[NTLUG:Discuss] bootable flag

[richard witt]

On Wed, May 27, 2009 at 11:00 AM, Chris Cox <cjcox at acm.org> wrote:
> On Wed, 2009-05-27 at 05:26 -0500, Ralph Green wrote:
>> Howdy,
>>  I almost always create a /boot partition when I setup a system.  I have
>> been setting that partition with the bootable flag when I am given the
>> choice.  It seems to work, but I am suspecting that it is more accurate
>> to set the / partition to be bootable.  What do you think?
>
> If your machine is 5 (probably 7+ years actually) years or old or more,
> then the purpose of /boot was to make sure the boot area resided in
> the lower tracks of the HD so that old BIOS's could handle it.
>
> Hasn't been an issue for a LONG time though.
>
> I still do /boot though.  I make it small and use ext2 to avoid
> journal overhead (50MB < /boot < 100MB).
>
> So... nothing necessarily wrong with just using /.  I have several
> fat root setups in place... but sometimes I regret them, for other
> reasons besides /boot though.

I also use /boot with an ext2 setup and i also set it to no auto
mount. I do this more for safety that i dont accidentally screw up the
kernel(s) that reside there and hopefully will still have working
kernels should i somehow hose the system and need to rescue it.