Again, how to access windows partition
 

I know this has been asked about 10 ^ 100000000000 times, but I'm asking it agian because I cant figure it out from the old posts :)
I'm trying to access my MP3 files on my WinXP parition (NTFS). I tried that mount command, but it just prints the manual (it knows I'm a Linux idiot :D)

I'm very new to Linux so I would be happy if you can explain it in details :)

Hehehe, I've used Linux for nearly the first time yesterday and finally a question I can answer.

Well in my version I had to be logged in as root, create a /windows/C folder and then use the command mount /dev/hd.... and it automatically mounted it in the folder I created. Well I'd tried the command before I created the folders but it said /windows/C folder doesn't exist so I created it.

My turn to ask you some now, I can't get WinXP to load anymore, it just says "missing NTLDR". Did you manage to do it? What did you install first, WinXP or Linux? On which partition have you got WinXP and on which one have you got Linux? Which partition is activated?

Well first off if you have NTFS file support built into the kernel, how are you trying to mount the partition ??

Usually a:

mount -t ntfs /dev/hdX /mnt/windows

Will work... where the X in hdX is the drive it resides on and you can create a empty directory to mount it to. For example I set it at /mnt/windows, that is where my empty directory is that I use to mount windows drives.

Just a word of advise though, NTFS doesn't or isn't read so well under Linux, it can work, but you might run into problems though. Linux is much better at reading fat filesystems.

ok tnx everyone, I tried this but I'm still confused...
I tried mount -t ntfs /dev/hda1 /mnt/windows and it didnt give me any errors this time, so I'm guessing it was successful. Now that it is "mounted" how can I access it????

:D Umm I just use System Commander, it lets you have different OS on your system. I rather use that and not the linux or windows boot manager stuff becuase maybe I want to uninstall linux someday.... System Commander is good.
see www.v-com.com (or a warez site if you like:p)

AAAH!! found it!!!!!!! :) :)
Ok one more question, sorry to bother you all :D

It sounds like that I can only access this through the console thingie, can I make it somehow that I would be able to access it through the graphical interface too?
another one, how can I tell the MP3 player to read from the windows partition? when I go to the MNT folder with the MP3 player, I only see CD-ROM and DISK. I guess it's because I'm logged in as root in the console only.... what should I do?

if you used mount -t ntfs /dev/hdX /mnt/windows it mean "mount this device to this folder, which means that the content of your C windows drive is down in /mnt/windows, so just go to the root and type cd /mnt/windows and then use the ls command to see what's in it.

Oh, I've tried to read my mp3 and it didn't work and they were on the Linux partition I guess it's just me. But now that the drive is mounted you can access it through the File manager in the graphical interface.

umm I tried that. I closed the console and now when I try to access mnt/windows, it says " you dont have enough permissions to read" and on the icon there is a little LOCK icon. I dont want to log in as root, any ways to access it?

I know I had the same problem, it looks like it doesn't want to mount a hard drive unless you're logged in as root, but try without closing the console.

Ok ok ok...

You will need permissions to access it. You can either gain those by mounting the drive in fstab with the 'users' option or by chowning /mnt/windows to users.

OR
That is if you use pico, you can use whatever text editor you like, just add the line beginning with /dev... and end it at 0 0

Cool, I think that's it?

But just as trickykid said, if you want to be able to READ AND WRITE to this drive with Linux, then you will want to change it to Fat32 rather than NTFS. If you are just going to add MP3's to it from windows, and just READ them from Linux, then don't worry about changing.

Oh, almost forgot about your Mp3 Player prog. You can access the files just the same as you would in linux, if you need to supply a folder like this: C:\Program Files\Mp3's\ Then you would type it with either of the following:
"/mnt/windows/Program Files/Mp3's/" with the quotes OR
/mnt/windows/Program\ Files/Mp3's/ where the \ represents the space. The quotes one has seemed to work for me pretty good so far, but I am sure that it won't always, so the more correct way is the \ way. Also, you SHOULD be able to access the drive the same way in a GUI. Open a file manager, go to the mnt directory, and go from there.

Umm tnx everyone for answering :) :)
MasterC, I tried what you said. I tried this:
it gives me this error: chown: changing of ownership of '/mnt/windows': Operation not permitted

I used SU to log in as root, but it aint working:confused:

MrPolite, try MasterC's suggestion of editing your /etc/fstab file.

pico /etc/fstab
(add to the bottom)
/dev/hda1 /mnt/windows ntfs users,ro 0 0
CTRL+X
Yes
ENTER

After you edit and save the file, then run:

mount /mnt/windows
ls /mnt/windows

See if that lists the files and folders on your xp partition. Remember that after you are finished with using the xp partition to unmount it ( umount /mnt/windows ).

Why is it so important to unmount it afterwards?