What is a DOS PARTITION?

**rossnixon** · 02-07-2004, 05:41 AM

Newbie here...

Booted my Knoppix 3.1 CD, hardware all OK, but have only 64 MB of RAM.
So it wants a "DOS partition" for a swap file.
I made one of 448MB with BootitNG, but there were several variations of FAT12 FAT16 etc available. I tried most of them. Knoppix can't locate this drive. Any idea why?
Can I just try to mount it anyway? It should be the 3rd partition on my HDD. (1st is for BootitNG. 2nd is for Win98.)
What command line should I try.

Thanks,
Ross

**WSC-fsl** · 02-07-2004, 08:04 AM

rossnixon,
Typically a fat32 drive will work fine to resolve this issue. Make sure that the partition is not only created but also formatted and healthy. What knoppix wants to do is create a file on this fat32 partition to use as a swap file. I haven't ever used BootitNG but you can use the utilities "fdisk" and "format" off of any windows boot disk to create this. One note though...running knoppix this way (without adequate memory) does not work very well. In my experience it is very slow, almost to the point of not being usable. Best of luck

fsl

**Hunkah** · 02-07-2004, 10:47 AM

These are the File Alocation Tables that the Win OS' are able to read and write to.

FAT 12 = Floppy Disk FAT all WinOS'
FAT 16 = all WinOS'
FAT 32 = Win98 Win2k WinXP (I think Win95B also)
NTFS = WinNT Win2k WinXP

**WSC-fsl** · 02-07-2004, 04:07 PM

@Hunkah,
True, but in this particular case, KNOPPIX cannot use an ntfs drive to make a swap file; a fat32/16 would be more suitable correct?

**Cuddles** · 02-07-2004, 05:12 PM

WSC-fsl,

Here is what I would do...

Run your BootitNG, display your partitions, determine which drive letter it is assigning to your newly created 448meg FAT32 partition.

Exit out of BootitNG, and boot your Win98 operating system...

Start a MS-DOS window, or you could boot to a COMMAND PROMPT ONLY (not Safe Mode, just the normal Command Prompt Only option)... At the DOS prompt, type:

format [drive]:

(replace [drive] with the drive letter you got from when you were in BootitNG - probably either D: or maybe E: or something) -=- NOTE the [:] "colon" after the drive letter - Windows isn't case sensitive, so you can type the command and drive letter in upper or lower case, it doesn't matter to Windows, not like Linux, Unix, etc...

Format [should] yell at you about: You are going to erase everything on "non-removable" disk media, and (being sure that you have the correct drive letter), press Y, not sure if it will want you to press [enter] as well, or not?

Once format starts its magic, ensure that the MEG that it is formatting is something around 448 [plus or minus] - this will guarentee that you "still" have the right drive.

When format completes, and you are back at the DOS prompt, you might want to run scandisk on the drive letter - to ensure the health of the drive...

One last point - When Knoppix creates its "Swap" - it will be a file, viewable, and removable, from within Win98 - you could just let Knoppix create the Swap on your Win98 disk, and when you are done using Knoppix - boot into your Win98, and remove the file. (I did this when I was running Win98 and Knoppix from the CD)

Hope this helps,
Cuddles

**WSC-fsl** · 02-07-2004, 05:23 PM

@Cuddles,
Yeah I got it, it was rossnixon that initiated the post. ... But thanks! I think your post will prove to be the most helpful for him/her.

**Cuddles** · 02-07-2004, 05:42 PM

DOH

Sorry bout that, I didn't scroll down the topic far enough, I do the dumbest things sometimes ( it proves I have blonde roots - but only my Salonist knows this

)

Cuddles

**WSC-fsl** · 02-07-2004, 05:56 PM

No Problem! I'm sure your post will still prove to be very helpful no matter who it is addressed to.

fsl

**rossnixon** · 02-07-2004, 07:31 PM

PROBLEM SOLVED !

What I had done was create the swap partition as another primary partition. When I created an extended dos partition, and made a drive on that instead - it worked fine... used fat32.

Cheers,
Ross

**Hunkah** · 02-08-2004, 08:58 AM

Sorry I was at work all day and missed keeping up with this...

I forgot to mention in my last post that a DOS based partition is somthing that DOS based OSes can read. DOS based OSes are DOS, Win3.x, Win95A&B, Win98&98SE, WinME so therefore a DOS based partition is a FAT 12, 16 & 32.

WinNT and WinXP are not considered DOS based, therefore a NTFS partition is not a DOS partition.

It seemed that you didn't know what all this stuff was and I was just schooling you on the Partition crap.

Hope I helped, if not... maybe someone?!