Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Linux

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Reset: Used to restore Disk Druid to its original state. All changes made will be lost if you Reset

the partitions.

RAID: Used to provide redundancy to any or all disk partitions. It should only be used if you have

experience using RAID. To read more about RAID, refer to the Official Red Hat Linux Customiza 

tion Guide.

To make a RAID device, you must first create software RAID partitions. Once you have created

two or more software RAID partitions, select RAID to join the software RAID partitions into a

RAID device.

LVM: Allows you to create an LVM logical volume. The role of LVM (Logical Volume Manager)

is to present a simple logical view of underlying physical storage space, such as a hard drive(s).

LVM manages individual physical disks   or to be more precise, the individual partitions present

on them. It should only be used if you have experience using LVM. To read more about LVM, refer

to the Official Red Hat Linux Customization Guide.

To create an LVM logical volume, you must first create partitions of type physical volume (LVM).

Once you have created one or more physical volume (LVM) partitions, select LVM to create an

LVM logical volume.

3.18.3. Partition Fields

Above the partition hierarchy are labels which present information about the partitions you are creat 

ing. The labels are defined as follows:

Device: This field displays the partition's device name.

Mount Point/RAID/Volume: A mount point is the location within the directory hierarchy at which

a volume exists; the volume is "mounted" at this location. This field indicates where the partition

will be mounted. If a partition exists, but is not set, then you need to define its mount point. Double 

click on the partition or click the Edit button.

Type: This field shows the partition's type (for example, ext2, ext3, or vfat).

Format: This field shows if the partition being created will be formatted.

Size (MB): This field shows the partition's size (in MB).

Start: This field shows the sector on your hard drive where the partition begins.

End: This field shows the sector on your hard drive where the partition ends.

Hide RAID device/LVM Volume Group members: Select this option if you do not want to view

any RAID device or LVM Volume Group members that have been created.

3.18.4. Recommended Partitioning Scheme

Unless you have a reason for doing otherwise, we recommend that you create the following partitions:

A swap partition (at least 32 MB)   swap partitions are used to support virtual memory. In other

words, data is written to a swap partition when there is not enough RAM to store the data your

system is processing. The size of your swap partition should be equal to twice your computer's

RAM, or 32 MB, whichever amount is larger.

For example, if you have 1 GB of RAM or less, your swap partition should be at least equal to the

amount of RAM on your system, up to two times the RAM. For more than 1 GB of RAM, 2 GB of

swap is recommended. Creating a large swap space partition will be especially helpful if you plan

to upgrade your RAM at a later time.