[linux-lvm] Is it better to use partitions or entire disk for LVM?

[Mario Becroft (mailing list)]

On Tue, 2006-06-06 at 00:31 +0200, Heinz Mauelshagen wrote:
> On Sun, Jun 04, 2006 at 10:46:45AM -0400, Mag Gam wrote:
> > Is it better to create 1 partition on a disk, and use that into the LVM, or
> > have a blank disk, and use that in the LVM (if possible)?
> 
> As long as we still need to live with partition tables, the advantage
> of having 1 partition to create a PV on it is, that all related tools
> (e.g. parted) *show* that there's an LVM partition.

Another reason for creating a partition (perhaps a silly one, but I have
found it useful) is that discs from different vendors (or even the same
vendor) that are supposedly the same size often vary slightly, so I find
it useful to create a partition slightly smaller than the total size of
the disc. This is a little wasteful of space, but means that if I need
to drop in a replacement disc that is slightly smaller than the original
one, I can just copy an image of the old disc and it will generally
work--otherwise I would have to fiddle around with whatever was near the
end of the old disc.