[gentoo-user] Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[gentoo-user] Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[Walter Dnes]

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  Bad news... my 1.8 ghz P4 died recently and I'm now running on my
emergency backup 6-year-old Dell (450 mhz PIII and 128 megs of RAM).
Let's just say that editing 2560 X 1920 digital photos in GIMP is a
"rather liesurely" process.

  Good news... Saturday, I'm picking up...

64bit AMD 3000BP (with SSE3 !!!)
AMD 939pin Athlon 64bit 3000+ Retail Box
Giga-Byte K8NF-9 MB Firewire A & B
2 gigs (OK, so I pigged out) DDR400
SATA2 WD1600JS 160G 7200 8M 3G
SONY 1.44 Floppy Drive
LG 4163B 16X DVD±RW & DVDRAM
PCI-E16X ATI X300HyperMem256MTVDV
227/206 Tower Case w Power & Front USB
Audio, Gigabit Lan, Firewire A & B

  This'll be my first linux install that won't be 32-bit Intel.  I've
been reading the AMD64 install docs on the Gentoo.org website.  The big
items I've noticed are...
  - stick with ext2fs/ext3fs with all other filesystems being unstable
  - do not enable kernel pre-emption if I want firewire to work
  - enable 32-bit emulation for some apps

  I notice that the AMD64 Gentoo install manual at
http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-amd64.xml only lists
GRUB.  Does LILO not work on AMD64?

  I intend to use the following partition layout...
  - /    8 gigs
  - swap 2 gigs
  - /var 8 gigs
  - /home gets the rest of the drive.  There'll be tons of my garbage
    under /home/misc.  /usr/local and /opt will be symlinks on / with
    the actual files sitting in /home/misc/local and /home/misc/opt.

  This layout reflects my experiences from my Windows and Redhat days.
Keep the OS on its own partition, so you can blow away and re-install or
install the next version as required.

  Anything else to watch for when installing on AMD64?

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>
My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca

-- 
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Re: [gentoo-user] Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[Rudmer van Dijk]

On Saturday 27 August 2005 05:41, Walter Dnes wrote:
>   This'll be my first linux install that won't be 32-bit Intel.  I've

Congratulations! you've made a wonderful choice 8-)

> been reading the AMD64 install docs on the Gentoo.org website.  The big
> items I've noticed are...
>   - stick with ext2fs/ext3fs with all other filesystems being unstable

oh? for almost a year now I have an AMD64 system and I've used reiserfs for 
all my filesystems without any problems! so I can really recommend reiserfs 
but I can't say anything about other filesystems...

>   - do not enable kernel pre-emption if I want firewire to work

I don't know about firewire and preemtion since I don't have firewire. But 
recent kernels have two preemt options: full and voluntary preemtion maybe 
you can try both and see what happens.

>   - enable 32-bit emulation for some apps

yup, if you want to use Flash then you need a 32-bit browser. 
to use win32 codecs you need a 32-bit mplayer.

>   I notice that the AMD64 Gentoo install manual at
> http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-amd64.xml only lists
> GRUB.  Does LILO not work on AMD64?

never tried to use lilo on AMD64, since I switched from lilo to grub and never 
want to go back.

>   I intend to use the following partition layout...
>   - /    8 gigs

a little tiny: your /usr gets very big when you have a lot of programs (Gentoo 
installs everything on /usr by default) and your posrtage cache easily 
reaches ~3GB...

I suggest to create a /usr partition of ~8GB and a / of ~2GB

>   - swap 2 gigs
>   - /var 8 gigs
>   - /home gets the rest of the drive.  There'll be tons of my garbage
>     under /home/misc.  /usr/local and /opt will be symlinks on / with
>     the actual files sitting in /home/misc/local and /home/misc/opt.

in Gentoo /usr/local is almost not used: du /usr/local only lists empty dirs. 
so this can just reside on the /usr partition

>   This layout reflects my experiences from my Windows and Redhat days.
> Keep the OS on its own partition, so you can blow away and re-install or
> install the next version as required.
>
>   Anything else to watch for when installing on AMD64?

not that I know of, so have fun with your new system!

	Rudmer
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Re: [gentoo-user] Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[Martins]

>
>never tried to use lilo on AMD64, since I switched from lilo to grub and 
>never
>want to go back.
>
> >   I intend to use the following partition layout...
> >   - /    8 gigs
>
>a little tiny: your /usr gets very big when you have a lot of programs 
>(Gentoo
>installs everything on /usr by default) and your posrtage cache easily
>reaches ~3GB...
>
>I suggest to create a /usr partition of ~8GB and a / of ~2GB


i wanted just notice that some stuf (java, OO, ati-drivers, some games) 
goes to /opt dir 

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[gentoo-user] Re: Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[Alvin A ONeal Jr]

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As regarding the partitioning, I would recommend using LVM2. Then no 
matter how you might mess up your partitioning in the beginning you can 
change it to suit your needs by resizing it on the fly - live - without 
rebooting or even unmounting.

Check the official guide as well as gentoo-wiki.com for more about LVM2.

fdisking is just so.... 1980's - even microsoft is using LVMs these days 
(forget what they call it though) - and they pretty much adopt ever hot 
technology absolutely dead last (IP, for example).

-- 
8^)
Laterz-
~Alvin
http://CoolAJ86.Havenite.net

---
SlickC92: Dude, flex your pecs. CoolAJ86: Dude, what are pecs and how do 
you flex them?

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Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[Greg Bur]

On 8/27/05, Alvin A ONeal Jr <coolaj86@gmail.com> wrote:
> As regarding the partitioning, I would recommend using LVM2. Then no
> matter how you might mess up your partitioning in the beginning you can
> change it to suit your needs by resizing it on the fly - live - without
> rebooting or even unmounting.
> 
> Check the official guide as well as gentoo-wiki.com for more about LVM2.

I'll second using LVM2.  I had to read the documentation a couple
times before I "got it" but it beats the "old" way of partitioning.

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Re: [gentoo-user] Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[Neil Bothwick]

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On Fri, 26 Aug 2005 23:41:10 -0400, Walter Dnes wrote:

>   This'll be my first linux install that won't be 32-bit Intel.  I've
> been reading the AMD64 install docs on the Gentoo.org website.  The big
> items I've noticed are...
>   - stick with ext2fs/ext3fs with all other filesystems being unstable

I've been running resierfs and xfs for well over a year with zero
problems.

>   I intend to use the following partition layout...
>   - /    8 gigs
>   - swap 2 gigs
>   - /var 8 gigs
>   - /home gets the rest of the drive.  There'll be tons of my garbage
>     under /home/misc.  /usr/local and /opt will be symlinks on / with
>     the actual files sitting in /home/misc/local and /home/misc/opt.

8GB for / is probably OK, I have that size for /usr, with /var and .opt
mounted on /usr/{var,opt} and it's around 75% full (/ is ~150MB).
symlinks for partitions always seem kludgy to me, I prefer to mount on
the directory with the bind option, I use

/usr/var /var  auto  bind  0 0

in /etc/fstab.

>   This layout reflects my experiences from my Windows and Redhat days.
> Keep the OS on its own partition, so you can blow away and re-install or
> install the next version as required.

There is no "next version" with Gentoo, so this doesn't really apply.
Even if you did feel some odd need to reinstall, it's no big deal to tar
up /usr/local before doing so.


-- 
Neil Bothwick

Top Oxymorons Number 48: freewill offering

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Re: [gentoo-user] Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[fire-eyes]

On Fri, 2005-08-26 at 23:41 -0400, Walter Dnes wrote:
>   Bad news... my 1.8 ghz P4 died recently and I'm now running on my
> emergency backup 6-year-old Dell (450 mhz PIII and 128 megs of RAM).
> Let's just say that editing 2560 X 1920 digital photos in GIMP is a
> "rather liesurely" process.
> 
>   Good news... Saturday, I'm picking up...
> 
> 64bit AMD 3000BP [snip]

Right on. Gentoo on AMD64 is the only way to go AMD64, in my opinion.

I'm actually going to lean towards the hardware side of things. I found
these items to be EXTREMELY important when I was building some dual
opteron 248's with 8GB ram.

1) First thing you should do is update your bios
2) Use only RAM recommended by the manufacturer. It will probably be
considerably more expensive, but NOT doing so can lead to some really
weird problems later, resembling bad ram, but you won't be able to track
it down in the usual ways with memtest

I guess this one isn't hardware, well, it sort of is:
3) Do not run more than 3 or 4GB (I forget) ram with the installation
CD's, it'll eventually puke. If you have more ram, add it back later
once you have configured a kernel to support it.

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Re: [gentoo-user] Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[Walter Dnes]

  I've got my bright shiney (would you believe dull beige-coloured?) new
toy, and I'm working on the install now.  A few anxious newbie moments...

  - when I tried unscrewing the dialup-modem-connector cable from my old
    machine, I ended up with the thumbscrew in my hand, and the modem
    connector still firmly connected... oops.  It took several minutes of
    screwing in, unscrewing, and wiggling around to get it out.  I have
    used my dialup account on occasion when my ADSL ISP was down so I do
    want to keep the dialup option.  I'll remove the thumbscrews before
    inserting the connector onto my new machine.

  - the install CD couldn't find /dev/hda ... because the SATA drive
    shows up as /dev/sda (dohhh)

  - when I first tried chrooting, it failed with an "Exec format error".
    After a bit of googling, I finally figured out that I had grabbed my
    ***32-bit X86*** Gentoo 2005.1 install CD and tried to install the
    64-bit version (dohhh).  Download and burn the AMD64 install ISO, wipe
    /dev/sda1 and restart.

  I've gone with 12 gigs for /dev/sda1, 2 gigs for /dev/sda5 (swap), and
the rest of the drive is /dev/sda6, which will be mounted as /home.  I'm
using ReiserFS, as the Gentoo AMD64 guide seems a bit dated, with
references to 2004.3.  The references to 32-bit compilation are somewhat
confusing.  It looks like I have two choices...

  1) Building my system with the "multilib" flag and *MANUALLY* building
stuff with the "m32" flag.  Stuff should probably go to /usr/local.

  2) A complete chrooted environment into which I do a full-blown 32-bit
X86 (*NOT* AMD64) install.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>
My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca
-- 
gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list

Re: [gentoo-user] Any booby-traps with AMD64?

[W.Kenworthy]

On my last few installs I have used LVM2: magic as it means you can
easily and transparently resize partitions and add new drives with
minimal downtime.  Partition size choices are no longer such a limiting
factor.

Highly recommended.

BillK


On Sun, 2005-08-28 at 22:11 -0400, Walter Dnes wrote:
>   I've got my bright shiney (would you believe dull beige-coloured?) new
> toy, and I'm working on the install now.  A few anxious newbie moments...
> 
>   - when I tried unscrewing the dialup-modem-connector cable from my old
>     machine, I ended up with the thumbscrew in my hand, and the modem
>     connector still firmly connected... oops.  It took several minutes of
>     screwing in, unscrewing, and wiggling around to get it out.  I have
>     used my dialup account on occasion when my ADSL ISP was down so I do
>     want to keep the dialup option.  I'll remove the thumbscrews before
>     inserting the connector onto my new machine.
> 
>   - the install CD couldn't find /dev/hda ... because the SATA drive
>     shows up as /dev/sda (dohhh)
> 
>   - when I first tried chrooting, it failed with an "Exec format error".
>     After a bit of googling, I finally figured out that I had grabbed my
>     ***32-bit X86*** Gentoo 2005.1 install CD and tried to install the
>     64-bit version (dohhh).  Download and burn the AMD64 install ISO, wipe
>     /dev/sda1 and restart.
> 
>   I've gone with 12 gigs for /dev/sda1, 2 gigs for /dev/sda5 (swap), and
> the rest of the drive is /dev/sda6, which will be mounted as /home.  I'm
> using ReiserFS, as the Gentoo AMD64 guide seems a bit dated, with
> references to 2004.3.  The references to 32-bit compilation are somewhat
> confusing.  It looks like I have two choices...
> 
>   1) Building my system with the "multilib" flag and *MANUALLY* building
> stuff with the "m32" flag.  Stuff should probably go to /usr/local.
> 
>   2) A complete chrooted environment into which I do a full-blown 32-bit
> X86 (*NOT* AMD64) install.
> 
> -- 
> Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>
> My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca
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