Accessing My Windows HDD

yourwar · 08-11-2005, 04:15 AM

Hello, I have 2 HDDs in my box, one with Debian, and one with Window. I was just wondering how I could access my windows hard drive through linux to view all the media I have saved on my windows HDD? I know you can do it cus I did it when I had Mandrake, anyways thanks in advance, byebye.

Ephracis · 08-11-2005, 04:22 AM

You first needs to find out what your hdd is named (you can use cfdisk to find that out: cfdisk hda or cfdisk hdb and so on). When you know your name (it should be something like hda1, hdb1, hda2, etc) you need to know what filesystem you are using. FAT is ok, but there is limited support for NTFS.

Now just do:
su
<password>
mount -t vfat /dev/hdxY /mnt/win

change vfat to ntfs if you have NTFS instead (you may want to check out captiva if you use NTFS). Now your content will be in /mnt/win.

ichrispa · 08-11-2005, 04:22 AM

Easy,
you have to mount it. Some distros (like knoppix) offer the option on the desktop, appearentlz yours does not.
Mounting a partition is easy. All devices in your computer, RAM, HDD, FD, CDROM, etc. are listed in /dev. If, for example, your hdd is the master on the first IDE bus, it would be called HDA, partitions are called HDA1, HDA2 etc.. The master on the second IDE controler would be HDC. Get it?
So you have to call up a console and try this: "mount -t vfat /dev/[your windows partition] /[the directory you want it mounted at] -rw"

If you dont know which partition your windows is on, I am willing to help you find it.

Have fun

biophysics · 08-11-2005, 04:26 AM

Login as root and add the line below to file /etc/fstab

/dev/hdaX /windows/C ntfs noauto,ro,users,gid=users,umask=0002,nls=utf8 0 0
^
^
***Warning*** change hdaX to what ever you have. like hdb or sda ...

Then create a directory called /windows/C as root.

Now you can to mount the C drive as (normal user) follows:
$ mount /windows/C

If you want it to mount it always automatically: remove "noauto".

Remember you should READ ONLY windows partition (as ntfs write is still experimental)

mani_iips · 08-11-2005, 08:27 AM

You just have to mount your Windows drives, and thats not a big deal at all.
first of all you type this command on console

Code:

fdisk -l

it will give you full info about your present HDD.
i am sending you the result of that cmd in my system

Quote:

[root@localhost hardware]# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/hda: 80.0 GB, 80026361856 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9729 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 1275 10241406 c Win95 FAT32 (LBA)
/dev/hda2 1276 9728 67898722+ f Win95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hda5 1276 2079 6458098+ b Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda6 2080 2844 6144831 b Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda7 2845 4119 10241406 b Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda8 4120 5394 10241406 b Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda9 5395 7178 14329948+ b Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda10 7179 9600 19454683+ 83 Linux
/dev/hda11 9601 9728 1028128+ 82 Linux swap

then u just have to make changes, accordingly, in you /etc/fstab file, i am sending you the copy of my file

Quote:

LABEL=/ / ext3 defaults 1 1
none /dev/pts devpts gid=5,mode=620 0 0
none /proc proc defaults 0 0
none /dev/shm tmpfs defaults 0 0
/dev/hda11 swap swap defaults 0 0
/dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom udf,iso9660 noauto,owner,kudzu,ro 0 0
/dev/hda1 /mnt/win_c auto
/dev/hda5 /mnt/win_d auto
/dev/hda6 /mnt/win_e auto
/dev/hda7 /mnt/win_f auto
/dev/hda8 /mnt/win_g auto
/dev/hda9 /mnt/win_h auto

i am having FAT 32 as my windows file system.

Comparing the chsnges in my fstab file you can make one as per your system config.
and ya you have to make the mount directories explicitly in the /mnt directoru (if you are also mounting in that path, although you can make it anywhere.

let me know if it helped.
cheerios.

b0nd · 08-11-2005, 08:49 AM

hi mani_iips....
what should be entries if i'm mounting one linux in second one...
i mean if i've 2 or more linux distributions on the same machine....then what should be the entries in the fstab of currently running linux so that i can access the other linux distributions...
regards

mani_iips · 08-11-2005, 10:37 AM

helo ruudra...
well i havent worked on other Linux distros as yet but may be if you tell me about those which you are using, filesystems that each supports and the result of "fdisk -l" in your distro, i can help you by providing the best solution accordingly.
cherrios.

yourwar · 08-11-2005, 03:23 PM

Okay, that helped, I mounted it but now I can only access it through console as root. How can I make it so I can access it through KDE without being root?

yourwar · 08-11-2005, 04:10 PM

*Bump*

b0nd · 08-12-2005, 12:46 AM

hi mani_iips,
here is the output of "fdisk -l"

Code:

[root@localhost root]# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/hdd: 10.2 GB, 10242892800 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 1245 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot    Start       End    Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hdd1             1      1245  10000431    c  Win95 FAT32 (LBA)

Disk /dev/hda: 40.0 GB, 40020664320 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 4865 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot    Start       End    Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda1   *         1       637   5116671    b  Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda2           638      4864  33953377+   f  Win95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hda5           638      1274   5116671    7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda6          1275      3696  19454683+   b  Win95 FAT32
/dev/hda7          3697      4257   4506201   83  Linux
/dev/hda8          4258      4282    200781   82  Linux swap
/dev/hda9          4283      4864   4674883+  83  Linux
[root@localhost root]#

now plz. tell me that what entries should i make in my /etc/fstab to mount the other linux partition................i'm currently in /dev/hda9.......and would like to mount the /dev/hda7 permanently...
regards

ichrispa · 08-15-2005, 05:16 AM

hi again yourwar,
What you have to keep in mind is that KDE is only an application running on a superstructur. For a novice user the accessable foundation of this superstructur is the console. If you have mounted a filesystem in a root konsole, processes on the superstructur (x-servers, KDE, GNOME, KONQUEROR, etc.) are bound to that change.

In short, if you mounted a fs, you can access it from any application. Including KDE... Try to access it with conqueror.