[SOLVED] Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
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There are no such things as "stupid" questions. However if you think your question is a bit stupid, then this is the right place for you to post it. Stick to easy to-the-point questions that you feel people can answer fast. For long and complicated questions use the other forums in the support section.
Before you post read how to get help. Topics in this forum are automatically closed 6 months after creation.
[SOLVED] Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
Hey, I'm new to Linux. The distro I chose is Linux Mint since it was the distro recommended for the first time users by everyone.
I have a 128GB SSD and 1TB HDD and I'm running Windows as my main OS. I wanted to dual boot with Linux Mint, the recommended space for Linux Mint as it says is 25GB.
Since I have like 40GB left in my boot drive (SSD) I made a partition of 25GB SSD and a 300Gb from my HDD since I thought I won't need too much space while I will be testing out the OS.
I installed the / root directory to my 25GB SSD partition and /home to my 300 HDD partition, and it worked good. The OS loaded very fast almost Instantly.
After using the OS for around 2 weeks, I really liked it. And since then I have installed some heck amount software, what I noticed my boot partition free space was decreasing. And suddenly it came to a point it said in a notification "0 bytes left" and I was like, WHAT? I clicked the "examine" option on the notification and examined my root folder (boot partition) didn't understand well from it, But when I checked the applications folder (which I just found out was in my / root directory) I saw all of my software was installed there and I was surprised, because for some reason I thought that all of my applications will be Installed in my /home directory.
I gave up organizing those folders and thought I would do that tomorrow, and shut downed and booted to windows.
While I booted back to Linux Mint, I noticed I couldn't log in to my user account at all. I was worried and don't know what to do, after some research I saw that the problem can happen with some graphics drivers issue or storage problems. of course, I saw the problem and made some free space by going to recovery mode of Linux and clicked "make free space" it worked. I tried to manage my files, but I gave up because my apps weren't loading idk what dependencies were important and my entire OS turned into a complete mess.
I completely deleted my Linux partitions and deleted the grub bootloader, right now I will be Installing Linux Mint again completely fresh new on a 25GSSD and a 300 HDD again. But before I do that I want to ask you guys and want advice and some help. What should be the best and efficient solution for organizing my storage? I just want my necessary boot files to be on my SSD and make sure it doesn't take any more space, and whatever I download and Install should be done on my HDD.
But I don't know how to do it.
Should I do something during the Installations of my OS? or is there a setting in the App centre which allows you to do it, and I was blind and couldn't find it? is there a command where I should write before Installing apps from the terminal?
Please really need some help here.
Note: As I have told you before I'm completely new to Linux right at the beginning, and yes I still don't know almost anything about Linux till now. So don't expect me to know much.
I have a 128GB SSD and 1TB HDD and I'm running Windows as my main OS. I wanted to dual boot with Linux Mint, the recommended space for Linux Mint as it says is 25GB.
Since I have like 40GB left in my boot drive (SSD) I made a partition of 25GB SSD and a 300Gb from my HDD since I thought I won't need too much space while I will be testing out the OS.
I installed the / root directory to my 25GB SSD partition and /home to my 300 HDD partition, and it worked good. The OS loaded very fast almost Instantly.
After using the OS for around 2 weeks, I really liked it. And since then I have installed some heck amount software, what I noticed my boot partition free space was decreasing. And suddenly it came to a point it said in a notification "0 bytes left" and I was like, WHAT? I clicked the "examine" option on the notification and examined my root folder (boot partition) didn't understand well from it, But when I checked the applications folder (which I just found out was in my / root directory) I saw all of my software was installed there and I was surprised, because for some reason I thought that all of my applications will be Installed in my /home directory.
I gave up organizing those folders and thought I would do that tomorrow, and shut downed and booted to windows.
While I booted back to Linux Mint, I noticed I couldn't log in to my user account at all. I was worried and don't know what to do, after some research I saw that the problem can happen with some graphics drivers issue or storage problems. of course, I saw the problem and made some free space by going to recovery mode of Linux and clicked "make free space" it worked. I tried to manage my files, but I gave up because my apps weren't loading idk what dependencies were important and my entire OS turned into a complete mess.
I completely deleted my Linux partitions and deleted the grub bootloader, right now I will be Installing Linux Mint again completely fresh new on a 25GSSD and a 300 HDD again. But before I do that I want to ask you guys and want advice and some help. What should be the best and efficient solution for organizing my storage? I just want my necessary boot files to be on my SSD and make sure it doesn't take any more space, and whatever I download and Install should be done on my HDD.
But I don't know how to do it.
Should I do something during the Installations of my OS? or is there a setting in the App centre which allows you to do it, and I was blind and couldn't find it? is there a command where I should write before Installing apps from the terminal?
Please really need some help here.
Note: As I have told you before I'm completely new to Linux right at the beginning, and yes I still don't know almost anything about Linux till now. So don't expect me to know much.
Last edited by LockBot on Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:16 am, edited 2 times in total.
Reason: Topic automatically closed 6 months after creation. New replies are no longer allowed.
Reason: Topic automatically closed 6 months after creation. New replies are no longer allowed.
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
25G for / and 300G for /home should in fact normally do; 25G is what I always give my VM installs.
What isn't standard is what you are saying wrt. "dowload and install", assuming you mean this in another sense than from/through the Software Manager or through apt, i.e., from the repositories. A specific difference between Linux and Windows is that on Linux you "are not supposed to" download software directly from the source but go through the repositories, and seeing as how 25G is in fact relatively hard to fill up if you do latter, question becomes what it is that you are "downloading and installing".
Now, there are of course valid exceptions to the repository rule; if you are e.g. installing things such as Mathematica or MATLAB or what have you then you could give them more room by mounting /opt and/or /usr/local from your HDD alongside /home, but the description up to now would seem to indicate that you're probably just doing something wrong/non-generic, and for a good answer we'd need to understand your usecase; what it is that you are downloading and installing and from where.
What isn't standard is what you are saying wrt. "dowload and install", assuming you mean this in another sense than from/through the Software Manager or through apt, i.e., from the repositories. A specific difference between Linux and Windows is that on Linux you "are not supposed to" download software directly from the source but go through the repositories, and seeing as how 25G is in fact relatively hard to fill up if you do latter, question becomes what it is that you are "downloading and installing".
Now, there are of course valid exceptions to the repository rule; if you are e.g. installing things such as Mathematica or MATLAB or what have you then you could give them more room by mounting /opt and/or /usr/local from your HDD alongside /home, but the description up to now would seem to indicate that you're probably just doing something wrong/non-generic, and for a good answer we'd need to understand your usecase; what it is that you are downloading and installing and from where.
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
Did you enable Timeshift?
If so, where are the snapshots being saved??
If to your root then maybe look at trimming them down (& saving future snapshots elsewhere)....
If so, where are the snapshots being saved??
If to your root then maybe look at trimming them down (& saving future snapshots elsewhere)....
Last edited by RIH on Sat Feb 23, 2019 7:45 am, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
You were probably saving your timeshift snapshots into your root partition and saving too many of them.
Do you remember how you set it up?
Do you remember how you set it up?
Linux Mint 20.3 (Cinnamon)
Linux Mint 19.3 (Cinnamon)
Bodhi Linux 6.0 (MokshaArcGreen)
Fedora 35 (Cinnamon)
Linux Mint 19.3 (Cinnamon)
Bodhi Linux 6.0 (MokshaArcGreen)
Fedora 35 (Cinnamon)
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
I forget that thing as a matter of course (and don't use it). Yes, that seems likely...
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
Sorry I know it is been a really long time, almost a month. But I'm simply downloading apps from the manager and repositories, and I'm simply installing a lot of Applications I guess that is being filled up.rene wrote: ⤴Sat Feb 23, 2019 7:35 am 25G for / and 300G for /home should in fact normally do; 25G is what I always give my VM installs.
What isn't standard is what you are saying wrt. "dowload and install", assuming you mean this in another sense than from/through the Software Manager or through apt, i.e., from the repositories. A specific difference between Linux and Windows is that on Linux you "are not supposed to" download software directly from the source but go through the repositories, and seeing as how 25G is in fact relatively hard to fill up if you do latter, question becomes what it is that you are "downloading and installing".
Now, there are of course valid exceptions to the repository rule; if you are e.g. installing things such as Mathematica or MATLAB or what have you then you could give them more room by mounting /opt and/or /usr/local from your HDD alongside /home, but the description up to now would seem to indicate that you're probably just doing something wrong/non-generic, and for a good answer we'd need to understand your usecase; what it is that you are downloading and installing and from where.
My use case, I simply want my Linux Mint OS to boot up really quickly. The system files to be in my SSD and every other third-party apps that I install, I want it to be installed in my HDD. Is that possible in Linux, (i'm still a newbie lol)
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
@Everyone, Sorry for relying on y'all very late. Been a bit busy with my personal life,
Let me clear everything, what I actually want is to store all of my system files at my SSD (so my OS can boot very quickly) and nothing else, and every other applications and file I download to be in my HDD. How to do it?
Let me clear everything, what I actually want is to store all of my system files at my SSD (so my OS can boot very quickly) and nothing else, and every other applications and file I download to be in my HDD. How to do it?
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
You would spend 30 GB for /. That would be enough to install any program you needs.
You may hold /home too on your SSD and mount some of your user diurectories, e.g. ~/Documents, ~/Music..... ino partitions on the hard disk. You can use the harddisk as big room for mass of data, like music or whatever you likes and mount them ino your user directory in /home. As /home is contains each and any userdata and user specific settings. Each directory that needs more room for data can created as mountpoint that mounts a partition (on other drive).
Linux knows nothing about drive letters - but each directory can work as mountpoint that mounts a partition on its logical place where the data is location inside the partiton mounted in.
You may hold /home too on your SSD and mount some of your user diurectories, e.g. ~/Documents, ~/Music..... ino partitions on the hard disk. You can use the harddisk as big room for mass of data, like music or whatever you likes and mount them ino your user directory in /home. As /home is contains each and any userdata and user specific settings. Each directory that needs more room for data can created as mountpoint that mounts a partition (on other drive).
Linux knows nothing about drive letters - but each directory can work as mountpoint that mounts a partition on its logical place where the data is location inside the partiton mounted in.
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
You see, I would like to use Linux mint for productivity tasks (video editing etc), I will have a lot of software installed related to it. Is there a way I can simply make Linux main system files to be stored in my ssd just so it can boot faster? and applications to my HDD? Maybe in like future that 30 Gb might get used after linux mint updates and it may get filled up.hcentaur13 wrote: ⤴Sat Mar 16, 2019 11:15 am You would spend 30 GB for /. That would be enough to install any program you needs.
You may hold /home too on your SSD and mount some of your user diurectories, e.g. ~/Documents, ~/Music..... ino partitions on the hard disk. You can use the harddisk as big room for mass of data, like music or whatever you likes and mount them ino your user directory in /home. As /home is contains each and any userdata and user specific settings. Each directory that needs more room for data can created as mountpoint that mounts a partition (on other drive).
Linux knows nothing about drive letters - but each directory can work as mountpoint that mounts a partition on its logical place where the data is location inside the partiton mounted in.
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
The short simple answer is no, applications generally install intoapplications to my HDD
/bin
, /sbin
or /usr/bin
and support files, e.g. libraries in /lib
. Configuration files/folders are normally hidden and live in your home folder. So there is no easy way to tell them to go somewhere else. And it won't make your system boot any faster.But this is not a concern, linux isn't disk hungry like windows. I've got a lot of stuff installed and my root partition has only used 17G. If your root partition is filling up the solution is to find the culprit. Timeshift has been suggested, another is logs - have a look at
/var/log
. There is a tool called 'disk usage analyser', think installed by default. You can use it to see what's using up space:
T430 root folder selected (it takes a while to generate):
Thinkcentre M720Q - LM21.3 cinnamon, 4 x T430 - LM21.3 cinnamon, Homebrew desktop i5-8400+GTX1080 Cinnamon 19.0
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
I found the solution for my problem! Read on
Hey guys! I just found a solution what I needed to, I reinstalled Linux Mint from scratch again, but during the installation. I pressed "something else" and
I created 3 different partition mount points and and on my hard drive,
And then the root to my SSD. I'm not sure if that is the most efficient way to do it, but it works for me!
I also did some research on what is "TimeShift" I found out it is an application that stores something called "snapshots" and it takes a lot of space.
Then I went to its "settings" then "location" and change the location to mine,
I have installed tons of software now, updated the OS to the latest version, and it is working very fine!
My storage is being utilised as a wanted, Thank you for all who helped me.
Hey guys! I just found a solution what I needed to, I reinstalled Linux Mint from scratch again, but during the installation. I pressed "something else" and
I created 3 different partition mount points
Code: Select all
/user
Code: Select all
/opt
Code: Select all
/home
And then the root
Code: Select all
/
I also did some research on what is "TimeShift" I found out it is an application that stores something called "snapshots" and it takes a lot of space.
Then I went to its "settings" then "location" and change the location to mine
Code: Select all
/home
I have installed tons of software now, updated the OS to the latest version, and it is working very fine!
My storage is being utilised as a wanted, Thank you for all who helped me.
Last edited by OppositeCube on Sat Mar 23, 2019 2:24 pm, edited 5 times in total.
Re: Best storage solution for Linux Mint, with 25GB SSD and 300GB HDD?
Thank you for helping me, but I have solved my problem now. my 20GB boot partition has 12Gb free space with probably like 40 software installed (yeah I know it is a lot XD)AndyMH wrote: ⤴Thu Mar 21, 2019 11:29 amThe short simple answer is no, applications generally install intoapplications to my HDD/bin
,/sbin
or/usr/bin
and support files, e.g. libraries in/lib
. Configuration files/folders are normally hidden and live in your home folder. So there is no easy way to tell them to go somewhere else. And it won't make your system boot any faster.
But this is not a concern, linux isn't disk hungry like windows. I've got a lot of stuff installed and my root partition has only used 17G. If your root partition is filling up the solution is to find the culprit. Timeshift has been suggested, another is logs - have a look at/var/log
.
There is a tool called 'disk usage analyser', think installed by default. You can use it to see what's using up space:
Screenshot from 2019-03-21 15-27-15.png
T430 root folder selected (it takes a while to generate):
Screenshot from 2019-03-21 15-26-31.png