In Linux Mint 18.2 Mate 32 bit, how to use unallocated disk space?

[comcoco]

I operate several barebones computers without disk drives with 8 GIG of RAM. I install Linux Mint 18.2 Mate 32 bit on to 32 GIG USB memory sticks. These act as my only drives, but often I also store some data on separate USB memory sticks of various kinds in different USB ports.

Recently I have been getting a message that there is inadequate disk space and often I have crashes. I want to increase the size of the main bootable USB sticks to overcome these problems. I acquired some 128 GIG USB sticks and have copied, or cloned, my 32 stick to one of them. It boots and runs well, exactly as the original, but I still get the message that I do not have enough disk space.

I am sure that I can use the extra unallocated space on these higher capacity USB sticks, but I do not know how to do this. In order to examine the 128 GIG clone in an unmounted state, I booted the original 32 GIG. Then I insert the higher capacity clone of it into a separate USB port. This screenshot is what I see on GParted when I select the unmounted 128 GIG clone. It is attached as a file to this posting.

I need detailed instructions on how to change this to make all the extra unallocated space available to store more data, install more programs, or improve its operation. I think GParted is the appropriate tool to do this. How do I do it? Which partitions need to be expanded and how is this done? I need very detailed step by step instruction. Nothing I have tried works, and every time I fail, I have to go back and recopy (clone) the original again. This copying takes several hours. I use a Puppy Linux tool named “Puppy universal dd: copying”. If it is better to use the terminal, I will try, but I am not good on the terminal. I would rather use a GUI like GParted.

Perhaps I need to install Linux Mint from scratch on these higher capacity USB memory sticks. This would be a chore because I have several programs installed, the operating system and programs configured for my use, and lots of data on the stick which would have to be copied to the new one. Each of these introduces possible errors and mistakes which I always make. Cloneing the whole stick has worked well for me for a long time. It allows me to easily upgrade every computer.

Thanks for help anyone can provide. Perhaps there is a better forum on which this request should be posted.

Peter

[Pierre]

that screen_shot does show a typical Ubuntu Install,
& on that particular USB Stick, you can use the program Gparted,
to create another /data partition, as SDb3 or SDb4 or even SDb7or SDb8

and thus use it as an /data partition for yet, another booted Usb Stick.

NB: you are using LinuxMint /32bit with 8Gb of RAM
- - that /32bit system can only access ~ 3 1/8th Gb of that available RAM - Y'know.
maybe start using LinuxMint /64 bit system - instead ?.

[kevin987]

Hi Peter,

I'm assuming some of these older computers have single core processors and are not capable of running the 64 bit version of Mint? If they're dual core, you should download a 64 bit version.

Since you've been cloning to other USB for a long time, I think it's time to start over with your latest 128 GB USB stick. You'll still have your data on the 32 GB and those files can be put on the 128 once you've reinstalled Mint to the 128.

Just make sure to use all 128 GB on a single partition as ext4 with the mount point set to /

You may even want to download Mint 19.1 since it's supported through April 2023 and it doesn't use a swap partition like previous versions.

[comcoco]

Thank you both for your suggestions. They seem to offer good advice. I would still like to be able to expand the partitions which are existing to use the unallocated disk space. Can this be done? If so, how, using GParted, some other GUI, or if required, the terminal? I have not found a users guide for GParted. Does anyone know where there is such a thing? I need to learn to use this program.

Thanks,

Peter

[pbear]

My main advice, actually, would be to stop using flash drives for your operating system. External hard drives aren't much more expensive, will give much better performance and will last much longer. That said, you have this flash drive. Also, you'd have the same issue cloning to an external hard drive.

Simplest solution would be to delete the swap partition and the extended partition in which it is nested. Then, extend the root partition to the right, leaving room for a new swap partition. Extending to the right is a relatively quick process. Now, create a new swap partition equal in size to the old one. No need for the "host" extended partition, which is superfluous in a simple partition scheme like this. Finally, you have to edit fstab to tell it the UUID of your new swap partition. You can get that information by right-clicking the partition in GParted. Also available in Terminal with sudo blkid. Open your text editor with gksudo xed; navigate to /etc/fstab of the USB drive. Find the line for swap; copy in the new UUID; save and exit.

To do the partition work, the new drive has to be unmounted, so do all this from the original 32 GB drive as you did when taking the screenshot. Also, for completeness, I will mention that in LM19 the command to open xed with root privileges changed from gksudo to pkexec.

Hope that helps. Good luck.