howmany partitions per disk possible?

[Alexander Skwar]

· Kim Goldenberg <kgoldenberg at oit.state.nj.us>:

> Actually there is a primary partition - it's called the extended partition.

Yep.

> As I understand it:
> 
>     You can have up to four (4) primary partitions. One of these may be 
> an "Extended" partition, and is always designated as the fourth Primary 
> partition (hdX4).

No. The extended partition can also be the first, second or third.

> Subsequent logical partitions are created in the Extended Partition, up 
> to a total of twelve (12) logical partitions. While this seems to total 
> 16 partitions, you lose one to the extended partition, so the total is 15.

No. The limit of 15 partitions exists only for "SCSI". IDE has
a limit of 63.

>     If the first (or only) primary partition is defined as an extended 
> partition, it show up as the fourth partition,

No, it doesn't.

Disk /dev/hda: 40.0 GB, 40007762432 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 4864 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda2               1        4864    39070048+   5  Extended
/dev/hda5               1        2000    16064937   83  Linux

Alexander Skwar
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