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Guide to disks and disk partitions in Linux
September 18, 2011
This article is an attempt to provide basic information about disk naming and partition
numbering conventions, in non-technical terms, to those new to Linux. I believe a basic
understanding of all the aspects concerning how a disk is referenced and partitioned will put you
in a better position to troubleshoot installation and disk-related...

Guide to disks and disk partitions in Linux

RECOMMENDED READING, TUTORIALS/TIPS | SEPTEMBER 18, 2011 12:22 AM

This article is an attempt to provide basic information about disk naming and partition numbering conventions, in non-
technical terms, to those new to Linux. I believe a basic understanding of all the aspects concerning how a disk is
referenced and partitioned will put you in a better position to troubleshoot installation and disk-related problems.

Basic information about partition tables and the difference between primary and logical partitions will be covered.

Hard Drive Naming Convention: – The first thing you need to know is there is no “C drive” or “E drive” in Linux. There are
equivalents, but when you come across a reference to a hard drive in a modern Linux system, you will typically see
something like /dev/sda, /dev/sdb, /dev/sdc, … etc. The “dev” is short for device, and in this case, a block storage device.
The “sd” is short for SCSI mass-storage driver. (SCSI stands for Small Computer System Interface.) For the rest of this
article, the “/dev/” will be dropped, so all references to hard drives and partitions will start with the last part only.

The first hard drive detected by a Linux system carries the sda label. In numerical terms, it is hard drive 0 (zero; counting
begins from 0, not 1). The second hard drive is sdb, the third drive, sdc, and so on. In the screenshot below, there are two
hard drives – sda and sdb, detected by the installer.

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Guide to disks and disk partitions in Linux

Partition Tables: – A partition table describes the partitions of a hard drive or any storage device. And there are two ALT Linux 6 Simply review
standards for the layout of the partition table – MBR (Master Boot Record) and GPT (GUID Partition Table). MBR, also know ALT Linux 6 KDesktop review
as ms-dos, is what you might call the first standard. GPT came much later. While MBR is still the most widely used partition Ubuntu 11.10 beta 1 screenshot preview
table, it comes with two major limitations which led to the development of GPT. They are: How to delete DigiNotar CA certificate from
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1. It does not allow the configuration of more than four main partitions. Those partitions are called primary partitions. Mandriva Desktop 2011 review

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Partitions and Partition Numbering: – To install an operating system on a hard drive, it must first be subdivided into partitioning guide

distinct storage units. Those storage units are called partitions. Under the MBR partitioning scheme, which is the default on Fedora 16 KDE and GNOME 3 Alpha

virtually all Linux distributions, there are three different types of partitions – Primary, Extended, and Logical. Extended, and screenshots

Logical partitions will be discussed further down.

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With MBR, any partition that is not explicitly created as an extended or logical partition, is a primary partition. And, as stated
Paul: Can you add information about UUID and disk
earlier, there can be no more than four primary partitions. The screenshot below was taken from an installation process labels please? Distributions are going the UUI...
where four primary partitions were created. If you observe closely, you will see that the first primary partition is sda1 and the
last sda4. Unlike hard drives, partition numbers start from 1, not 0 (zero). Any space not allocated to the primary partitions, Sal: I tried to install ubuntu 11.04 from usb stick to
external hard drive(no other internal ha...
is shown as “Free.” But while it may be free, it is, however, unusable. And that is because as far as the system is
concerned, that free space does not exist. darkduck: I'd like to mention that correct name of
distribution is Simply Linux. The fact that it w ...

alex_from_somewhere: Hmm, ok, thanks!! I

agree w ith Tom. Clear, short, easy tutorials like this
are aw esome...

Scott: Thank you so very much, my good man. I

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So if you attempt to create another partition using the free space, the installer will throw up the type of error message
So if you attempt to create another partition using the free space, the installer will throw up the type of error message
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shown in this image. The error message will always say, “not enough free space,” even when you know that there is space
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To get around the four primary partitions limit of the MBR partition table, the smart guys involved came up with the concept gNewSense TrueBSD

of an extended partition. By tagging a partition as an extended partition, it is then possible to create many more partitions Hymera Open
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under the extended partition. Those partitions are called logical partitions, and theoretically, there is no limit to the number Knoppix
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of logical partitions that you can create. Note: Only one extended partition may be configured on a single hard drive. Astaro Security
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What the concept of extended partition brings to the table is illustrated in the screenshot below. You can see that there are Mint
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three primary partitions (sda1, sda2 and sda3). And the fourth partition is an extended partition, which makes it possible to OzOS
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create more partitions (in this example, sda5, sda6 and sda7). Under an extended partition, you can have free space, and Pardus
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Being able to create logical partitions comes in handy when you have to dual-boot with other operating systems like
Windows, PC-BSD or even another Linux distribution, especially if that other operating systems has used up three primary
partitions. In the image below, which was taken while setting up a system to dual-boot Windows 7 and Fedora 15 (see how
to dual-boot Fedora 15 and Windows 7), three Windows 7 partitions already exist on the target hard drive. That meant there
was just one primary partition to play with. Only by setting up the available free space as an extended partition, was it
possible to install the system. What this also shows is that Linux can boot from a logical partition.

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In the last two screenshots, the extended partitions were the last primary partitions (sda4). But it does not have to be. In this
screenshot, for example, the extended partition is the second primary partition (sda2), and first logical partition number is
still 5 (sda5). So whether an extended partition is the last primary partition or not, the logical partition number always starts
with the number 5.

Not all installation programs broadcast the presence of an extended partition. But if you know what to look for, you can tell if
one exists. In the image below, for example, you can see the partition numbers go from 1, then 5, 6 and 7. The presence of
partition number 5 and above, is the most obvious tell-tale sign of an extended partition. This image, by the way, was taken
while installing Ubuntu.
GPT: – As stated earlier, GPT, or GUID Partition Table, overcomes two limitations of the MBR scheme – maximum of four
primary partitions, and the 2TB limit to partition sizes. In the image below, for example, you can see that there are eight
partitions, with about 45GB still available. The most important point to note here is that all eight partitions are primary
partitions, as the concept of extended and logical partitions, is foreign to GPT.

With GPT, there can always be unallocated space at the end of existing partitions. And unlike the case with an MBR
scheme that has no extended partition, that “unallocated” space can be used to create new or additional partitions, unless
the maximum number of partitions possible with GPT has been reached. In the image below, for example, there are six
partitions and a small unallocated space remaining. The unallocated space may be used to create a new partition.

Currently, Chakra is the only Linux distribution that is configured to use GPT by default. You may read GPT disk partitioning
guide for Chakra to see the steps involved. Fedora 16, which is slated for release in early November 2011, will support
GPT. Test installations of the first beta release show that GPT will be the default on standalone installations. In dual-boot
setups, MBR will be used if there is an existing operating system installed on MBR partitions on the target disk. You may
read feature preview of Fedora 16 installer and Fedora 16 KDE and GNOME alpha screenshots for a few screenshots of
GPT partitions in Anaconda, the Fedora system installer.
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TAGS: DISK PARTITION, GPT

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5 Comments

Paul
September 19, 2011 at 3:45 pm

Can you add information about UUID and disk labels please? Distributions are going the UUID route but you can get
around ugly UUIDs by labeling your disks. Much appreciated. Thanks.

REPLY

alex_from_somewhere
September 18, 2011 at 10:16 am

In the 5th picture (counting the error message picture), you point to the free space and say its “Free (and usable)
space”. But that’s only true IF you made the extended partition bigger…? Isn’t it? Cause it’s outside the extended
partition…

REPLY

finid
September 18, 2011 at 3:16 pm

The free space in that image is under the extended partition. It might not be apparent, but it is.

REPLY

alex_from_somewhere
September 19, 2011 at 4:16 am

Hmm, ok, thanks!!

 I agree w ith Tom.
Clear, short, easy tutorials like this are aw esome!

REPLY

tom
September 18, 2011 at 9:17 am

This is the Best Article I have ever read on Partitions!! and I’m gonna spread it and use it to tech my friends!

Thank You!!! This has helped me learn the key concepts in partitions, even though I have been using linux for past 4
years!

REPLY

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