In case you don't know what parted is then I can only assume that you never worked with disks larger then 2 TB. Good for you.
If you do know what parted is that I also can assume that you came across problems with fdisk and disks larger then 2TB.
If you do know what parted is that I also can assume that you came across problems with fdisk and disks larger then 2TB.
So what is parted?
Simple answer to this question is just another disks partitioning tool. What is so special about parted? When using parted you can create partitions that are larger then 2TB. Why? Because. Don't get to techical about it.
Can you use parted for partitions smaller then 2TB? Yes, you can! Do you use parted for partitions smaller then 2TB if you don't have partitions larger then 2TB? I don't think so. Why? Answer is pretty simple. Big disks are still expensive.
Fdisk limitations for large partitions
Fdisk limitation is that it can't create partitions larger then 2TB.
Example: you have a disk sdb that is 3TB. Do all things that you need for creating new partion on it.
fdisk /dev/sdb
(new primary partition, number 1, first block on disk, last block on disk)
When you are finish with creating partition, list info about it
fdisk /dev/sdb1
You will see that is it only 2TB big. Even if you did select last block on disk, you can get partition bigger then 2TB.
Can I still make partitions larger then 2TB with fdisk?
Well, you can but ... you will need to to use LVM and make some tricks.
How to do it? Pretty simple really. Let's show this in an example.
If you can 3TB disks on your server,let's say it is sdb, you first create one partition. Then create second partition on save disk. So you will have sdb1 and sdb2 partition that are in total 3TB large.
Now, implement LVM on them.
Create PV on them:
pvcreate /dev/sdb1
pvcreate /dev/sdb2
Check PV
# pvs
PV VG Fmt Attr PSize PFree
/dev/sda2 rootvg lvm2 a- 40.00g 0
/dev/sdb2 data_vg lvm2 a- 2.00t 0
/dev/sdb1 data_vg lvm2 a- 1.00t 0
PV VG Fmt Attr PSize PFree
/dev/sda2 rootvg lvm2 a- 40.00g 0
/dev/sdb2 data_vg lvm2 a- 2.00t 0
/dev/sdb1 data_vg lvm2 a- 1.00t 0
Create VG on them:
vgcreate data_vg /dev/sdb1
vgextend data_vg /dev/sdb2
You must use extend for second disks because you can't have to VG with same name.
So when you execute vgs command, you will see something like this
# vgs
VG #PV #LV #SN Attr VSize VFree
data_vg 2 1 0 wz--n- 3.00tg 0
rootvg 1 3 0 wz--n- 90.00g 28.00g
VG #PV #LV #SN Attr VSize VFree
data_vg 2 1 0 wz--n- 3.00tg 0
rootvg 1 3 0 wz--n- 90.00g 28.00g
Now you can create LV on VG data_vg that is 3TB big.
lvcreate -L3T -n data_lv data_vg
# lvs
LV VG Attr LSize Origin Snap% Move Log Copy% Convert
data_lv data_vg -wi-ao 3.00T
rootlv rootvg -wi-ao 20.00g
varlv rootvg -wi-ao 10.00g
LV VG Attr LSize Origin Snap% Move Log Copy% Convert
data_lv data_vg -wi-ao 3.00T
rootlv rootvg -wi-ao 20.00g
varlv rootvg -wi-ao 10.00g
Rest is easy, create file system on /dev/mapper/data_lv and mount it somewhere.
Making all this with parted
Same disk - sdb
# parted /dev/sdb GNU Parted 2.3 Using /dev/sdb Welcome to GNU Parted! Type 'help' to view a list of commands. (parted) mklabel GPT Warning: The existing disk label on /dev/sdc will be destroyed and all data on this disk will be lost. Do you want to continue? Yes/No? Yes
(parted) mkpart primary 65535s 100%
(parted) q Information: You may need to update /etc/fstab.
# parted /dev/sdb print Model: Unknown (unknown) Disk /dev/sdb: 3299GB Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B Partition Table: gpt Number Start End Size File system Name Flags 1 33.6MB 3299GB 3298GB primary
And now you can create file system on sdb1 or you can create LVM on sdb1.
