Partition/hard drive related questions...and more

[bassamie]

I'm planning on installing Linux Mint Debian on an 128gb mSata SSD. What filesystem should I use? ext3, ext4...? How big should the OS partition be?

Also, what filesystem is safely usable by both win7 and linux? exFAT, FAT32? I may have read somewhere that there may be dangers when writing to NTFS from linux, is this true?

What about SWAP? Do I need such a partition/file? My thinkpad(T530) will have 8gb of memory.

Thanks!

[caf4926]

For Mint use ext4
swap.. yes = 2 x RAM

Windows cannot really deal with other file systems, but Linux can manage ntfs and fat no problem, but you can't use those systems to install Linux.

I use
ext4 25GB for /
ext4 as big as I can manage for /home (usually 70GB+) depending on what I have available

I take it the SSD is just for linux, not windows as well?

[widget]

As long as you have ntfs-3g and ntfsprogs installed there is no problem with partitioning ntfs from Linux. One of the best tools to repair ntfs file systems is included with ntfsprogs.

There really is a reason that people that spend their working ours rescuing MS users from their Windows disasters use Linux to do so.

If you are installing Windows on this drive, install it first and let it do its installer do its thing. Then resize the partitions. Assuming you have an install disk for MS if it installs a recovery partitions you don't need it at all and can delete that partition or shrink it as far as it will go.

Where this crap about partitioning and linux comes from is that MS is very picky about where it starts. Leave the beginning end of the MS installs partition where it is.

You should have, unless W7 and W8 are different, 2 partitions. The first is relatively small and is the boot sector. The second is the MS installed system, if there is a third it is the recovery partition.

Delete the third partition and shrink the second. I would then create the partitions for your LMDE install and simply point the installer at them.

If you are not installing MS on this drive and want data available to it from LMDE, install LMDE on / and /home and then create a third partition for data. Format the Data partition to ntfs. Do not store data there that has any security sensitive nature to it as it will be available to your MS install which no matter what you do is not as secure as a default install of LMDE.

Your best security for MS is to never allow it to connect to the internet. Disable that function completely. Put your data in a data partition and if it needs transmitted out or needs input in use LMDE as your sole connection.

You could also leave a nice amount of space for a VB install of MS inside LMDE. This would at least be somewhat more secure than connecting direct because it will be going through only one port.

[bassamie]

Great info guys, thanks!

Linux will be installed on a partition on the SSD; win7 will be on the seperate HDD.

widget: are you saying that if I have ntfs-3g and ntfsprogs installed on Mint, I will have no issues accessing and editing files on an NTFS partition? I would also like to have a partition, either on the SSD or the HDD, that will not be an OS partition, that I want accessible and editable by both OSs; is NTFS the way to go due to limitations on windows?

Does anyone know what is best used with a SSD, swap partition or swap file?

And how much space should I allocate for Linux Mint Debian?

Thanks!

[caf4926]

Use a swap partition

If you use the 128GB SSD
I would use Gparted first from the live session and create:

Primary:
swap 2 xRAM
ext4 20GB (will be for / )

Extended:
To fill all the remaining space

Logical:
ext4 50GB (will be for /home)
ntfs 50GB (for your needs)

Install example https://dl.dropbox.com/u/10573557/Mint_ ... deshow.mkv

Yes Mint has no trouble read write to windows ntfs

[bassamie]

Decided to do a practice run on my old, dieing laptop.

When creating a partition, should one 'allign' to cylinder or MiB?

[widget]

Go with the Mib.

And yes you can do about anything you want in a MS install if you have the ntfs driver for linux (ntfs-3g) and the tools to work with the system (ntfsprogs).

I would put that ntfs data partition on the hdd rather than the ssd simply because I like a bigger /home than 50gigs. I have a /home with data going back to 1998 so it is a bit larger than 50 gigs.

You may also want to look into how and why you need to set up trim on your ssd. This is a rather free wheeling and strange forum but this is very good information that is well laid out for someone, like myself, that has no experience with such a drive.
http://openubuntu.com/index.php/topic,2 ... l#msg95121
Trim support is taken up in the 3rd from last post from the bottom of the first page.

You may find the rest of the page interesting too. They don't have numbered posts.

[bassamie]

So I tried installing LMDE on my new thinkpad T530 and failed miserably. I would get a screen telling me that there is already an X server running and that I could press Ctrl+Alt+Fn## to switch screens... Anyway I was able to get to the desktop but everything was garbled. Being the impatient man that I am and also a newbie, I decided that perhaps Mint 14 Cinnamon would be my first linux distro; it is supposed to be 'easier' right?

I absolutely love it, took me about 6 minutes to install, the updates took about 9.5 minutes to download and install(I was downloading at about 1MB/s); I love my mSATA SSD. Booting is instantaneous; if I didn't have to login, I think it would take me a whole 4 seconds to go from the OS selection screen to being able to open a window on the mint desktop.

I love Mint!