Hi folks.

I installed openSUSE 11.1 on D drive. This was partitioned, and Linux now calls this "C" for the data on that drive. I can access it, but not save to it.

My original C drive that has WinXP and some spreadsheets I wish to access, does not show on the drive list in 'My computer'. Dual-boot is a dream that vanished after Linux install where WinXP can no longer boot, but a good start would be a way to 'mount'? the old C drive so I can at least access my old data via the openSUSE installation.

How do I attempt this?


Secondly, I have a Maxtor OneTouch4 external HDD, plugged in via USB. I used to use this to download to, but Linux seems to lose the drive acccss from time to time, then reacquire. So the connection is now 'OneTouch4-2' in Dolphin. I did want to use this as a download drive but the above problem seems to prevent this. Any workarounds for this?

Thank you so much.
Petey

Need a bit more info.

What format were the C & D drives before you started? FAT32 or NTFS

When you say "This was partitioned..", do you mean you installed Linux on the D drive, or divided it in two first?

I suggest you open a terminal as root (Start menu > Terminal > Terminal - Super User Mode) then type at the prompt:You will get something like this:This shows 4 NTFS partitions (the first is C, and the others are for data) and two Linux (one for the install and one for swap)
If you can cut and paste this into your reply we can be more helpful.

Once you know the partition config, and we can confirm you have NTFS partitions, then you may need to enable writing using a config tool. In YaST start the Software Manager and search for NTFS. Make sure you have ntfs-3g installed, plus ntfs-config & ntfsprogs. If you don't, install them and then look in Start menu > System > File System, and you should have NTFS Configuration tool. This will detect any NTFS partitions and allow you to set the write permissions.

I can't help with the Maxtor OneTouch, but I understand that it uses some sort of on-board utility, and that may be what is causing the problem.

Im running Ubuntu 8.04. This distro is really good. Specifically all my other ntfs drives are mounted, including my XP drive (C. I can access ALL areas of the data. Maybe you want to try it out.

For mounting, when i was playing around with this section i was using the following line

df -h (gives a good list of the drives available) or sudo fdisk -l, to find which one you are looking for

mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sdcX /media/drive1

Hope this helps a bit.

LOL. I was just thinking I needed to amend my post and add this info (just found out how to list it in Konsole.

fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 122.9 GB, 122942324736 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14946 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x077d077c

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 14946 120053713+ 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/sdb: 40.0 GB, 40000000000 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 4863 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x41ab2316

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 1 7 56196 de Dell Utility
/dev/sdb2 * 8 4861 38989755 f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sdb5 8 269 2104483+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sdb6 270 2129 14940418+ 83 Linux
/dev/sdb7 2130 4861 21944758+ 83 Linux

Disk /dev/sdc: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xc691b517

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdc1 * 1 60801 488384001 7 HPFS/NTFS



It looks to me like I did install Linux to the D drive (second on the list) and it's the top one, my old C drive that I need to access.

Not figured out the repositories and different ways to install, so lost with that at present. Reading up on it next. With Windows you just download and install, so this level of complexity is unexpected.

Petey

Your right about where Linux is, and this confirms that the working Windows partitions are NTFS.

Linux also has a download, right click and install function, but most software is kept in on-line repositories and accessed through a Package Manager. Suse uses YaST for all it's system configuration functions. If you are using the default Start Menu (green lizard) then Package Management is in Computer > Install Software.

There is a very good WiKi with a section just for Package Management - http://en.opensuse.org/YaST_Software_Management. It's different from Windows, but once you get used to it it makes a lot more sense. The Package Manager keeps track of version status, updates and dependencies. That means that if you stick to applications packaged for Suse, it will always install it correctly and make sure that any extras get installed at the same time. You never get "Missing DLL ..." errors - touching wood!

The next think to learn is that with Linux, all hard drives & partitions are treated as directories/folders, unlike windows which treats them as extra drives. All storage devices live in the /dev directory. HDDs are identified by hda, hdb, sda, sdb, etc., and partitions are numbered in the order they are created. Partitions numbered 1 to 4 are Primary or Extended, and 5 upwards are Logical.

Linux likes multiple partitions, and the usual minimum is 3, one for the OS (/) one for data (/home) and a swap. There are other configs. I have several partitions for keeping backups, and one for my local Apache web-server.