Notebooks Ok. New dell, take a look at the partitions.

So I got my new m1530 today and I was about to back up the primary partition so I have a clean install without needing to actually install. So I insert my trusty system rescue cd, run_qtparted to take a look at how the drive is set up. I'm greeted by this:




What a mess!!? Is this normal?

 

It could be recovery partitions, maybe one is the OS, the other is the drivers... (just a guess).
If that is the case, I don't know why they would do that... (folders exists), but I think you can void the technical support or your whole warranty is you remove them.

 

much easier to make a partition disappear than a folder, it stops idle noob hands deleting important crap.

 

Yeah, one is the Dell recovery partition, that's the 10gb ntfs partition. But what about the 125mb fat16?

Well I suppose I could go in and see whats in there. I may be gone some time...

 

Screw it, install Fedora. ^_^

It does look reasonably normal, for a branded system..
I never liked multi-partition setups, I would much rather have a set of OS discs and a full backup set of my files.
As I'm sure most people would.

 

one is the recovery partition, another is probably teh mediadirect thing
dunno about the other
just wipe it anyway

 

Sorry to threadjack but how did you get a m1530 with linux direct from dell? I ask because my Uni provides XP and Vista free to students so I don't really want to pay for a licence when I don't have to, problem is that looking on the dell site all I can find with Ubuntu on is the m1330, inspiron 1525 and a desktop. Are you in the US? is there more choice over there?

Moriquendi

 

where do you see it being a linux install? all those ntfs partitions look like it came with windows installed to me.

although i believe that dell US does sell the 1530 with ubuntu.

 

Yeah exactly, it's a vista install but the screenshot is of qtparted running from a linux live cd.

I was planning on wiping it and triple booting xp, ubuntu, and perhaps something a little more... fruity. And maybe i'll even keep vista!

 

/dev/sda is what linux calls a SATA hard disk, of course I could be being really stupid, if the program he's using to look at all the partitions is runing under linux from a live cd that would be another explanation. Erk, find out soon enough I guess.

Moriquendi

Edit: yeah that explains it, Ill get me coat...

 

Recovery partition, diagnostics, Media Direct, and perhaps an OS and data partition...who knows, Dells have the weirdest partition structures I've seen.

 

125mb= Boot Loader, when you boot the computer after the bios for about 10 seconds you get a blue bar across the top of the screen, that's their boot loader, if you look really close it'll say something like loading PBR for a millisecond. At this screen you can press ctrl+F11 to enter the recovery partition, which is the last FAT32 (unless you have a SATA ODD, in which case that last FAT32 may be the boot partition from the liveCD, in which case the 10GB NTFS would be the recovery partition). If you really don't like it, I suggest making a backup of the Ghost image file in the IMG directory under the recovery partition. That way you can recover using Symantec Ghost (or Ghost from the Hiren's Bootable Tech. CD). To do network image transfers you'll need the full Ghost Corporate Suite.
Good luck!

 

Dell actually have fantastic recovery set up, looks a little messy when you see all the partitions but its great when you can reinstall windows at the touch of a button.

 

Cheers for the explanation!

 

If you plan on reinstalling Windows, you should look into what OEM specific files you need to save for a fresh install. OEMs use a system called system locked preinstall (SLP) so they don't need activation. It's tied to the board via the BIOS, and there are keys in the OS. The sum of all this is what handles licensing for the OS. I have not ventured far into Vista yet, which uses a new version of SLP. So I don't know what you need to save for that. But the XP files are know, and some googling should get you the info you need.
I'm at the point where, if I get an OEM machine with XP, I back up the license files first thing.

 

Just call to activate... it's perfectly legal and takes like 2 minutes, after which you can fresh install and activate on the same hardware without needing to go through any BS.

 

Create recovery CDs/DVDs from within Windows just incase, wipe, and enjoy. Thats what I always do. Then you can put it back to "normal" if you ever need to in future.

 

Just an addition to my previous post that I thought of while in selective start up on some Dell on my bench. New Dells come with a diagnostic utility boot partition, that would explain the smaller 630MB FAT32 while the larger one is the restore partition

 

Yeah.... so why does dell use it's own bootloader? Oh wait it must be because of that damn media direct. What an awful idea that is. I think I'll leave the bootloader partition alone (unless I install linux and then I assume grub will take care of everything for me anyway). I'll delete the recovery and media direct partions though, what a waste of space.

 

Media direct is only one of the many options the extra partitions give you, in reality, it's not a bad idea at all to partition your hard drive with a bootable utility system for hardware diagnostic and a recovery partition. This is almost ideal honestly... now if only they had them on different physical disks, then we'de be in heaven...

ps. I agree, media direct sucks, I don't use it, but the rest of it's a great idea, and I'm sure some people use media direct.