joechummer
June 9th, 2008, 12:52 AM
I'm planning on rebuilding my PC with a WinXP/Ubuntu dual boot, and I've only been using Linux for less than 3 months.
My question is about partitioning. I know you can install Ubuntu inside Windows without needing a dedicated Linux partition, but supposedly there is a noticeable hit in disk performance, which I'm assuming is due to Ubuntu running from NTFS instead of Linux's native ext3 file system.
To this end I plan on partitioning my drive to give Ubuntu its own native ext3 space and use the Windows partition for storing files that would be used for both OSes, since I'm assuming Windows will probably refuse to read an ext3 partition.
Which brings me to these points of contention:
1. What size of partition should I give Ubuntu on an 80GB drive if I plan on keeping most of my non-Linux files on the Windows partition. I know Ubuntu is about 2GB, but how much room should I leave on the partition for Linuz programs, swap, etc? I'm worried if I make it too small, I'll run out of space too quickly, and if I make it too big, I'll run out of space on my Windows partition.
2. Will storing most of my files on an NTFS partition cause a disk performance hit in Ubuntu anyway? Or is it just Ubuntu running in NTFS space that causes disk performance issues?
3. Can Windows read ext3? If I boot into XP, will I even be able to access any files in my Ubuntu home directory, for example?
4. Is Ubuntu's disk performance hit when installed on top of Windows that noticeable? Would I be better off just installing Ubuntu on the same partition as Windows?
My question is about partitioning. I know you can install Ubuntu inside Windows without needing a dedicated Linux partition, but supposedly there is a noticeable hit in disk performance, which I'm assuming is due to Ubuntu running from NTFS instead of Linux's native ext3 file system.
To this end I plan on partitioning my drive to give Ubuntu its own native ext3 space and use the Windows partition for storing files that would be used for both OSes, since I'm assuming Windows will probably refuse to read an ext3 partition.
Which brings me to these points of contention:
1. What size of partition should I give Ubuntu on an 80GB drive if I plan on keeping most of my non-Linux files on the Windows partition. I know Ubuntu is about 2GB, but how much room should I leave on the partition for Linuz programs, swap, etc? I'm worried if I make it too small, I'll run out of space too quickly, and if I make it too big, I'll run out of space on my Windows partition.
2. Will storing most of my files on an NTFS partition cause a disk performance hit in Ubuntu anyway? Or is it just Ubuntu running in NTFS space that causes disk performance issues?
3. Can Windows read ext3? If I boot into XP, will I even be able to access any files in my Ubuntu home directory, for example?
4. Is Ubuntu's disk performance hit when installed on top of Windows that noticeable? Would I be better off just installing Ubuntu on the same partition as Windows?