Recommend Me a File Storage Solution

[Jack Straw]

Hi All, first post here.

Yesterday I picked up a new Laptop (Core 2 Duo, 3GB RAM, 160 GB Drive), which came with Vista, which I already don't like. 918 mb of ram as a baseline with only task manager and backgrounds running is not how I envisioned using my new hardware capacity.

Anyway, I was looking at Linux as an alternative, and plan on setting up with Ubuntu desktop in dual-boot, which seems like a good way to try it out/get into it (user friendly, no?). I want to keep windows in case I need to use a picky program. For the record, I have done about 3 hours of research on Linux in general this morning, and while not being up on a lot of the terms I've found, I am a fast learner, so bear with me.

Here's the question: I have searched around google for solutions to sharing files between Windows and Linux. It seems like there are a decent number of solutions for accessing files from one to the other and visa-versa. I was wondering, though - seeing as I have a brand new computer which I will be setting up with Ubuntu OS (I have not yet transferred files from my old POS pentium III desktop), I might as well set it up right as far as being able to easily share files between Ubuntu and Windows.

I feel like my best option might be to make a partition just for file sharing (I feel like I would portion out a large chunk of the hard drive for this). What sort of format should I use?

Forgive the newbie-ness, but this is the newbie forum

[HROAdmin26]

918 mb of ram as a baseline with only task manager and backgrounds running is not how I envisioned using my new hardware capacity.

I recommend trying something new any time you can, but understand that Vista's memory management is NOT the same as previous Windows versions:

Vista Memory

The "change" you see in memory usage in Vista is actually a good thing.

[Jack Straw]

I recommend trying something new any time you can, but understand that Vista's memory management is NOT the same as previous Windows versions:

Vista Memory

The "change" you see in memory usage in Vista is actually a good thing.

That's interesting - "What'll they think of next?"

[HROAdmin26]

That's interesting - "What'll they think of next?"

The same thing Linux has been doing for years. That's why you see all of the "Why's Linux say it's using all of my RAM" threads.

Example:

free -m
             total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:          7846       7797         49          0          8       7539
-/+ buffers/cache:        249       7597

8GB RAM - 7797 "Used" - 7597MB of that is buffer and cache

Why have RAM sitting around do nothing for you?

As for file access...

Windows' native "network" file system is CIFS/SMB. Linux can create and access these shares (using Samba.)

*Nix's native "network file system" is NFS. Linux can create and access these shares. Windows would need NFS support to be installed.

I like to keep it simple - I share the same data out on a Linux host via Samba (S-M-B) for Windows clients and NFS for *Nix clients.

[Jack Straw]

So 80% of my RAM with Windows 2000 SE4 was just loafing around. They must have been unionized.

Thanks - I saw Samba in a few of my searches. It seems like it would be straightforward to just keep everything in the Windows file system (baby steps!) and read/write to that from Linux until I become more comfortable.

By "shares," I'm assuming you mean files/folders shared on a commonly accessible hard drive/network?

[Jack Straw]

I've just been reading about FAT32, would this be a good option for a shared drive?

[Grandebasta]

SpiderOak

Online storage. Online backup.

[Jack Straw]

SpiderOak

Online storage. Online backup.

Ooh, that is great. Thanks.

It actually solves a problem I'm having, sometime in the last 6 years or so my desktop with Win2000 SE4 lost it's networking capability, so I can't transfer stuff easily to my new computer (haven't had the time to try and fix it in the last few days). I was going to borrow my roommate's external HD, but this seems like a better option. For the long term, though, 2 GB is not that much. Good for transfer, though.

[bigtomrodney]

I've just been reading about FAT32, would this be a good option for a shared drive?

Shared as in mounted/mapped share over the network or as in a partition shared over a dual boot?

Given the nature of the thread I'll go with networking. No I wouldn't touch FAT32 at all. It isn't journalled and dies a lot more easily than a journalled filesystem like ext3, reiserfs or NTFS. Plus there's the 4GB file size limit.

[Jack Straw]

Shared as in mounted/mapped share over the network or as in a partition shared over a dual boot?

Given the nature of the thread I'll go with networking. No I wouldn't touch FAT32 at all. It isn't journalled and dies a lot more easily than a journalled filesystem like ext3, reiserfs or NTFS. Plus there's the 4GB file size limit.

Sorry - should be more specific with these terms - I meant partition shared over a dual boot (ie, 4 logical hard drives - Win/UbU/"Shared Files"/swap). Your answer still makes sense, though, after reading the wiki article on journalling. I think I am going to go with NTFS, and stick with 3 LHD's, at least until I become more familiar with this new-to-me ground.