i'm still into linux and installed and deleted a lot of distro's but now i want to setup my main distro to my main pc. i don't know what to do with the partitioning. i wanna do it myself:)
250gb ssd
1tb hdd
i was thinking about making a primary partition on my hdd called /files and make 3 logical partitions called /hddfiles/hdddrivers, /hddfiles/hddgames and /hddfiles/files
but i don't know how to do that.
this is my idea:
ssd 250gb
primary 1gb boot /boot
primary 40gb root /
primary (dont know how big????)blender /blender
primary restgb most used games /ssdgames
1tb hdd
primary 50gb var (don't know how big. i'm not making a server) /varprimary 200gb home /homeprimary 738gb hddfiles /hddfileslogical 488gb hddgames /hddfiles/hddgameslogical 240gb files /hddfiles/fileslogical 10gb drivers and some software /hddfiles/driversprimary 12gb swap
i like to have everything in his own folder:)
is this stupid, will it work, how to do al this? do you have a idea if it doesn't work? (i'm a big newb)
If you're only using one OS just give 1tb to your home and let linux take care of it, place your documents there.
Not sure if swap should be on hdd or ssd, maybe someone else has more experience with that.
for the SSD, 1GB is more than you will ever need for boot, I would recommend a /tmp on your ram if you have enough ram, that's much faster and will save you some write cycles on your SSD. 40GB for / is usually more than enough and I doubt you will need the /var to be on the HDD unless you know for a fact that it will contain countless amount of logs and server files. If you don't care about logs make /var/logs also a ram system. (tmpfs or ramfs) mount the rest of your SSD as /home/USER/blender and /home/USER/games and use it to store any files you need to reside on the SSD if you don't know the size of blender and games, just keep then as one partition i would guess, you can mount it as /extra make it contain two folders Blender and Games and then mount -o bind /extra/Blender /home/USER/blender and mount -o bind /extra/Games /home/USER/games
EDIT: If you really want to split your hdd into partitions do it as you see fit but mount them all under /home/USER or at least mount bind them if you want to take advantage of the UNIX directory structure. Specifically, you might want to mount your games parition as .steam/whehereversteamsaveslocalfilesforgames/ this will save you the pain when reinstalling, just make sure not to delete home and you should be safe, also make sure not to delete any bind, basically save your fstab and delete / and /boot
i'm pretty newbe and i don't really know how to do /home/example. and installing is another problem i ran into. how to instal programs to the folder i like?
When you get to the partitioning part in your installer, it should display default mount options, and will have an advanced option where you can setup the partitions just as you need.
Normally, the disks on a linux system are named /dev/sdXY where X is a letter showing the drive order and Y is a the partition. If we say you split your 1TB hdd into 490GB files, 500GB Games and 10GB Swap, you will then have sth like /dev/sdb1 as 490GB, /dev/sdb2 as 500GB and /dev/sdb3 as 10GB, you then specify in your installer your 490 GB files as /home/USER/ where USER is your desired username, and then you specify the mount point for your 500GB as /home/USER/.local/share/Steam/SteamApps (That's where steam defaults on my system) keep in mind that you have to create these manually directories manually before mounting them.
If you are by this point lost and don't know what I'm talking about, just use your 1TB hdd as /home and let linux handle the rest, remove 10GB from it for swap if you want. In your proposed setup you also had a blender partition in SSD, you still need to tell the installer where to place this (/home/USER/blender is my bet but maybe other users who have used blender can help more)
As to where you install your programs, let linux handle this, I have my system on a 32GB SSD, and i've never had space issues, I have /tmp mounted as tmpfs which means that the /tmp directory lives on my ram not my harddisk which makes it faster to install programs but don't worry about that.
If you're looking to learn more about these i recommend you install one of the more advanced distributions such as Gentoo or Arch, or even Debian this will let you learn Linux this quicker
let's make an example. i make a primary partition on my hdd and i called it /files and make it 500gb. i want it to be in 200/200/100gb. i make a new partition, logical. mount it on /files/games and make it 200gb.
is this the right way? i don't know if i need to use usr or user, i'm the only one on the pc.
and when i'm installing for example the drivers. how can i choose were to install it? or is it always going into my /home folder?
so you are splitting your harddisk in 500(files)/200/200/100 or are you splitting the 500 into 200/200/100.
My recommendation in both cases:
First Case: Files alone 500GB then 200/200/100 :
You create the first Primary primary partition as 500GB, you set the mount point for it in /home/USER/Documents (USER is your username it has nothing to do with /usr)
You then create an extended parition of 500GB (Remaining space)
Inside it you create a logical partition of 200GB (you're calling it games) and set the mount point to /home/USER/.local/share/Steam (If that's where you want to install your games if not just pick another name)
Repeat for the other 200 and 100 partitions.
If you want the 500 GB partition you're calling files to be split into 200/200/100 then you only do step 2.
Is there a reason why you don't want your files to be in the /home partition btw?
You will not have to install any drivers btw, when you mentioned a drivers partition I thought you mean you are saving drivers as datafiles, same for software, let linux handle these and don't worry about them. Drivers are provided by the kernel, graphic drivers might be installed separately but always follow your distribution guide before you do something you will regret.
Maybe we should start from the beginning in here btw, what distribution are you thinking of installing, and what will you use your system for?
thanx. i'm using crunchbang and i'm gonna use it as my main os. i have w7 on a 1tb barracuda and my windows games on it too.
i think i make a 1gb boot on ssd, 40gb root on ssd, a primary partition called /ssdgames, a swap on hdd 16gb, 984gb /home on hdd. i make them all primary.
than make logical partitions /home/*my name*/hddgames.
you can choose were to store your steam games in settings. i think what you said is a better option. make a big /home folder and split it in different. no driver folder etc. and let linux choose were to install it.
but i want to know i thing cuz i still don't know if it's good or not. can i make a primary partition called /home. and make logical partition called /home/games?
Yes that will work, if you're not planning on sharing that partition or the entire system with another user make it /home/user/games
If you're dual booting, it will be a good idea to keep some partition as NTFS or FAT32 for sharing, or keep your windows documents big enough to contain both world's files, but once you get used to Linux i doubt you'll be starting windows much anymore..
thank you so much! yah windows sucks. it's pretty big. 2gb compared to 0.2gb with crunchbang:). i don't dualboot and the hdd with w7 isn't connected when i use linux. not the best setup but i don't care. i'm a hardcore gamer and now i'm only buying games that are on linux (damn you tittanfall!)