Hard drive installation...

This is a discussion about Hard drive installation... in the Everything Linux category; I am trying to install mandrake 9. 2 and i have 3 hard drives can i install it on my 3rd one? ;(.

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I am trying to install mandrake 9.2 and i have 3 hard drives can i install it on my 3rd one? ;(

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Feb 20
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Yes you can. I did find a little quirk in the install process though.
 
How about giving a little more information on your system.
 
You just need to be a little cautious.
 
Do you have raid on the system?
 
Do you have a linux partiton on the third drive ready to be populated?
 
I found the best way to do this is when the first cd loads, you get a boot prompt.
 
type in expert then hit the enter key.
 
This will accomplish a few things. One it will prevent Mandrake from trying to use any other linux partitions that you may have, assigned to another distro, as the root partiiton for Mandrake, on the other drives.
 
Go though the install process until you get to the partitioning menu.
 
Choose custom partitioning.
 
Look at the diagrams, which will list your drives and partiitons. Highlight the partition that you want to use (or empty space) and either let Mandarke divide the space automatically, or choose the mount point yourself and assign root to the partition, as the mount point.
 
This should go well, but if you find that Mandrake won't let you assign root as the mount point, or that root has been assigned to another partition on the first or second drive, back out of the partitioning scheme and try again.
 
If you don't chose the auto partitioning scheme, make sure that you assign some swap space on the third drive, usually 2X the ram that is installed on the machine.
 
If this goes well, allow the partiitons to be formatted and go form there.
 
I also found that Mandrake sometimes fails to make a boot floppy outside of the expert mode in myltiple drive systems. This is another reason why to use expert mode. This can be confusing if you have a raid system enabled in the bios, as the drive designations will be different.
 
Make sure that you chose to make a boot floppy, when prompted, just in case.
 
Remember, you need to tell Mandrake if it is OK to insert a bootloader (lilo or grub) to the MBR, If you have another OS, like windows, realize that your windows MBR will be written over, but a windows boot option will be available to you with grub or lilo, when you boot the system.
 
Ask any questions that you may have, so we can help with the process. If unsure, back out of the install process and ask a question.
 
Others may have had an easier solution, but I found the above relevent to my system, which has three hard drives.

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Joined 2004-02-20
OP
lets see... i have a
2.6 pentium 4 ht
on a intel mother board
1st hard drive 200gb Primary Master on controller card
2nd harddrive 120gb primary slave on controller card
3rd harddrive 80gb secondary master in 2nd slot of controller card
i want the 3rd one to have linux on it
zip drive connected as primary master to motherboard
sony dvd+r/rw 2.4x
toshiba 16x dvd-rom
pny nividia 256mb 5600 series
and how do you "linux format" the harddrive and does it have to be done first?