Linux Mint Forums

Hey all, I just have a few Q's

My original setup on win7 was a 120GB SSD for my OS and main programs and a 2TB HDD for music/games/downloads and stuff.

What do I format the HDD as?

and how to I move my home directory to the second HDD?

thanks

You want to have the same disk arrangement as you had with Win 7, but want to replace Win 7 with Mint?
In that case you can format the second HDD as ext4 or even leave it as NTFS if you want to keep the stuff you have on the disk. Linux can handle NTFS quite well.

About your home directory, (someone correct me if I'm wrong): You copy your home directory to the second HDD, remove it from /home and make a link from the /home to your new home directory on the second HDD. Just add the second HDD in to the fstab to be mounted at the start-up.

Can I still install programs and such properly with it as NTFS format?

Lundmore wrote:Can I still install programs and such properly with it as NTFS format?

I assume you want to keep Windwoes on the SSD so what you need to do is shrink the large drive down and install linux on a new partition in the empty space. You should backup your data first. How much space you need depends on your intentions. If it's just to play around with and learn a bit then 20-40GB will be more than enough.

I thought the second drive was supposed to be mainly for data (and your home directory).

I don't see why NTFS could not be used for any other stuff as well, but I guess ext4 would be
better.

Maybe you should clarify your intentions a bit further.

Linux can also be installed within windows using virtual machine, or (some distros) can be installed on Windows disk.
Anyway, NTFS-support for linux is typically far from perfect. That's why it's far more safe to use Linux's "own" formats.
In wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison ... #Technical

Support for Microsoft Windows NT's NTFS file system has appeared, and is now comparable to the support available for other native Unix file systems.

Sorry for the confusion guys, what i mean't to say is I've removed 'Windwoes' all together now, I'm running Cinnamon completely and i want to install Steam on my SSD whilst installing the games on my HDD (like TF2).
Is that still possible in NTFS?

I don't see why not.

It's just that if there are disk problems, Linux probably can't fix NTFS-disks.
At least not as well as ext4 disks.

Lundmore wrote:Sorry for the confusion guys, what i mean't to say is I've removed 'Windwoes' all together now,

I'm grinning stupidly to myself here. At 84 years of age I might have just created my own internet meme.

I'm running Cinnamon completely and i want to install Steam on my SSD whilst installing the games on my HDD (like TF2).Is that still possible in NTFS?

Yes, you can do that.

You won't get the benefit of NTFS' journalling system, though. I recently backed up one of my hardware RAID sets that was NTFS and made it ext4. I saw no point in keeping NTFS after I realised I'd taken to linux like a duck to water. Oddly, I kept all my Windwoes software. Maybe I'm going dotty in my dotage.

I understood that Lundmore has lotsa stuff (pics, vids, music, ...) on NTFS and doesn't want to loose it all or doesn't have a suitable medium to store it all...

Thank you both. I have fixed my problem by biting the bullet and just formatting to ext4.