Setting up 24.04

[Don]

I have a new 2Tb M2 drive on which I am going to install Kubuntu 24.04.1, but I have a couple of questions.

The first choice it gives me is MBR or GPT. I think MBR is what I'm used to, but is GPT is better?

Should I continue with ext4 format or switch to btrfs? I'm not sure it would give me any advantage for my predominantly text use, but I have heard and read that it's somehow better..

I am going to use (in fact have already tried) manual partitioning, because I want /home on a separate partition from /root. The installation disk did tell me that if I am going to use GPT, I need an unformatted 8Mb partition at the beginning. So here's how I tried to set up my partitions:

8 Mb unformatted

400 Mb /boot/efi (fat32)

40 Gb / (ext4)

1.77 Tb /home (ext4)

remainder /swap

I've entered all that, but when I've finished, the button to go forward is grayed out; hence, I have left something out. But what? It's not giving me any message at all; it just offers Go Back and Cancel.

Many thanks.

[Qqmike]

If your PC is using an M.2, then it is fairly new, modern. So its BIOS is actually UEFI-BIOS, not 'MBR with GRUB Legacy.'
So you want to use GPT, not MBR.
As for btrfs, that's a religious question. I would not muddy the waters at this point, Stick with trusty ext4.
As for Manual partitioning option during installation, that's OK, BUT ...
a lot of people here -- including myslelf -- would prefer FIRST to do the partitioning using GParted. Then run the installer using Manual.
You can use GParted from your live Kubuntu USB ("Try Kubuntu" -- install it with Discover during the live session).
Create your ESP (550 MiB, FAT32, set the boot flag on it.) Then make your partitions (as you did). You do not need any 8 MB unformatted partition, just root (/), /home. and swap (swap can be 2x your RAM -- it's an old standard).
I just did this in my recent how-to, but I have other how-to's that record the process, too.
https://www.kubuntuforums.net/forum/...-esp-or-2-esps
or, there are how-to's listed here,
https://www.kubuntuforums.net/forum/...-fixing-things

[Virginio Miranda]

I have a new 2Tb M2 drive on which I am going to install Kubuntu 24.04.1, but I have a couple of questions.

The first choice it gives me is MBR or GPT. I think MBR is what I'm used to, but is GPT is better?

Should I continue with ext4 format or switch to btrfs? I'm not sure it would give me any advantage for my predominantly text use, but I have heard and read that it's somehow better..

I am going to use (in fact have already tried) manual partitioning, because I want /home on a separate partition from /root. The installation disk did tell me that if I am going to use GPT, I need an unformatted 8Mb partition at the beginning. So here's how I tried to set up my partitions:

8 Mb unformatted

400 Mb /boot/efi (fat32)

40 Gb / (ext4)

1.77 Tb /home (ext4)

remainder /swap

I've entered all that, but when I've finished, the button to go forward is grayed out; hence, I have left something out. But what? It's not giving me any message at all; it just offers Go Back and Cancel.

Many thanks.

With MBR you are going to be limited with four primary partitions. For a disk with up to 2 TB you can use MBR. No problem at all. But for for modern systems its better to use GPT.

About ext4 or btfrs is a question of personal opinion. I use and prefer ext4, due to learning curve on btrfs file system and ext4 is a liitle faster compared to btrfs file system in my opinion. Overall i think ext4 is more mature.

About swap, i use swap file and not swap partition and only 512 MB with swappiness= 5. I have 32 GB of memory ram and do not use to do video or photo edition. I prefer swap file because there are some flexibility using it, but to tell you the truth it does not matter in the end of the day, because my system rarely use swap.

I have 3 operational system ( Windows, Kubuntu and Ubuntu Studio ) each one in a separate drive ( SSD ), so i use the entire space in the SSD for / only, but i symlink most of the folders on /home to separate Hard disk Drives. Most of the time Kubuntu run 24/7. My /tmp is tmpfs with 8 GB of ram memory and its more than enough for my usage, so i dont know if 40 GB on / is a good number for you.

I use MBR for my 3 operational system in each separate SSD disk.

Thats all.