Installation on ssd with hhd for storage

[roylond]

I have install Debian 9 on a 60gb ssd. I want to use a 500gb hdd for file storage - Documents Pictures Videos etc.
Is there an article or guide which spells out in detail for a beginner on how to move the directories to the hdd and link between the two drives.
I have tried to find a manual for beginners to use but no joy so far.
Thanks in advance

[bw123]

The folders are described here, easy to adjust https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Xd ... irectories

If you're not sure, maybe the best idea is just mount the drive, and put a link to it in each directory?

It's okay to experiment, backup your home first, or create a new user and mess with that until you get the idea.

[NFT5]

There are articles/tutorials out there, but their solutions don't always match.

Moving you Home folder and its contents, while possible, isn't the best answer. Too many programs look for it in its original location and this can cause all sorts of problems.

This is what I do and it works for me:

First, when installing a Linux distribution I set up separate partitions on the SSD for root and home. Because I have a 240GB SSD and I run up to 3 different distros/releases I set the sizes of the SSD partitions at around 10GB each for root and 50GB for home. The 50GB home partition may seem excessively large but my hdd where I store all my data is not shared and I use Virtualbox so there is a need, sometimes to copy a virtual machine across the network and I do that from the Public folder, which is shared. Your needs may be different and with only 60GB ssd you may need to handle a little differently.

Either in the CLI or your file manager, create a new folder called "DATA". DATA is the name I use, you may use something different, but make sure that you're consistent.

Now edit your /etc/fstab so that your hdd, which in my case is called "DATA" is mounted to the /home/DATA folder you just created.

Do this by opening a terminal and entering:

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sudo blkid

This will result in something like this, although maybe not as complex:

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/dev/sda1: LABEL="EFI" UUID="C3A8-EEA4" TYPE="vfat" PARTUUID="18d763ec-f0d2-4bc3-9eb6-aafd4921c843"
/dev/sda2: LABEL="DEBIAN9-OS" UUID="48924ed0-df74-4077-bbdf-a677b0e5eb1d" TYPE="ext4" PARTLABEL="DEBIAN9-OS" PARTUUID="1ba83d88-2840-4bc4-879f-6f0acb2e01b8"
/dev/sda3: LABEL="DEBIAN9-HOME" UUID="1136dbd8-a167-40f3-afe1-bfdd275c8a37" TYPE="ext4" PARTLABEL="DEBIAN9-HOME" PARTUUID="6df9990d-20db-485d-b0f4-31fdeab291f0"
/dev/sda4: LABEL="DEVUAN-OS" UUID="4cb4ef61-d6c2-4437-b6fb-ea66d27fb2ac" TYPE="ext4" PARTLABEL="DEVUAN-OS" PARTUUID="f0163448-0a80-4ee9-8438-1992a67e2a8d"
/dev/sda5: LABEL="DEVUAN-HOME" UUID="82dc6bcf-89ca-42a3-b94e-8ea0fb9c79fe" TYPE="ext4" PARTLABEL="DEVUAN-HOME" PARTUUID="cc94bd7b-24f4-4c38-925f-c87d341fdd4e"
/dev/sda6: LABEL="DEBIAN8-OS" UUID="13b081a7-653e-48e1-b0db-1175f2a6cd66" TYPE="ext4" PARTLABEL="DEBIAN8-OS" PARTUUID="2fbe6f6f-1b11-454d-b80e-03e8f62f0200"
/dev/sda7: LABEL="DEBIAN8-HOME" UUID="09a78e50-1716-49c5-8439-f94f314c62bf" TYPE="ext4" PARTLABEL="DEBIAN8-HOME" PARTUUID="e35ceaf8-57ac-44cf-91d7-89d76548f891"
/dev/sda8: LABEL="SWAP" UUID="0a3dd51f-e085-477a-a750-cd2e81d02dc4" TYPE="swap" PARTLABEL="SWAP" PARTUUID="1800d4d4-3fb4-4e60-bd1c-73cd8969b081"
/dev/sdb1: LABEL="DATA" UUID="043A4F4345301970" TYPE="ntfs"
/dev/sdc1: LABEL="SYSBACKUPS" UUID="10c418b1-2119-4af2-ab87-6adde0deaf1d" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="dbd9bdf0-ad7a-436c-b805-488d895d0adf"
/dev/sdc3: LABEL="MYDOCS-VM" UUID="975c915b-6c44-4ea0-b914-85514a31ea1e" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="68905310-f03c-419b-bc99-cee1a654e919"
/dev/sdc4: LABEL="VBOX-VMS" UUID="bdc2948d-0793-43c0-af75-34965771ac99" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="4ad37e99-ecaf-4e9e-9582-b0f6cd5db2da"
/dev/sdi1: UUID="1B1F-19EF" TYPE="vfat"

You will use these results from this to get the UUID for your hdd.

Now open a root terminal and use nano to edit your fstab file

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chris@BOSSDESK:~$ su
Password: 
root@BOSSDESK:/home/chris# nano /etc/fstab

This will open fstab which will look like this:

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# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
# / was on /dev/sda4 during installation
UUID=4cb4ef61-d6c2-4437-b6fb-ea66d27fb2ac /               ext4    errors=remount-ro 0       1
# /boot/efi was on /dev/sda1 during installation
UUID=C3A8-EEA4  /boot/efi       vfat    umask=0077      0       1
# /home was on /dev/sda5 during installation
UUID=82dc6bcf-89ca-42a3-b94e-8ea0fb9c79fe /home           ext4    defaults        0       2
# Automount DATA
UUID=043A4F4345301970		/home/chris/DATA		ntfs	defaults	0	0
# Automount VBOX-VMS
UUID=bdc2948d-0793-43c0-af75-34965771ac99	/home/chris/VBOX-VMS	ext4	defaults	0	0
# Automount MYDOCS-VM
UUID=975c915b-6c44-4ea0-b914-85514a31ea1e	/home/chris/MYDOCS-VM	ext4	defaults	0	0
# Automount SWAP disabled on installation
UUID=0a3dd51f-e085-477a-a750-cd2e81d02dc4	none	swap	sw	0	0
#
/dev/sr0        /media/cdrom0   udf,iso9660 user,noauto     0       0

The relevant entry in my fstab is this one:

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# Automount DATA
UUID=043A4F4345301970		/home/chris/DATA		ntfs	defaults	0	0

Type new lines which follow these, substituting your UUID and your name in the mount path as well as the file type that you use on your hdd (mine is ntfs, yours mat be ext4 or something else). Use the Tab key to create spaces in each line. You can change the <options>, <dump> and <pass> entries if you really want to but I'd suggest you leave this at the defaults for now.

Double check that your typing has no errors then save with Ctrl+x and then y.

Restart your machine and your DATA hdd will be mounted in your home folder. You may want to change a few defaults like where your browser saves downloads and other programs that default to folders in /home. Dropbox is one that comes to mind. Depending on how it was set up your DATA hdd may need some changes in permissions to allow access. Be vary careful if you're tempted to delete folders in your home folder - some of these contain hidden files that, if not there, will make your system possibly unusable.

[roylond]

Thanks everyone I'll tread carefully and give it a try

[roylond]

When I try to follow what has been suggested and reboot I get a 728 line of reports which i don't understand and at the end a message
You are in emergency mode log as root or ctrl -D to continue
Everytime I enter Ctrl -D I just get the same message over and over.
I then have to ctrl - alt - del to switch off.
After that i reinstall Debian as I see no way out of this.

Any ideas as to how I can install on a ssd and have the Documents Downloads Pictures etc on a hdd.
Thanks

[bw123]

If you are having trouble with fstab, you can paste the output of blkid command and your /etc/fstab file here in

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 tags and someone will help you edit it.  The first step is getting a partition on the hd mounted at boot, but you didn't say whether it has been partitioned, or has a file system on it yet?

[roylond]

Hi the hdd has been partitioned with just one partition and has been formatted with ext4.

[roylond]

This is the output of blkid

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/dev/sdb1: UUID="3b7c44db-d647-4ae0-b584-74ab96512765" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="000cdd59-01"
/dev/sda1: UUID="c8e2c85e-91c6-4e12-a056-bb18d7c94f9f" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="dbd5e3cb-01"
/dev/sda5: UUID="c3fdf70d-959f-4f4c-8e36-a3576106ffd7" TYPE="swap" PARTUUID="dbd5e3cb-05"

if this is any help.

[bw123]

Now would probably be a good time to label the partitions, and also consider whether you really want to have a system with only two partitions using all available space? I never do this anymore, because for whatever reason I find it helpful to have some unallocated space for future.

If you want to go ahead with the 500mb partition the way it is and use UUID to mount it, just create the mount point, and use the entry you have now in /etc/fstab as a guide. You can get more info about it with the man command from a terminal.

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man fstab

Once you get it setup to mount automatically when you boot, the rest is pretty easy. I think some desktop environments can move the location and the contents of those special folders for you. I'm pretty sure kde plasma offers to do this, but never tried it. You didn't say what desktop you are using, if any?

[NFT5]

When I try to follow what has been suggested and reboot I get a 728 line of reports which i don't understand and at the end a message
You are in emergency mode log as root or ctrl -D to continue

You've made an error in typing the entry in fstab.

This is fixable, but I'd agree with bw123 that having a single partition is not good practice. Since you're still at the installation phase I'd consider starting again, this time with, at a minimum, separate partitions for / and /home. Plan this before you do it. If you have a 60GB ssd then the root partition should be about 8-10GB and the swap partition a bit bigger than your RAM. For example, if you have 4GB RAM then make swap about 4.5GB.

The thinking on unallocated space on an ssd used to be to leave 10% unallocated. For newer ssd this isn't necessary but I'd suggest it isn't a bad idea. So, my plan for a 60GB ssd with 4GB RAM would be:

sda1 / 10GB
sda2 /home 39.5GB
sda3 swap 4.5GB
unallocated 6GB

Is 10GB necessary for / ? No it isn't, but leaves plenty of space for programs and since your data is on a separate hdd then /home isn't under pressure and you can afford to be a bit generous.

Now, before you do all this, here's a tip. At the moment your ssd loads as "sdb". I like it to load as "sda". You can encourage this to happen by unplugging both data cables from the motherboard and connecting the ssd cable to the socket marked "SATAIII-0". In some BIOS you can change the order of loading as well and making the ssd first will speed things up a little. Not absolutely necessary, but I like things orderly.

Leave your data hdd unplugged until after you load Debian on to your ssd. Reduces the risk of overwriting any data that may be on there if you make a mistake.

Partitioning your ssd can be done from within the Debian installer, but it's clunky. It's easier to do from a live disk, first. GParted have a distro that can be put on a CD, or use another distro that comes with gParted on the live disk. MX-16 is a good choice, but not Ubuntu which leaves a trail.

Once your ssd is partitioned then go ahead and install Debian. You'll need to use the manual option in the partitioner and, as bw123 suggests, label and name your partitions for easier identification later.

Once Debian is installed then you will still need to go through the process of adding your hdd to fstab so it will mount to a folder in your home on startup.