External Harddrive question

[shattered.darkness]

I've been reading about the problems with external harddrives for NTFS. Im having the same problems. I hook it up to a windows system then take it and plug it into my Kubuntu system and it won't mount the drive. I have to manually force mount the drive in terminal every time to get it to work.

My question is: If I format it as a FAT32 filesystem instead of an NTFS filesystem, will linux have an easier time reading it?

[dibl]

Re: External Harddrive question

My question is: If I format it as a FAT32 filesystem instead of an NTFS filesystem, will linux have an easier time reading it?

Yes.

However, your data will be less secure (meaning data is subject to corruption) -- FAT32 is nowhere near as robust as NTFS.

Are you using the "Eject" option in Windows prior to removing it? NTFS is a journalling filesystem, meaning that it holds the transaction file open while running, until you tell it to close, via the "Eject" or "Safely Remove" items. The same goes for removing it from Linux.

To fix it, plug it in to your computer and boot Windows, then run chkdsk on it with the "fix" option, then "eject" it and it should be fine in Linux. Just don't shut off the drive or disconnect it without doing the "Eject" thing.

[shattered.darkness]

Re: External Harddrive question

Thanks! I'll try that.

One more question. If I do everything you just mentioned will linux auto-mount every time like it is supposed to or will I still need to run the ntfs-config app.

This is what I have been doing everytime:

SUDO NTFS-CONFIG

Then I check the read and write boxs and everyting works.

[dibl]

Re: External Harddrive question

Linux isn't very good at automatically recognizing and mounting NTFS-formatted USB drives.

Here's a method that works in Mepis -- I haven't tried it yet on my Kubuntu system, so you can be the guinea pig and tell how it works.

Open Kate in Super User mode -- Alt-F2 "kdesu kate". Now paste this into kate:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<deviceinfo version="0.2">
  <device>
    <match key="volume.fstype" string="ntfs">
      <match key="@block.storage_device:storage.hotpluggable" bool="true">
        <merge key="volume.fstype" type="string">ntfs-3g</merge>
        <merge key="volume.policy.mount_filesystem" type="string">ntfs-3g</merge>
        <append key="volume.mount.valid_options" type="strlist">locale=</append>
      </match>
    </match>
  </device>
</deviceinfo>

Now, click "File > Save As" and the name you give it is:

/usr/share/hal/fdi/policy/10osvendor/20-ntfs-config-write-policy.fdi


In other words, the new text file is "20-ntfs-config-write-policy.fdi" and you will save it in the folder located at /usr/share/hal/fdi/policy/10osvendor/.

Save that, reboot the system with your USB drive connected, and let's see what happens.

[shattered.darkness]

Re: External Harddrive question

WORKED GREAT!!! As soon as it went through the boot up it was available and mounted. Thanks for your help!

[dibl]

Re: External Harddrive question

Nice -- thanks for being the first Kubuntun to test that out!