[CentOS] "multi-boot" drive partitioning

Fajar Priyanto fajarpri at cbn.net.id
Tue Dec 18 04:43:17 UTC 2007


On Tuesday 18 December 2007 10:52:59 Frank Cox wrote:
> It's a new Intel Pentium Core 2 machine.
>
> I don't want to complicate this thing any more than I have to.  I want to
> be able to put this machine in the corner and tell the guy who owns the
> place that if his webserver quits, he can put the spare online and hit "1",
> if the application server quits, put it online and hit "2" and so on.  And
> 4 independent and separate Centos installations sounds like the easiest way
> to accomplish that, if I knew how to partition the disk.

Hello Frank,
I agree with Mckerrs. Virtualization is the easier way.
However if you want to do the multi-boot way. You can achieve that too.

On minimum you will need:
/ and swap. So, if you plan to do 4 multi-boot, you will need:
(4 x /) + (1 x swap) = 5 partitions

The steps are:
1. Install the 1st Centos. Prepare the partitions, it should be:
sda1 = /
sda2 = swap
sda3 = for / 2nd centos
sda4 = extended
sda5 = 3rd centos
sda6 = 4th centos

2. When installing 2nd centos, install it on sda3. Important step: install the 
bootloader on the root partition (don't the MBR). You can use the swap from 
the 1st centos.

3. When done, boot, and you will see the boot loader from 1st centos. Boot 
into it. While in 1st centos, edit /boot/grub/menu.lst and add the entry for 
2nd centos:

title CentOS no. 2 (2.6.18-8.el5)
        root (hd0,2)
        kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.18-8.el5 ro root=/dev/sda3 rhgb quiet
        initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.18-8.el5.img

4. And so on for the rest of other centos.

HTH,
-- 
Fajar Priyanto | Reg'd Linux User #327841 | Linux tutorial 
http://linux2.arinet.org
11:42:41 up 4:01, 2.6.22-14-generic GNU/Linux 
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