Primary partitions vs Logical Partitions

1 Answers

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   finid on May 10, 2011

   Not really. Here’s the skinny on partitions.

   The partitioning scheme in use allows a maximum of four primary partitions, but to accommodate situations when more than four partitions are needed, the system allows you to create an extended partition. Under an extended partition, you can theoretically create an unlimited number of partitions. Those partitions, the ones created under the extended partition, are called logical partitions. So logical partitions allows you to bypass the limit of primary partitions. That’s the difference.

   If you create 4 primary partitions, the system will see them as /dev/sda1, /dev/sda2, /dev/sda3, /dev/sda4.

   Numbering of logical partitions begins at 5, so the first logical partition on a system will always be /dev/sda5, the second will be /dev/sda6, etc.

   In a situation where you want to dual-boot with, say, Windows 7, logical partitions makes it possible, especially if you almost reached the limit of four primary partitions on the Windows side. If you have four primary partitions on the Windows side, you cannot create any other partitions, so you cannot dual-boot.

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