4. Partition the new disk

Use this command to partition the new disk:

fdisk /dev/hdb

EIDE devices are identified as hda, hdb, hdc, and hdd in the /dev directory. Partitions on these disks can range from 1 to 16 and are also in the /dev directory. For example, /dev/hda4 refers to partition 4 on hard disk a (first EIDE hard disk).

SCSI devices are listed as devices sda, sdb, sdc, sdd, sde, sdf, and sdg in the /dev directory. Similarly, partitions on these disks can range from 1 to 16 and are also in the /dev directory. For example, /dev/sda3 refers to partition 3 on SCSI disk a (first SCSI hard disk).

For Linux partitions with the ext2 file system, use system ID 83. For swap partitions, use system ID 82.

For more information on partitioning, see the Installation How-To and the Partition Mini How-To.

If your new disk has over 1024 cylinders, see the Large Disk Mini How-To. In brief, you should install all files required to boot Linux within the first 1024 cylinders. One way to do this is to create a small partition (5 Mb or so) just for the /boot directory at the beginning of the disk. (Slackware only: The kernel is at /vmlinuz rather than /boot/vmlinuz, so you should put both the / directory and the /boot directory in this partition.)

Partitions for systems other than Linux should be created using their own fdisk or equivalent command rather than with Linux's fdisk.