Partitioning, Formatting, and Installing the Main Disk
A primary partition contains a single volume that is the size of the partition. An extended partition can contain many volumes. The combined size of all volumes must be less than or equal to the size of the partition.
Partition information is stored in the Master Boot Record (MBR). The MBR holds four entries. A disk may have no more than one extended partition. This means that a disk can have from zero to four primary partitions if no partitions are extended; or it can have from zero to three primary partitions if one partition is extended.
Disk Configuration
In general the Server Appliance Kit does not require a special disk layout. However, to support the failover feature that is usually within the BIOS, we recommend that the primary OS be installed in the first primary partition and the backup OS to be installed in the second primary partition or the active partition in another disk.
Note If the disk layout does not meet these minimum requirements, the failover feature will not work.
Microsoft recommends the primary and backup OS partitions be 2 GB or larger. Both primary and backup partitions must use the NTFS file system. It is recommended that any other partitions also use the NTFS file system.
| Primary partition | Backup partition | Optional partitions |
|---|---|---|
Primary OS
|
Backup OS
|
OEM partitions. Permissible but not required. |