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Thread ID: 104632 2009-11-03 03:20:00 Why can I only create 3 primary partitions? xyz823 (13649) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
826774 2009-11-03 03:20:00 I thought i could create 4?

At the moment I have a "system reserved" partition my "windows" partition and my "data" one. I want to create a new one to install debain on.

But whenever I create a new one it just makes a new logical drive?
xyz823 (13649)
826775 2009-11-03 03:38:00 I also think you can have 4. Is there a hidden partition like for recovery?

Just a thought.
Sweep (90)
826776 2009-11-03 03:44:00 You can have up to four primary partitions, however judging by your description of the problem it sounds like your entire disk space has already been allocated to primary partitions, one of which is set as a container for extended / logical partitions. As there is still space available to allocate logical partitions inside it, your partition manager is doing that for you by default.

If you actually need a primary partition for whatever reason, you may need to tweak your disk layout a bit.
Erayd (23)
826777 2009-11-03 04:19:00 Debian does not care and will boot fine from a non-primary partition.
I wouldn't bother creating the partition (as you will need a / & swap & usually /home partition as well) Just run the installer and pick the "guided" install into free space.
fred_fish (15241)
826778 2009-11-03 04:41:00 Debian does not care and will boot fine from a non-primary partition.
I wouldn't bother creating the partition (as you will need a / & swap & usually /home partition as well) Just run the installer and pick the "guided" install into free space.

If there is any free space of course.
Sweep (90)
826779 2009-11-03 05:49:00 Haha I ended up wiping the HDD and merging the system and windows into 1. installed windows to that and created 2 more. one for data and one for "another" OS. (It violates their EULA to install on my hardware) I dont think chill wants me talking about that here!

I think I will just install ubuntu inside windows.
xyz823 (13649)
826780 2009-11-03 06:17:00 Haha I ended up wiping the HDD and merging the system and windows into 1. installed windows to that and created 2 more. one for data and one for "another" OS. (It violates their EULA to install on my hardware) I dont think chill wants me talking about that here!

I think I will just install ubuntu inside windows.

So you still have three partitions I think which means you are not any futher ahead than what you were earlier.
Sweep (90)
826781 2009-11-03 07:17:00 The general hardware rule is up to 4 primary partitions or up to 3 primary partitions and one extended partition which is a placeholder for logical drives. If the only spare space on the drive was inside the extended partition then the above is normal - you can only have logical drives inside an extended partition. johnd (85)
826782 2009-11-03 11:44:00 The extended partition *is* a primary partition - it's just a primary partition that's reserved for containing other partitions.

Also note that's not a hardware limit; it's a limit imposed by the DOS partition table format. If you use a different type of partition table, you can do all kinds of crazy and interesting things :thumbs:. Although if you pick anything other than a DOS partition table, Windows won't understand it.
Erayd (23)
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