Acessing second internal hard drive sdb1?

[Frank616]

I just switched my laptop from 32 bit to 64 bit Kubuntu 12.04. I'm now setting it up again the way it used to be. I've run into a snag accessing the second hard drive. This is a Dell M6600. I have the original 750 GB HDD in the second bay, complete with all my data, and the original Win7 install (which I never use, but I keep it anyway). The primary drive is a new SSD

On the 32 bit install, I had the second hard drive available with no problems. Libre Office could see it, I could access all the data there, Firefox could see a directory on it where I stored my home page file, and I could symlink the drive into my main directory tree. However, I do not remember how I did that, or if it happened on its own.

Ordinarily, one would add a line to fstab to mount the drive on boot. I had a look at the previous fstab on the previous SSD that I used as the primary drive. It does not appear to be materially different from what I have now. However, when I symlink the second drive now, it does not 'stick'. The link goes away each time I boot.

What did I do before, and how do I do it again?

I can add a line to fstab, but I'll have to load gparted to find out which partition I need to mount as there are so many of them on that second HDD because of the Windows install.

Thanks.

Frank.

[Frank616]

Never mind. I just added a mount for sdb4 into fstab. Works fine now.

I still don't know what I did on the previous install, however, as I see no edit to fstab on the previous system disk.

Oh well.

Frank.

[dmeyer]

I have two hard drives too. I use an fstab entry like you but mount it under /other. Then I I just symlink as necessary.

[Frank616]

All:

OK, my face is red... There WAS an fstab entry for the second disk in the previous installation. Don't know how I missed it.

Frank.

[dmeyer]

Please mark thread as solved using the thread tools. Thanks!

[Frank616]

dmeyer:

OK, I marked it by editing the original post. You mention thread tools. What are those? Though I've been here a long time, I still don't know how all the software here works.

Frank.

[vinnywright]

I do something similar but with 1 hard drive , I have 7 partitions on it 1 for swap 3 for the / of 3 installs 1 /home 1 storage and 1 extended to hold the 3 over the 4 primary limit.

the storage partition gets an entry in fstab and the usual /home DIR's Music,Videos,Documents,ect,ect get made into system links to the storage partition but I use /mnt for the mount point for storage as /mnt is the traditional place for such things , in fact user mounts is the sole purpose for the /mnt DIR in the first place and I just automatically type "mkdir /mnt/disk1 or whatever I feel like calling the mount point at the time wile making it.

when auto mounting of disks/partitions came into being (like when you click a drive in dolphins places panel ) the move to /media came about to have a place to temporarily mount such things, but /mnt is still hear for permanent mounts.

VINNY

[Frank616]

Vinny:

when auto mounting of disks/partitions came into being (like when you click a drive in dolphins places panel ) the move to /media came about to have a place to temporarily mount such things, but /mnt is still hear for permanent mounts.

I wondered why the switch. Thanks for explaining that.

I have just mounted the second disk as /data on root, but I'm careful to give ownership of the mount point to my personal account on the machine. I agree, however, that it would be better placed as /mnt/data

Frank.

[dmeyer]

The Linux file system - one of the most elegant and messy things at one time. Seriously even most distros don't have a unified filesystem. At least its simple enough that you can familiarize yourself really quickly.

[oshunluvr]

Frank: As usual - being linux - there are several other ways to handle this sort of thing. I prefer using /data for my HDD mount (the OS runs on an SSD). I then use bind mounts via a script file to attach the various folders (Documents, Pictures, etc.) to my /home which I also keep on the SSD. It's a little bit to set up but smooth after that.

I prefer this method because I have several installs so I keep my /home within the install (so settings don't get jacked up) and then the vast majority of data is available to every install. Also this means when I wipe one install in favor of another my data doesn't have to be moved. The final benefit is the folder icons in my home appear normal - not like the symlink icons - and if I'm messing about using the terminal my folders operate normally, not like symlinks.