Manual Install

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The manual install is when you want to be able to determine all of the configuration options for the drives on your own.  You have the choice to select the default install to allow the system to configure it or you can choose the advanced option as you see here.  This article will show you how to install the basic necessities with 4 partitions.  You can create more than 4 partitions as long as you make the 4th partition a Logical partition.  Also, sadly you will not be able to install LVM from the install nor software RAID, use the Alternative CD if you need those options.

You will need to create a new partition table if this is a new hard driver or you will need to delete the old partitions before you add new ones.  Be sure to back up all files before you do this as it will wipe out the data on the disk.

The first partition to create is to create a /boot partition.  This is where your kernel will be placed and so it needs to be a bootable partition.  This is one reason it is good to separate it from a the rest of the partitions.  The size is 100 MB.  A kernel is about 15-20 MB so you will have plenty of room for several kernels.  Note it is the new Ext4 file system.

Here is a list of file systems that you can use.  Note: you will not be able to install LVM (Logical Volume Managment) nor software RAID with the Desktop CD.  You will have to use the Alternate CD for those options.   Though this make installation simpiler those were significant options that were often used.

The next partition to create is the / partition.  In the example it is only using 3.5 GB which is a minimum.  A better size would be 10 GB or more assuming you will create a separate /home partition as well.  Note that it is a primary partition.

The third primary partition is the SWAP area.  This SWAP is 512 MB but your SWAP should be twice your RAM, so a size of 2-3 GB would not be uncommon.  SWAP is what your computer will use when it runs out of RAM and swap information onto the hard drive.

The final partition in a simple manual set up is to use the rest of the drive for a /home partition.  This is listed as a Primary partition which means you can only have 4 Primary partitions so this is the last one.  One huge advantage for doing a separate /home partition is that you will not need to wipe it out when you upgrade or even if you move to a different distro.

This is what it will look like when you are done.  Note, the sizes here are small just for illustration, your disk size will likely be much larger.