Re: [gentoo-user] lvm2/external partitions question

[Neil Bothwick]

On Mon, 29 Aug 2005 17:50:15 -0700, Mark Knecht wrote:

>    I'm looking at LVN2 for this install. The main drive is 250GB. I'm
> wondering a couple of things:

I've ben using LVM2 on my AMD64 box since I built it.

> 1) Should use all of the drive, other than the boot and swap
> partitions, for the main LVN partition and then let LVN subdivide it
> as needs come up as per the Gentoo-wiki on LVN2? This would meen, as I
> understand it, that there would never been more than real partitions
> on the drive.

I have /boot, swap and / on normal partitions, everything else on LVM. /
is only 300MB, as /usr is on an LVM2 partition, /var and /opt are bound
to directories in /usr. I kow I could put / on LVM, but that requires an
initrd, which adds unnecessary complication IMO.

> 2) Possibly make the main install partition something like 50GB and
> use the balance of the hard drive outside of LVM2? If I do this and
> later add a new partition within LVM does that somehow change device
> numbering (/dev/sdaX) on the external partitions?

LVM uses its own partition naming. As far as the /dev/sda is concerned,
there are only four partitions in my setup. As someone else has already
suggested, make your partitions within LVM no larger than you think
you'll need, because it is so easy to enlarge them later. Most
filesystems can be enlarged while still mounted, while shrinking a
filesystem either requires it to be unmounted or is impossible depending
on your filesystem.

> QUESTION: Are there any performance differences between using LVM and
> a standard partition?

Not that I've noticed.

> QUESTION 2: does anythign about LVM2 beg for a 2005.1 LiveCD? Mine is
> 2005.0.

I installed it with a 2004.x CD, so I'm sure 2005.0 should be fine.


-- 
Neil Bothwick

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