Windows/linux Hard Drive


wickermonkey

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Dec 6, 2006
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Ive had a search but i carnt find the answer. I run windows on my home pc, where all my music is kept and with the gp2x being linux based would i be able to use a usb external hard drive that i have saved the music onto using the windows pc with the gp2x and the breakout board to access the music?
 
If you're using windows XP and the drive is of a fairly large size, you may find that it has been formatted with NTFS. Linux in general can certainly read NTFS, but I'm not sure whether or not the kernel in the GP2X can.

You should be able to see what type of file system is on it from Control Panel -> Computer Management -> Disk Management.
 
in which case you could just move the files someware else, reformat the disk as fat32, and move them back on.
through artition magic allows converting the fs to another one without data loss afaik.
 
as vimacs said use fat32 it allows for larger partitions and file sizes though if your using it for mp3s you won't notice the file size limitation.
 
Make a 2gb NTFS partition and make the rest EXT2. Install XP on the NTFS and your favorite linux distro (I like Ubuntu) to the EXT2 partition. There is a driver that allows windows to access EXT2 drives and it works very well but I forget the name of it.
 
Blah posted on Dec 18 2006 at 04:34 PM said:
Make a 2gb NTFS partition and make the rest EXT2. Install XP on the NTFS and your favorite linux distro (I like Ubuntu) to the EXT2 partition. There is a driver that allows windows to access EXT2 drives and it works very well but I forget the name of it.
he's talking about http://www.fs-driver.org/ it works. But if your not going to have files over 4 gigs on the drive, and it doesn't exceed the partition limitation it might be better to use fat32 that way you can plug it into any computer and have it work without installing the driver.
 
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Also, I don't reccommend you use one of your main hard drives in anything but your computer, my brothers fairly new hard drive got wiped when his usb hard drive enclosure decided it was a good day to die.
 
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