Download Parted Magic 4.5 RC 1

The release candidate of version 4.5 of Parted Magic was released on Sunday. Parted Magic is a Linux distribution specifically for partitioning hard drives. In addition to GParted, it includes a number of other useful tools, including Partition Image, TestDisk, Truecrypt, Clonezilla, G4L, SuperGrubDisk, and ddrescue. The software is released under the gpl license and is available in different versions. For example, there is a live CD, a pxeversion and a version that can be used from a USB stick. Parted Magic can handle ext2, ext3, ext4, fat16, fat32, hfs, hfs+, jfs, linux-swap, ntfs, reiserfs, reiser4, and xfs.

New in version 4.5 includes a newer version of Xorg Server, which immediately updates all drivers. Furthermore, the software has been thoroughly cleaned, so that not only has the download become a lot smaller, it now also uses fewer resources. Below is the full changelog for this release:

New features:

• pmagic.sqfs now has a version number: pmagic-4.5.sqfs. This should stop the loading of old pmagic.sqfs files lying around on hard disks and USB drives. You can disable Conky at the boot prompt with noconky. Busybox in the initramfs is compiled against uclibc with buildroot and the initramfs is only 136KB now. PPPoE connections can be started from the ‘Start Network’ program. Parted Magic only needs 192MB to run completely from RAM. The “Live with low RAM” option only requires 48MB of RAM to run.
• New command line entries for alternative Intel drivers:
  • intel-2.5.1
  • intel-2.7.1
  • intel-2.6.3

  Hit at the first boot screen to display them. To switch versions just hit and type in one of the values ​​above. No distribution makes switching Intel driver versions for Xorg this easy.

Clean ups:

• syslinux message files for boot options have been separated into kernel command line options and daemon options. The message.text was getting too big to fit on the screen. I spent a lot of time combing over every binary and library and removed nearly 20MB (50MB+ uncompressed) of unneeded and worthless files. I also removed DRI and glx from Xorg and linux. Nobody needs 3D acceleration to run Parted Magic. It’s back down to ~80MB now.

Updated:

• xorg-server-1.6.3 (all drivers were updated)
• busybox-1.14.3
• glibc-2.9
• hdt-0.3.4
• gparted-0.4.6
• pigz-2.1.5
• e2fsprogs-1.41.9
• clonezilla-2.3.3-74
• drbl-1.9.4-53
• partclone_0.1.1-16
• TrueCrypt 6.2a
• openssl-0.9.8k
• vte-0.20.5
• openssh-5.2p1
• hose-2.1.4
• libxml2-2.7.3
• ncurses-5.7
• gtk+-2.16.6
• glib-2.20.5
• linux-2.6.30.6
• gsmartcontrol-0.8.5
• fsarchiver-0.5.9
• ntfs-3g-2009.4.4AR.17
• firefox-3.5.3
• safecopy-1.6
• adblock-1.1.1
• gdisk-0.4.1

Added:

• bluez-utils-3.36
• bluez-libs-3.36
• bluez-hcidump-1.42 (Bluetooth daemons are started at boot)
• ntfsdump_logfile
• ntfswipe
• ntfstruncate
• ntfsmove
• ntfsmftalloc
• ntfsck
• rp-pppoe-3.10
• beep
• stress-1.0.1

Fixed:

• Listing devices by uuid
• clonezilla bug pigz
• dhclient dirty trick
• Adding beep functionality†
• update for Fsarchiver and ntfs-3gAR
• How do you set up a PPPoE internet connection?