Linux fdisk question (Oracle Enterprise Linux)

UNIX for Advanced & Expert Users
1

OS: Oracle Enterprise Linux 6.2
Hypervisor: VMWare workstation 9

I created a VM and attached a 7gb virtual disk to it.

Using fdisk , I partioned the disk like below. The filesystems mounted on this is working fine. But I am seeing the message

Partition n does not end on cylinder boundary.

for each partitions as shown below.

# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 7516 MB, 7516192768 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 913 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x0006b683

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *           1          13      102400   83  Linux
Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda2              13         144     1049600   83  Linux
Partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda3             144         275     1049600   82  Linux swap / Solaris
Partition 3 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda4             275         914     5137408    5  Extended
Partition 4 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda5             275         914     5136384   83  Linux

Why am I getting this message ?
Can this be ignored ?

2

This is an old warning which doesn't apply to modern disks. You can ignore it, especially on a virtual disk which doesn't actually have cylinders in any sense of the word.

Beware that very small ext2/3 partitions may have a small number of inodes, which can limit the number of files you put on a filesystem even when all available space isn't exhausted. You can adjust how many inodes you get when you create the filesystem, but it's very very difficult to add more later.

1 Like
3

regarding your error messages ...

if you look at your partitions, each preceding partition ends exactly on the start of the succeeding partition (i.e., SDA1 ends at cylinder 13 where SDA2 starts, SDA2 ends on cylinder 144 where SDA3 starts, etc.). SDA1 should end at cylinder 13 and SDA2 should start at cylinder 14, SDA2 should end at cylinder 144 and SDA3 should start at cylinder 145 ....