debian-setup

Manual Partitioning

This is the step Partition disks. Partitioning method is Manual.

The manual partitioning screen has 3 sections. The first section are the top-level operations. Of particular interest is Configure Software RAID. Toward the end of this page, there is discussion of creating a software RAID. The second section lists the disks and, under each disk, its partitions. The third section are menu items fo finalize the partitions.

Select a disk to create an empty partition table.

Note, if you want to keep the existing data, select the partition instead. Flip Use as: do not use to Use as: Ext4 journaling file system. And then Format the partition: no, keep existing data. Lastly set up the mount point and the mount options.

Below shows a disk selected for creating a partition table.

Partition table type gpt.

Select the free space to set up the partitions.

Set up the partion with the correct format Ext4 journaling, mount point, and mount options. Below shows a partition where we want to keep the existing data on it.

Example Partitions

You may notice the discard mount option for SSD drive.

Drive Mount Point Type Size Mount Options Typical Usage Note
sda (256 GB SSD)   EFI 256 MB     FAT32
  / EXT4 96 GB discard, relatime standard  
  /usr/local EXT4 32 GB discard, relatime, nodev largefile  
  /opt EXT4 32 GB discard, relatime, nodev largefile  
  /home EXT4 remaining discard, relatime, nodev, nosuid standard  
sdb (1 TB spinning)   SWAP 128 GB      
  /var EXT4 128 GB relatime, nodev, nosuid news  
  /tmp EXT4 128 GB relatime, nodev, nosuid, noexec news  
  /data EXT4 remaining relatime, nodev, nosuid, noexec largefile4  
RAID10 /samba EXT4 4 TB relatime, nodev, nosuid, noexec largefile4  

More examples for larger disks.

Drive Mount Point Type Size Mount Options Typical Usage Note
sda (512 GB NVMe)   EFI 512 MB     FAT32
  / EXT4 128 GB discard, relatime standard  
  /usr/local EXT4 96 GB discard, relatime, nodev largefile  
  /opt EXT4 96 GB discard, relatime, nodev largefile  
  /home EXT4 remaining discard, relatime, nodev, nosuid standard  
sdb (2 TB spinning)   SWAP 196 GB     128 GB memory
  /var EXT4 256 GB relatime, nodev, nosuid news  
  /tmp EXT4 256 GB relatime, nodev, nosuid, noexec news  
  /data EXT4 remaining relatime, nodev, nosuid, noexec largefile4  
RAID10 /samba EXT4 4 TB relatime, nodev, nosuid, noexec largefile4  
Drive Mount Point Type Size Mount Options Typical Usage Note
sda (2 TB NVMe)   EFI 512 MB     FAT32
    SWAP 128 GB     128 GB memory
  / EXT4 128 GB discard, relatime standard  
  /tmp EXT4 256 GB discard, relatime, nodev, nosuid, noexec news  
  /var EXT4 256 GB discard, relatime, nodev, nosuid news  
  /opt EXT4 256 GB discard, relatime, nodev largefile  
  /usr/local EXT4 256 GB discard, relatime, nodev largefile  
  /home EXT4 remaining discard, relatime, nodev, nosuid standard  
RAID10 /samba EXT4 32 TB relatime, nodev, nosuid, noexec largefile4  

Finally it lets you review the partitions. Scroll to the bottom of the review list, choose Finish partitioning and write changes to disk.

Note one use of the partition mounted at /data (or /stash as shown) is to link to the datasets folder of a project, e.g. /data/<usr>/<project> is linked to ~/Workspace/<project>/datasets.

Go back to Installation

Software RAID

First, let’s talk briefly about hardware RAID. If you have set up RAID in the BIOS and have correctly edited the command Expert install, the RAID should appear here as a single disk. Partition it as if it is a single disk. Again this is for setting up a hardware RAID.

Now software RAID is different from hardware RAID. See the screenshot below for software RAID.

Software RAID is the preferred RAID. There is an option Configure software RAID (the first blue box in the screenshot). Once set, the RAID will appear as a single disk (the second blue box). The third blue box list the disks composing the RAID. Do not touch them.

If you have a previously set software RAID, as the RAID configuration is written on the disks, it should show up here as a single device. You do not need to configure the RAID again. For example, mine just shows up as RAID10 device #0. It is from a previous install.

You can keep the data already on the RAID device. Here is how: Select the partition (not the disk) on the RAID disk. Flip Use as: do not use to Use as: Ext4 journaling file system and Format the partition: no, keep existing data. Set up the mount point and mounting options.

In fact, this applied not only to RAID partitions but also to any partition. Note, even if we keep the existing data, we still need to mount the partition and set the mount options (see the above table). The exception is the swap partition. It is already marked as F (format it) and nothing needs to be done for it.

Go back to Installation

  1. About partitions
  2. What should NOT be on separate partitions
    • The root / has /bin, /etc, /lib and they should be kept on the same partition.
    • Also avoid mounting /usr on a separate partition. Nowadays, the /usr directory has most of the system installed binaries, kernel source tree (e.g. Arch Build Tree), documentations.
  3. Recommended partitions
    • /usr/local installs packages, built by the user (via make install), outside the system’s package manager.
    • /opt installs self-contained packages.
    • /var package cache (note that packages may be executed here, so do not set the no exec flag), spool (for mail, printing), logs.
  4. Useful commands
    • fdisk -l or gdisk -l to list partitions.
    • mkfs to build a Linux file system on a hard disk partition.
    • lsblk to list block devices. It reads the sysfs file to gather the information.
    • less /etc/fstab to view the file system tabs.
  5. SSD Notes

Go back to Installation

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