Debian 12 Manual Partition Install | MBR & UEFI

A video describing how to create manual partitions during a Debain installation. Descriptions of both MRB and UEFI boot options are provided in this example.

[wakesiah]

Thank you for this -- very helpful! I too shied away from manual partitioning on the Debian installer, didn't want to take the risk of screwing things up, lol. Now it seems much less intimidating. I've been acclimatising myself to Debian 12 for a few weeks on QEMU/KVM in anticipation of LMDE 6 release (YeeHaaa!!). Subbed & Liked.

[takakazushi]

FANTASTIC Video. Finally, someone who answers my questions before I think them up. Like many just "take it" whatever the default is for install. Your video makes me comfortable doing a manual partition. BTW - Why a SWAP partition instead of a swap file? Thought with 16GB RAM swaps weren't that necessary. PLS consider "pimping out / customizing Debian 12" videos. Everything from customizing / repairing GRUB, dual or more booting in Linux or Linux and Windows, , , anything...Adding a desktop?...Perhaps running VirtualBox and the secrets of loading Guest Addtitions in Debian 12. Thank you.

[catsartpics]

Thanks for confirming that all partitions on a uefi machine need to be primary.

[gerald]

The default for gnome 40 and above opened up in activities. Never read where anyone liked it. There's an extension for it. "No overview at start-up. Then it will just login to full desktop as normal. Ubuntu at some point started doing legacy boot with one bios boot unformatted 1mb, EFI 538mb fat32, then the balance ext 4 root so it could be partitioned GPT. Manjaro on the other hand is simpler. 8mb unformated partition for bios-grub. Then followed by the balance ext 4 for root. My mb is an Asus Z77 and it has UEFI. But one of the issues with early UEFI boards was messing things up if you switched drives. With legacy boot I can switch cables all days long without issue. UEFI the next drive indicates unbootable, or not detected at all. You have great content. Been going thru your older videos.

[nkushgaur]

very very on point video, thank you very much

[tripcurrent]

Thanks for detailed boot flag explanation, uefi-related stuff always gives me trouble. Btw can you give some tips on how to use recovery partition properly? Does it work similar to the one PopOS creates or requires additional tools?

[Lars-pivx]

For virt-machines maybe large files instead of standard for usage?

[BartFlossom]

Did I miss something? When did you select your DE? Does the new installer default to gnome?

[mestrebimbashouse]

Video summary!! (I still recommend watching the whole video): for a desktop, the partitions i use are 1.0 gb for the boot/efi partition; 15 gb minimum (20gb recommended) of space for the root, which should have boot flag enabled, note that this partition NEEDS to be primary and not logical; and the swap partition, which should be the same size as your ram. Note that if your system has 2.0 of ram, you should double the swap to 4 gb

[immortallman]

Hi! I want to install Debian 12 along the WIndows 11. Fisrt time it worked fine for me. But later i haven't boot manager. Maybe you can tell how to use EFI (UEFI) to have over there boot option for Debian??

[DiegoAzuaga]

Hello, when I create a new partition it does not allow me to select whether it will be primary or logical. Go directly to the location section (at the beginning or at the end). Is there a problem with this?

[thepathnotfound]

Hey, thank you for this. Question? I don't see the format option per partition on my end. I am installing Bookworm. Thx

[farshadshiri]

Hi, i want to install debian just for computing softwars. Is it ok to only have a root partition and a swap area? If yes they should be on by bootable option?

[wellnesspathforme]

(Edit — I was in UEFI mode) My partition setup would not all either boot or root to be bootable. Currently searching to find out why this is a problem.

[SanjayWale]

Thank you. The manual partitioning is explained beautifully. Initial partition setup for MBR vs UEFI was brilliant starting point.

As far as swap partition is concerned, it’s much less of an issue with modern distributions & hardware. I’d keep swap partition at the end, which provides more flexibility.

One question. Does this method directly applicable for dual boot with Windows boot on the first partition?

[mestrebimbashouse]

Please note that if you want a clean install, set all of the system partitions to be formatted, as /boot automatically is set to skip formatting, unlike the others.

This was useful for me since i also use windows, and it wasnt in the grub menu

Cheers!!

[Melethasgar]

Partition #4 is the extended partition that contains the logical ones.

[jiunsa]

i have no ssd detected - please help me

[patrickprucha]

Curious. I noticed you put the boot flag on /. I don't usually because i thought grub would handle it. So do we need to put the "boot" flag on root?