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I have a Dell G5 notebook with two drives (256Gb SSD and 1Tb HDD). I use it only for Ubuntu 20.04 (no dual-boot) and intend to keep it that way. For the first installation, I was using the system entirely on the SSD and leaving the HDD only for data. However, I do need to use very demanding and space consuming applications such as Matlab and Xilinx Vivado, and I ran out of space very fast. However, they both use many system libraries, so I could not just install them in the HDD. So... I will need to do a new Ubuntu installation in such a way that I can profit a little more from the HDD space for this large apps. Since I am a newbie, I am asking for a little more insight of how should this be done and how should I build my system partitions so I don't need to do a fresh install again in the next few months

Thanks in advance

Mariana Bernardes
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  • What does df -h show? How large does / need to be. I like to keep /home inside / as the hidden user files are small. My / with /home is 8.4GB, but all data is in data partition(s). I used to have all my data on HDD with / on SSD. But newer larger SSD allows almost all my data on SSD, and HDD is now mostly for backup. If newer user, having / on SSD and /home on HDD is easiest as that sets mount, fstab entry & ownership & permissions. If you add data partitions, you have to do all that yourself Not really difficult but requires some terminal work. – oldfred Jan 22 '21 at 22:12
  • My / directory is currently using 52G and my /home is 140G (from 234G available in the partition). However, I still have to install Vivado (a proprietary app from Xilinx for FPGA programming) which requires another 65Gb. Since this Ubuntu installation is only 2 months old, and I will probably have to install some more stuff in the near future, I think this install is not sustainable in the long term and I want to correct while a re-install is still not so painful – Mariana Bernardes Jan 22 '21 at 23:56
  • I consider myself a newbie Linux user (I don't fully understand its directories hierarchy, for instance) but I have no problem in using the terminal if someone provides me appropriate instructions to do so. Maybe I can manage to do the manual partitioning if you could kindly instruct me or provide a link with the step by step – Mariana Bernardes Jan 23 '21 at 00:00
  • Welcome to Ask Ubuntu. Please edit and update your question with all the new informaiton. – user68186 Jan 23 '21 at 00:13
  • This is what I do. https://askubuntu.com/questions/1013677/storing-data-on-second-hdd-mounting & https://askubuntu.com/questions/1058756/installing-all-applications-on-a-ssd-disk-and-putting-all-files-on-hdd-disk & http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1811198 & http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1901437 Start simple with just one partition, I do not yet have fully partitioned either my SSD nor my HDD. Create partition & format ext4. Create mount point & add to fstab to auto mount on reboot. Then add folder & link it. If that works you can link many folders. – oldfred Jan 23 '21 at 03:31

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If you really intend to reinstall the OS, you could create a separate partition on the HDD, dedicated for any system directory, let's say /usr (where the most libraries are) and mount it at its place. As I remember correctly you can do that via the installation dialogue.

You can achieve the same result without reinstalling the OS. Just use gparted in order to resize the existing partitions on the HDD and create a new one, then follow the accepted answer of this question: How to move /usr to a new partition?

Another way is to move the /usr directory into the HDD and then mount it by using the bind option of the mount command in order to mount it at its place - the steps are described here: How do I mount a folder from another partition?

pa4080
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