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I am a Machine Learning Engineer and have to use NVIDIA GPU accelerators (CUDA implementation) for training learning algorithms and speeding up the process.

I have a Dell G3 15 with two disk drives (1: 256GB SSD and 2: 1TB HDD) and plan to install Ubuntu Desktop 18.04.3LTS but I currently have Windows 10 installed on my SSD as well.

  1. Will Ubuntu help in the extracting every last millisecond? Or rephrasing, should I consider installing Ubuntu (knowing the work I will have to do) to begin with? As evidently, Linux is preferred over Windows for pretty much every programming task.

  2. If yes, how should I manage the disk drives' storage and the OSs to get the best performance? Meaning, should I install Ubuntu on SSD and Windows on HDD? Or both can be installed on the same SSD (with or without creating partitions and which would be better)?

Edit: Though the question may seem familiar to other question on here, this is specifically in the context of Machine Learning and the importance/need/usage of Ubuntu for Programming practices instead of Windows.

Waqas Kayani
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Let me try to answer your questions

1. Utilizing the system resources up to every millisecond

Well, it is a misconception that 'Linux is preferred over Windows for pretty much every programming task'. Actually the preference of an OS varies from programmer to another. One may use Linux based OS, some may prefer MacOS. Personally i would have chosen Ubuntu and will change its desktop environment to XFCE because it uses less system resources so that you can use those for training ML algorithms.

2. Manage the disk drives' storage and the OSs to get the best performance

If you follow my advice for the fist question, then you will have to Install Ubuntu. Dual boot may be a solution. As far as partitioning is concerned, you might have to give more disk space to Ubuntu because sometimes datasets tend to be large in size.Just shrink the storage space in Windows > Disk management, the unallocated space can then be allocated to Ubuntu. Finally it's your personal choice depending on your use case. SSD are much faster than HDD so you could prefer SSD

Tejas Lotlikar
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