it's not as efficient as NTFS - that will allow you to share files between those two partitions.

[click watcher]

ok great thnx for the help

[seriesint]

In adding Linux to that mix of MS OSes, one has to be careful to leave UnPartitioned Free Space on the drive. If you are using Partition Magic it has the ability to create Linux Native (ext2fs) style partitions. To further complicate matters, most cases you have to have 2 partitions for linux one for the OS/Files etc and another for the swap file. (Swap file is smaller though usually around RAM + 64MB in total size) Whatever you do, I would not use 2k's option to create & format drives. It is the surest way to regret every starting this project :) Create the base for 9x and 2K from 9x. That is using PM if you have it. If you don't have it reconsider the idea.

And as a last note, sharing files on *nix is pretty much a one way street. So best measure might be to make a "files" partition in addition to the OS based partitions. Which would put you over the limit of 4 primary partitions per drive. So have to use an extended partition to house everything past the first 3.

partition 1: 9x (fat32)
partition 2: 2k (fat32)
partition 3: linux (ext2fs)
partition 4: extended partition
partition 4a: linux swap
partition 4b: files (fat32)

Booting 9x 2k you would see C: (Partition 1) D: (Partition 2) E: (Partition 4b)
Linux would have it as /dev/hda1 /dev/hda2 etc but you will get a taste of that when you start in with learning it.
That isn't the absolute best method but it should work to get you started and down the road. Main goal is to let all the OSes work together. ;)

[SmallTime]

You also need to think about booting. I use System Commander, but you can also use the Linux bootloader (grub or lilo). Also, Win98 will only install on drive C. I have the situation you describe, win98, Win2k, linux-mandrake on this machine. linux will see and read the windows files, not visa-versa (thanks Bill). I installed 98 first, then others. Can be a little challenging, read up on it a bit. I rescued one machine from a virus in windows by rebooting into linux, finding the virus script, reading it to find where it installed itself, and deleting it. So dual booting does have some advantages.

[click watcher]

thanks, got some great tips here