Can't see ntfs partition

[paulcspencer]

I couldn't find a similar problem by searching but forgive me if it's here somewhere already, because I couldn't think of many useful terms to try searching for.

I installed Kubuntu successfully but I did something wrong and it can't see the partition I set up to store all my documents and files on.

It's the first install I've done myself and I ran gparted and, following my interpretation of advice on a forum not unlike this one, I created partitions:
Within an extended partition
- about 12GB ext3 format which I allocated during installation to ext3, which I believe is where the OS lives, yes?
- about 6GB linux-swap format, for swap
same again for the other OS I plan to install later
Then there is another primary partition, the remainder (about 200GB), ntfs format. During installation, I allocated it to something that I think was just called ntfs again, intending to use it to store all my files.

Now after installation, the OS works fine but it just doesn't know the large partition exists. But before when my old Kubuntu OS ran alongside Windows, it could see the windows partition fine, which was ntfs as well I thought (though can it have been? but I'm pretty certain it was named that, anyway.)

I can imagine some of the places my mistake might be but I don't know which or what it is.

And can I fix it without reinstalling the OS? It wouldn't be a big disaster but I've spent a bit of time getting more applications and configuring the background and stuff so of course I'd rather fix it without starting again.

[paulcspencer]

Re: Can't see ntfs partition

Well look at that, I've found my first problem already. I don't even want a ntfs format now that I'm not running windows anywhere. I'll try changing that partition to something else later and when I install Ubuntu on the other side, I'll see if that can be linked to it then.

But that's not all I did wrong because Kubuntu is capable of writing into ntfs filesystems, I know.

[oshunluvr]

Re: Can't see ntfs partition

It depends on what you mean by not being able to "see" the partition. More likely, it's not mounted for you. Try opening a terminal and typing sudo fdisk -l which will list your partitions and then type df -h to what is mounted and where.

Once you have identified which partition is your ntfs one, type sudo mkdir /mnt/ntfs to create a mountable location and then type sudo mount -t ntfs /dev/sda1 /mnt/ntfs - change /dev/sda1 to whatever partition number you determine is the correct one.

You should then be able to use dolphin to browse your files. Once you're done, unmounting is sudo umount /mnt/ntfs

[rfakhrai]

Re: Can't see ntfs partition

But if you don't want it to be an NTFS partition then use gparted or similar software to format it as ext3 or ext4. It's a far superior format anyway and there should be no problems with kubuntu "seeing" the partition. Depending on where the partition is on the drive, you shouldn't have to re-install kubuntu.

[paulcspencer]

Re: Can't see ntfs partition

thanks for that advice
I'll reformat that drive as ext3 and see, and then if necessary follow oshunluvr's steps to mount it.
(i don't really know what's going on when things are mounted and unmounted but I'll at least learn the practical part of it by doing this kind of thing)

[oshunluvr]

Re: Can't see ntfs partition

I had assumed you had files already on your ntfs partition and wanted to access them. If not, you should reformat it to ext3, ext4 or reiserfs for average size files or XFS for large (like videos) files.

"Mounting" is the process that allows access to a file system. Hard drive partitions are not mounted by default unless they are required by the OS or are listed in /etc/fstab. Since you're planning on using this partition for files you will want it to mount at boot. You might consider re-formating it as I suggested and moving your /home to it and mounting it as /home. This will preserve your personal files even if you trash your install and have to start over.