Laptop only one disk SOLVED

[enjohn]

I have Linux Mint 20.2 installed on my laptop that has a 256GB disk. Do I need to partition this disk? At the moment I have 537MB file system partition - mounted at boot/efi FAT 32 and 256GB Ext4 file system partition. Do I need to resize the partition?

[Coggy]

Don't touch the efi partition - that's just for booting. Your Linux system and your user files will all be on the same large partition.

There's no actual need for having more partitions. Some people do like to have a separate partition to put /home on. This means you can reinstall the OS on the root partition without having to restore /home (with all your data and application settings) from a backup afterwards. I would go 50G for the system and 200G for the home partition if I were installing from scratch. But if you're happy with the way it is, there's no burning need to change it. Maybe next time you install, break it into two then.

[enjohn]

Okay - thanks for the details. I assume that when I do a reinstall, in order to make two partitions I would have to select the Manual option on the install menu?

[Cosmo.]

Your assumption is right. The installation method is called "something else".

But there is something else to consider for the size of the 2 partitions. What we need to know is the amount of RAM on your machine. The reason: The installer will create a swap file in the system partition and the size of this file depends from the amount of RAM. The bigger the swap file the more space is needed for the system partition.

[enjohn]

Thanks for the information. According to the System Monitor, the RAM is 15.6GB. Initially, I plan to use the laptop to learn and explore the Linux system. I have no personal data on it, other than a few files (all backed up) for use in tutorials etc. Eventually, I will be using it as my second PC. Thanks for the warning about the efi partition. When I mentioned partitioning, I referred to my Partition 2 with 256GB storage. When I'm more familiar with Linux, I will probably do an install and set up the partitions you advise.

[Cosmo.]

With your amount of RAM you should consider to give the swap file about 4 GB. But this will not allow you to hibernate. For hibernating about 20 GB swap size will be needed. In the latter case 50 GB system partition is too low, but even in the first case 50 GB seems to me risky. I recommend to give the system partition some more GB. In the case, that your partition for home gets filled, is it relatively easy to move data to an external disk; if the system partition gets filled, your at the end (or have to do rather complicated solutions).

My recommendation is 60 GB without hibernating, 70 GB with hibernating.

[enjohn]

Many thanks. I am fairly certain that I will do a reinstall on the laptop and set it up correctly with the partitions that are required.

[Cosmo.]

I encourage you. If I see it right, there is until now nothing to loose on the computer, I mean no data loss. So in case something goes not as expected you can do it again. This helps much - for experience and for self-confidence.

[enjohn]

Thanks for your guidance. Once I have got everything ready I will do a reinstall. I'll post updates when all complete.

[enjohn]

Hello. I have now completed a full reinstall on my laptop. Several hours of YouTube tutorials and posts on the forum, I think I have done it correctly. I would appreciate it if someone could view the screenshot for me, please? Just to make sure! I'm not sure how to check if a Swap file was created at the install. Some guidance please? Thanks

[rickNS]

I'm not sure how to check if a Swap file was created at the install. Some guidance please? Thanks

Two easy ways, one, free -h

Another way is to open system monitor, resources tab.

[enjohn]

Thanks - didn't realise it was that easy! The Swap file is only 2.0GB - is that enough?

[rickNS]

Please post results of inxi -Fxz

And do you intend to hibernate ?

[enjohn]

I thought I might want that option. To be honest, I'm still not 100% certain what it is! I had been told if I wanted to use hibernation I should have a 70GB swap file, but when doing the reinstall I didn't get an option to size the Swap File.

[rickNS]

I thought I might want that option. To be honest, I'm still not 100% certain what it is! I had been told if I wanted to use hibernation I should have a 70GB swap file,

If you don't know what it is then you "probably" don't need it. I personally find it useless, and just leave my computer running, or shut it off, it boots in seconds, anyway.

Still to answer your question (if you want an answer) is to post the results of that command inxi -Fxz

And I believe cosmo said you'd need a 20 GB swap for that, not 70.

[enjohn]

Sorry - I did post the information you wanted, but it was a bit late. Regarding Cosmos I think I misunderstood what he meant; he put, at the end of his post "My recommendation is 60 GB without hibernating, 70 GB with hibernating". I need to try harder!

[enjohn]

Please post results of inxi -Fxz

And do you intend to hibernate ?

Yes I will.

[coenjohn@Office:~$ inxi -Fxz
System:
Kernel: 5.4.0-113-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 9.4.0
Desktop: Cinnamon 5.2.7 Distro: Linux Mint 20.3 Una
base: Ubuntu 20.04 focal
Machine:
Type: Desktop Mobo: ASUSTeK model: PRIME B450M-A v: Rev X.0x
serial: <filter> UEFI [Legacy]: American Megatrends v: 2006
date: 11/13/2019
CPU:
Topology: 6-Core model: AMD Ryzen 5 3600X bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Zen
L2 cache: 3072 KiB
flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 sse4a ssse3 svm
bogomips: 91029
Speed: 2053 MHz min/max: 2200/3800 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 2078 2: 3593
3: 2196 4: 2195 5: 2052 6: 2195 7: 2196 8: 2195 9: 2186 10: 3591 11: 2151
12: 2196
Graphics:
Device-1: NVIDIA TU116 [GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER] driver: nvidia
v: 470.129.06 bus ID: 08:00.0
Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.13 driver: nvidia
unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,nouveau,vesa resolution: 2560x1440~60Hz
OpenGL: renderer: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER/PCIe/SSE2
v: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 470.129.06 direct render: Yes
Audio:
Device-1: NVIDIA TU116 High Definition Audio driver: snd_hda_intel
v: kernel bus ID: 08:00.1
Device-2: AMD Starship/Matisse HD Audio vendor: ASUSTeK
driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus ID: 0a:00.4
Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.4.0-113-generic
Network:
Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet
vendor: ASUSTeK driver: r8169 v: kernel port: f000 bus ID: 07:00.0
IF: enp7s0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter>
Drives:
Local Storage: total: 1.13 TiB used: 56.55 GiB (4.9%)
ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: A-Data model: SU630 size: 223.57 GiB
ID-2: /dev/sdb vendor: Seagate model: ST1000DM010-2EP102 size: 931.51 GiB
Partition:
ID-1: / size: 218.57 GiB used: 56.55 GiB (25.9%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda5
Sensors:
System Temperatures: cpu: 49.2 C mobo: N/A gpu: nvidia temp: 36 C
Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A gpu: nvidia fan: 38%
Info:
Processes: 454 Uptime: 5h 40m Memory: 15.62 GiB used: 1.44 GiB (9.2%)
Init: systemd runlevel: 5 Compilers: gcc: 9.4.0 Shell: bash v: 5.0.17
inxi: 3.0.38
enjohn@Office:~$

de][/code]

[Cosmo.]

enjohn, what you did was perfectly right.

Regarding the 2 questions:
Hibernating means, that all the content of RAM gets written to the disk (into the swqp file or partition) and then the computer gets turned off. After turning it on all the programs are again opened just as before.
The good thing is, that you can leave your computer alone and it will not stall, because the battery gets empty. (Obviously not of interest for desktop pcs.). The bad thing is, that dependent from the hardware this does not work on all machines. Some do not even enter the hibernate mode, others (the worst case) go into hibernate, but do not wake up, and the third group are those, which work perfectly with hibernating. It is impossible to make a prediction, it is question of trial and error. Or leaving it, if you do not want to invest the time. If you want it, than swap must be bigger than the amount of RAM, the 20 GB I told you for your machine.
Size of swap: If you read through the web you will find a number of different thoughts or believes about the right size. So what I gave you is my opinion about the right size. Without hibernating this would be 4 GB. What now, with the default 2 GB? As long as you have enough RAM for all the programs you are running, this will be enough. The critical point comes, if more RAM gets needed. The system will in this case take this "RAM" from swap; if swap is big enough it is all OK (although a bit slower, because reading and writing to disk (swap) is slower than to RAM). But if swap is completely used and the system needs more, than it will stall, what means shutting down without the chance to save anything to disk. With your 16 GB RAM you will most likely have no problem if you do not use memory-intensive programs, e.g. graphic-editing. So you can leave the 2 GB, if you use only "normal" programs.

P.S. You tried to enclose the system information between the code tags, very good. But obviously something went wrong. I tell you. You used the 2 tags [code] and [/code] and then the system information should have been pasted between both. But you made a little mistake and inserted the system info in the first tag between co and de. I assume that you have a touchpad and that the touchpad moved the cursor to this place.

[rickNS]

So if you want to go ahead, and make a larger swapfile, and set up hibernation there is a complete guide here,

viewtopic.php?f=42&t=284100

As cosmo, and gm10's guide says not 100% guaranteed to work.

[enjohn]

Thanks very much for your explanation and patience. I really appreciate your help and advice, as well as everyone else trying to help me I understand this very new and to me. 'alien' system. I will be using Darktable for photo editing, but that's about all. Based on that, what is your advice? I am quite prepared to reinstall again, with some guidance as to what to do differently. I am equally as happy to leave things as they are, or resize swap file and do anything else that you recomnend. Sorry to be such a dumbo, but moving from Windows to Linux is a bit like learning to walk again. I feel guilty asking all these questions, but am totally blown away with all help I'm getting. I await your guidance. Thank you.