[General Questions and Answers] marcuszmaximus:
The question you are asking requires a bit of an explanation, but I will do my best (forgive me if I gloss over some things).

When a windows PC boots up, it initializes CMOS which searches for the hard drive or other boot device based on the order set up in BIOS/CMOS. Once it finds a storage device it attempts to boot that device (i.e. hdd=hard disk drive, eMMC=electronic MultiMedia Card). There is a bit set somewhere that determines what type of filing system is on the drive. In linux, you can see the partition table by using fdisk (devices are located in the /dev folder and look like /dev/sda or /dev/mmcblk0, depending on the type and how many there are). Therefore the command would be 'fdisk /dev/sda' and let's take a look at that...

Welcome to fdisk (util-linux 2.32.1).

Changes will remain in memory only, until you decide to write them.

Be careful before using the write command.

Command (m for help): p

Disk /dev/sda: 931.5 GiB, 1000204886016 bytes, 1953525168 sectors

Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes

Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes

I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes

Disklabel type: gpt

Disk identifier: xxxxxxxxxx (omitted)

Device Start End Sectors Size Type

/dev/sda1 2048 2050047 2048000 1000M Windows recovery environment

/dev/sda2 2050048 2582527 532480 260M EFI System

/dev/sda3 2582528 4630527 2048000 1000M Windows recovery environment

/dev/sda4 4630528 4892671 262144 128M Microsoft reserved

/dev/sda5 4892672 1619314687 1614422016 769.8G Microsoft basic data

/dev/sda6 1619314688 1845840078 226525391 108G Microsoft basic data

/dev/sda7 1845840094 1853995007 8154914 3.9G Microsoft basic data

/dev/sda8 1853995008 1858228223 4233216 2G Windows recovery environment

/dev/sda9 1858228224 1859151871 923648 451M Windows recovery environment

/dev/sda10 1859151872 1911580671 52428800 25G Microsoft basic data

/dev/sda11 1911580672 1953523711 41943040 20G Windows recovery environment

As you can see, my device "sda" has 11 partitions. 1,3,8,9,11 are all recovery partitions, 2 is an EFI partition, etc. A short list of possibilities...

1 EFI System C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B

2 MBR partition scheme 024DEE41-33E7-11D3-9D69-0008C781F39F

3 Intel Fast Flash D3BFE2DE-3DAF-11DF-BA40-E3A556D89593

4 BIOS boot 21686148-6449-6E6F-744E-656564454649

5 Sony boot partition F4019732-066E-4E12-8273-346C5641494F

6 Lenovo boot partition BFBFAFE7-A34F-448A-9A5B-6213EB736C22

7 PowerPC PReP boot 9E1A2D38-C612-4316-AA26-8B49521E5A8B

8 ONIE boot 7412F7D5-A156-4B13-81DC-867174929325

9 ONIE config D4E6E2CD-4469-46F3-B5CB-1BFF57AFC149

10 Microsoft reserved E3C9E316-0B5C-4DB8-817D-F92DF00215AE

11 Microsoft basic data EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7

12 Microsoft LDM metadata 5808C8AA-7E8F-42E0-85D2-E1E90434CFB3

13 Microsoft LDM data AF9B60A0-1431-4F62-BC68-3311714A69AD

14 Windows recovery environment DE94BBA4-06D1-4D40-A16A-BFD50179D6AC

15 IBM General Parallel Fs 37AFFC90-EF7D-4E96-91C3-2D7AE055B174

16 Microsoft Storage Spaces E75CAF8F-F680-4CEE-AFA3-B001E56EFC2D

17 HP-UX data 75894C1E-3AEB-11D3-B7C1-7B03A0000000

18 HP-UX service E2A1E728-32E3-11D6-A682-7B03A0000000

19 Linux swap 0657FD6D-A4AB-43C4-84E5-0933C84B4F4F

20 Linux filesystem 0FC63DAF-8483-4772-8E79-3D69D8477DE4

21 Linux server data 3B8F8425-20E0-4F3B-907F-1A25A76F98E8

22 Linux root (x86) 44479540-F297-41B2-9AF7-D131D5F0458A

23 Linux root (ARM) 69DAD710-2CE4-4E3C-B16C-21A1D49ABED3

24 Linux root (x86-64) 4F68BCE3-E8CD-4DB1-96E7-FBCAF984B709

Each partition stores data differently. Windows 95 all the way through Windows ME uses FAT (File Allocation Table) and doesn't use user permissions on files. NTFS (Windows NT File System) is the updated version of FAT which had its evolution and caveats. NTFS is the Windows standard now because it 1) can handle file systems larger than 2GB and 2) has the ability to set user file permissions so only the owner can read/write/execute certain files. Android uses ext4, which is a linux file system. The difference is that linux doesn't have drive letters. In windows, C:\ is your normal hard drive, A:\ is a floppy drive, and all disk devices (Thumb drive, CD ROM drive, tape backup, etc) have a letter and are almost always "mounted". In linux... the "root" is / and every device is either mounted as a subfolder or listed in /dev. So if I do a ls /dev I get this as a result (ls is the same command as dir for windows/dos):

ls -l

total 0

crw-r--r-- 1 root root 10, 235 Aug 27 05:17 autofs

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 340 Aug 27 05:34 block

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 60 Aug 27 05:34 bsg

crw------- 1 root root 10, 234 Aug 27 05:17 btrfs-control

drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 60 Aug 26 22:17 bus

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 3580 Aug 27 14:00 char

crw------- 1 root root 5, 1 Aug 27 05:17 console

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 11 Aug 26 22:17 core -> /proc/kcore

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 60 Aug 26 22:17 cpu

crw------- 1 root root 10, 62 Aug 27 05:17 cpu_dma_latency

crw------- 1 root root 10, 203 Aug 27 05:17 cuse

drwxr-xr-x 8 root root 160 Aug 26 22:17 disk

drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 100 Aug 27 05:17 dri

crw------- 1 root root 245, 0 Aug 27 05:17 drm_dp_aux0

crw-rw---- 1 root video 29, 0 Aug 27 05:17 fb0

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 13 Aug 26 22:17 fd -> /proc/self/fd

crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 1, 7 Aug 27 05:17 full

crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 10, 229 Aug 27 05:17 fuse

crw------- 1 root root 247, 0 Aug 27 05:17 hidraw0

crw------- 1 root root 247, 1 Aug 27 05:17 hidraw1

crw------- 1 root root 10, 228 Aug 27 05:17 hpet

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 0 Aug 27 05:17 hugepages

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 12 Aug 27 05:17 initctl -> /run/initctl

drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 580 Aug 27 05:44 input

crw-r--r-- 1 root root 1, 11 Aug 27 05:17 kmsg

crw-rw----+ 1 root kvm 10, 232 Aug 27 05:17 kvm

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 28 Aug 27 05:17 log -> /run/systemd/journal/dev-log

crw-rw---- 1 root disk 10, 237 Aug 27 05:17 loop-control

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 60 Aug 27 05:17 mapper

crw-rw---- 1 root video 243, 0 Aug 27 05:17 media0

crw-rw---- 1 root video 243, 1 Aug 27 05:42 media1

crw-rw---- 1 root video 243, 2 Aug 27 05:43 media2

crw-rw---- 1 root video 243, 3 Aug 27 05:44 media3

crw-rw---- 1 root video 243, 4 Aug 27 05:44 media4

crw-rw---- 1 root video 243, 5 Aug 27 05:44 media5

crw-rw---- 1 root video 243, 6 Aug 27 05:44 media6

crw-rw---- 1 root video 243, 7 Aug 27 05:44 media7

crw------- 1 root root 244, 0 Aug 27 05:17 mei0

crw-r----- 1 root kmem 1, 1 Aug 27 05:17 mem

crw------- 1 root root 10, 59 Aug 27 05:17 memory_bandwidth

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 179, 0 Aug 27 05:17 mmcblk0

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 179, 1 Aug 27 05:17 mmcblk0p1

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 179, 2 Aug 27 05:17 mmcblk0p2

drwxrwxrwt 2 root root 40 Aug 26 22:17 mqueue

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 60 Aug 27 05:17 net

crw------- 1 root root 10, 61 Aug 27 05:17 network_latency

crw------- 1 root root 10, 60 Aug 27 05:17 network_throughput

crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 1, 3 Aug 27 05:17 null

crw-r----- 1 root kmem 1, 4 Aug 27 05:17 port

crw------- 1 root root 108, 0 Aug 27 05:17 ppp

crw------- 1 root root 10, 1 Aug 27 05:17 psaux

crw-rw-rw- 1 root tty 5, 2 Aug 27 14:05 ptmx

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 0 Aug 26 22:17 pts

crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 1, 8 Aug 27 05:17 random

crw-rw-r--+ 1 root netdev 10, 58 Aug 27 05:17 rfkill

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 Aug 27 05:17 rtc -> rtc0

crw------- 1 root root 252, 0 Aug 27 05:17 rtc0

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 0 Aug 27 05:17 sda

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 1 Aug 27 05:17 sda1

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 10 Aug 27 05:17 sda10

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 11 Aug 27 05:17 sda11

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 2 Aug 27 05:17 sda2

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 3 Aug 27 05:17 sda3

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 4 Aug 27 05:17 sda4

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 5 Aug 27 05:17 sda5

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 6 Aug 27 05:17 sda6

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 7 Aug 27 05:17 sda7

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 8 Aug 27 05:17 sda8

brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 9 Aug 27 05:17 sda9

crw-rw---- 1 root disk 21, 0 Aug 27 05:17 sg0

drwxrwxrwt 2 root root 40 Aug 27 14:05 shm

crw------- 1 root root 10, 231 Aug 27 05:17 snapshot

drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 220 Aug 27 06:31 snd

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Aug 26 22:17 stderr -> /proc/self/fd/2

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Aug 26 22:17 stdin -> /proc/self/fd/0

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Aug 26 22:17 stdout -> /proc/self/fd/1

crw-rw-rw- 1 root tty 5, 0 Aug 27 13:16 tty

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 0 Aug 27 05:17 tty0

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 1 Aug 27 05:18 tty1

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 10 Aug 27 05:17 tty10

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 11 Aug 27 05:17 tty11

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 12 Aug 27 05:17 tty12

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 13 Aug 27 05:17 tty13

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 14 Aug 27 05:17 tty14

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 15 Aug 27 05:17 tty15

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 16 Aug 27 05:17 tty16

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 17 Aug 27 05:17 tty17

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 18 Aug 27 05:17 tty18

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 19 Aug 27 05:17 tty19

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 2 Aug 27 05:17 tty2

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 20 Aug 27 05:17 tty20

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 21 Aug 27 05:17 tty21

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 22 Aug 27 05:17 tty22

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 23 Aug 27 05:17 tty23

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 24 Aug 27 05:17 tty24

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 25 Aug 27 05:17 tty25

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 26 Aug 27 05:17 tty26

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 27 Aug 27 05:17 tty27

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 28 Aug 27 05:17 tty28

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 29 Aug 27 05:17 tty29

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 3 Aug 27 05:17 tty3

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 30 Aug 27 05:17 tty30

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 31 Aug 27 05:17 tty31

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 32 Aug 27 05:17 tty32

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 33 Aug 27 05:17 tty33

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 34 Aug 27 05:17 tty34

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 35 Aug 27 05:17 tty35

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 36 Aug 27 05:17 tty36

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 37 Aug 27 05:17 tty37

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 38 Aug 27 05:17 tty38

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 39 Aug 27 05:17 tty39

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 4 Aug 27 05:17 tty4

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 40 Aug 27 05:17 tty40

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 41 Aug 27 05:17 tty41

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 42 Aug 27 05:17 tty42

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 43 Aug 27 05:17 tty43

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 44 Aug 27 05:17 tty44

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 45 Aug 27 05:17 tty45

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 46 Aug 27 05:17 tty46

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 47 Aug 27 05:17 tty47

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 48 Aug 27 05:17 tty48

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 49 Aug 27 05:17 tty49

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 5 Aug 27 05:17 tty5

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 50 Aug 27 05:17 tty50

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 51 Aug 27 05:17 tty51

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 52 Aug 27 05:17 tty52

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 53 Aug 27 05:17 tty53

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 54 Aug 27 05:17 tty54

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 55 Aug 27 05:17 tty55

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 56 Aug 27 05:17 tty56

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 57 Aug 27 05:17 tty57

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 58 Aug 27 05:17 tty58

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 59 Aug 27 05:17 tty59

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 6 Aug 27 05:17 tty6

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 60 Aug 27 05:17 tty60

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 61 Aug 27 05:17 tty61

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 62 Aug 27 05:17 tty62

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 63 Aug 27 05:17 tty63

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 7 Aug 27 05:18 tty7

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 8 Aug 27 05:17 tty8

crw--w---- 1 root tty 4, 9 Aug 27 05:17 tty9

crw-rw---- 1 root dialout 4, 64 Aug 27 05:17 ttyS0

crw-rw---- 1 root dialout 4, 65 Aug 27 05:17 ttyS1

crw-rw---- 1 root dialout 4, 66 Aug 27 05:17 ttyS2

crw-rw---- 1 root dialout 4, 67 Aug 27 05:17 ttyS3

crw------- 1 root root 10, 239 Aug 27 05:17 uhid

crw------- 1 root root 10, 223 Aug 27 05:17 uinput

crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 1, 9 Aug 27 05:17 urandom

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 80 Aug 27 09:50 usb

drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 80 Aug 27 05:17 v4l

crw------- 1 root root 10, 57 Aug 27 05:18 vboxdrv

crw------- 1 root root 10, 56 Aug 27 05:18 vboxdrvu

crw------- 1 root root 10, 55 Aug 27 05:18 vboxnetctl

drwxr-x--- 4 root vboxusers 80 Aug 27 05:17 vboxusb

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 0 Aug 27 05:17 vcs

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 1 Aug 27 05:17 vcs1

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 2 Aug 27 05:17 vcs2

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 3 Aug 27 05:17 vcs3

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 4 Aug 27 05:17 vcs4

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 5 Aug 27 05:17 vcs5

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 6 Aug 27 05:17 vcs6

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 7 Aug 27 05:18 vcs7

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 128 Aug 27 05:17 vcsa

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 129 Aug 27 05:17 vcsa1

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 130 Aug 27 05:17 vcsa2

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 131 Aug 27 05:17 vcsa3

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 132 Aug 27 05:17 vcsa4

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 133 Aug 27 05:17 vcsa5

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 134 Aug 27 05:17 vcsa6

crw-rw---- 1 root tty 7, 135 Aug 27 05:18 vcsa7

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 60 Aug 27 05:17 vfio

crw------- 1 root root 10, 63 Aug 27 05:17 vga_arbiter

crw------- 1 root root 10, 137 Aug 27 05:17 vhci

crw------- 1 root root 10, 238 Aug 27 05:17 vhost-net

crw------- 1 root root 10, 241 Aug 27 05:17 vhost-vsock

crw-rw----+ 1 root video 81, 0 Aug 27 05:17 video0

crw-rw----+ 1 root video 81, 1 Aug 27 05:17 video1

crw------- 1 root root 10, 130 Aug 27 05:17 watchdog

crw------- 1 root root 249, 0 Aug 27 05:17 watchdog0

crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 1, 5 Aug 27 05:17 zero

As you can see there are a lot of devices, and some of those are pipes/other linux things. To get a list of BLOCK devices, we can either use the lsblk command or we can go into the /dev/block folder and type ls...

/dev/block$ ls -l

total 0

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 10 Aug 27 05:17 179:0 -> ../mmcblk0

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 12 Aug 27 05:17 179:1 -> ../mmcblk0p1

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 12 Aug 27 05:17 179:2 -> ../mmcblk0p2

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 6 Aug 27 05:17 8:0 -> ../sda

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:1 -> ../sda1

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 8 Aug 27 05:17 8:10 -> ../sda10

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 8 Aug 27 05:17 8:11 -> ../sda11

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:2 -> ../sda2

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:3 -> ../sda3

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:4 -> ../sda4

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:5 -> ../sda5

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:6 -> ../sda6

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:7 -> ../sda7

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:8 -> ../sda8

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Aug 27 05:17 8:9 -> ../sda9

Here you can see my sdcard (mmcblk0) and my primary hard drive (sda). The number at the end represents the partition number. As you cans see, I have 11 partitions on my hard drive on my laptop and my sdcard has 2 partitions (in liunx the first of almost everything is 0 instead of 1).

Those ARE real partitions... but the storage isn't exactly like a hard disk drive. All of the information is saved on memory chips in the phone, whereas a hard disk drive (HDD) uses magnetic dust to signify bits (if more dust is on the top of the sector it's a 1, and if more dust is down it's a zero). Also, there are MANY more Android partitions than the partitions that you listed.... using the "cat" command you can print a text file to the screen in linux (including Android) and the /proc/ folder has a bunch of text files with information about your device. Typing the command "cat /proc/partitions" on my ZTE prints this out...

$ cat /proc/partitions

major minor #blocks name

253 0 196608 zram0

179 0 7634944 mmcblk0

179 1 8192 mmcblk0p1

179 2 8192 mmcblk0p2

179 3 8192 mmcblk0p3

179 4 8192 mmcblk0p4

179 5 8192 mmcblk0p5

179 6 8192 mmcblk0p6

179 7 8192 mmcblk0p7

179 8 16384 mmcblk0p8

179 9 16384 mmcblk0p9

179 10 8192 mmcblk0p10

179 11 90112 mmcblk0p11

179 12 49152 mmcblk0p12

179 13 49152 mmcblk0p13

179 14 8192 mmcblk0p14

179 15 8192 mmcblk0p15

179 16 16384 mmcblk0p16

179 17 8192 mmcblk0p17

179 18 8192 mmcblk0p18

179 19 8192 mmcblk0p19

179 20 8192 mmcblk0p20

179 21 8192 mmcblk0p21

179 22 8192 mmcblk0p22

179 23 8192 mmcblk0p23

179 24 1024 mmcblk0p24

179 25 8192 mmcblk0p25

179 26 8192 mmcblk0p26

179 27 32768 mmcblk0p27

179 28 540672 mmcblk0p28

179 29 2621440 mmcblk0p29

179 30 4030447 mmcblk0p30

179 64 4096 mmcblk0rpmb

179 128 31260672 mmcblk1

179 129 31256576 mmcblk1p1

254 0 4030431 dm-0

Each of those partitions stores different information in them. One is the cache partition, which is where all app data is stored. One is for the baseband (cellular radio chip), zram0 is RAM, system contains the Android system file (like c:\windows). Nowadays, there is an frp partition to lock the device if someone attempts to factory reset the device, the account information is still maintained (as the data and cache partitions are formatted but frp isn't, and therefore Android won't let you in unless you supply the username and password). The laf partition has to do with Fastboot (a PC command line program to change the partitions) and there are also vendor, firmware, carrier, and several others that I don't know the purpose of.

I hope this helped you and maybe some other people. :)