Linux Gurus...I need your help yet again...

[mjr]

Because I cannot figure this out at all...

I have a 500GB SSD. That's where Ubuntu is installed. No issue there.

I have an additional 3TB disk and a 500GB disk that already have data on them that I want to preserve. I also have a 6TB disk that is a new one that has no "data" on it. All I want to do is mount these disks so that I can access them from the file manager.

I can SEE the disks when I use terminal commands, but I still can't seem to mount them or see any files on them. Or I get errors when trying to mount them.

What I'd really like to do is mount all three disks (not the SSD, just the other three HDDs) as ONE, but that's probably going to be too complicated.

Here's what I've tried so far, and results:

sudo hwinfo --disk --short

/dev/sdb is my 3TB drive that has data on it.
/dev/sdc is my 500GB HDD that has data on it (NOT my SSD where Ubuntu resides), and
/dev/sda is my 6TB drive.

Here's an fstab:

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point> <type> <options> <dump> <pass>
# / was on /dev/nvme0n1p2 during installation
UUID=<UUID> / ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 1
# /boot/efi was on /dev/nvme0n1p1 during installation
UUID=7DAB-2D91 /boot/efi vfat umask=0077 0 1
/swapfile none swap sw 0 0

These are apparently the three disks:

Disk /dev/sda: 5.47 TiB, 6001175126016 bytes, 11721045168 sectors
Disk model: TOSHIBA HDWR160
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes


Disk /dev/sdb: 2.75 TiB, 3000592982016 bytes, 5860533168 sectors
Disk model: WDC WD30EZRX-00D
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0xd6ad236e

Device Boot Start End Sectors Size Id Type
/dev/sdb1 2048 4294967294 4294965247 2T 83 Linux


Disk /dev/sdc: 465.78 GiB, 500107862016 bytes, 976773168 sectors
Disk model: WDC WD5000AAKX-0
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x000e82d4

And this is my SSD:

Disk /dev/nvme0n1: 465.78 GiB, 500107862016 bytes, 976773168 sectors
Disk model: WDC WDS500G2B0C-00PXH0
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: 9C2E3AD9-8772-46C2-A840-2065EC2F2D6B

Device Start End Sectors Size Type
/dev/nvme0n1p1 2048 1050623 1048576 512M EFI System
/dev/nvme0n1p2 1050624 976771071 975720448 465.3G Linux filesystem

Anything at all I can do to mount these disks? I'm not against formatting the 6TB one, but I don't want to format the 3TB and the other 500GB HDDs.

[RealUnimportant]

How are you trying to mount them, what are the errors you're getting? What format are the discs currently, were they previously used under Linux or another OS? By "mount them as one", you want the capability of spreading a single file across the whole lot?

[mjr]

How are you trying to mount them, what are the errors you're getting? What format are the discs currently, were they previously used under Linux or another OS? By "mount them as one", you want the capability of spreading a single file across the whole lot?

I've used the 3TB one before, on my previous Linux machine. But when I built this new machine, the OS didn't recognize it. I can't recall for the 500GB HDD, but the 6TB is new, so I could "format" it or whatever, as it has no files I need/want to keep on it.

I don't mind so much if they show up as separate drives, or if they're one "big" 9.5 TB drive. As long as I can get to them I don't know that it matters to me.

As far as mounting them, I've tried using the mount command with, for instance, sda and sda1. I'll try it again and post one of the errors.

[csquared]

Three steps
1. Partition the disk
2. Create a file system
3. Mount the File System

If you used a GUI, it may have done these steps for you. From the command line
1. Use fdisk, gdisk or parted (to name a few) to partion the disk. Although, some people like to use the entire disk, without partitions. I prefer the partitions.
2. Use mkfs. Read us on your options. i.e ext#, xfs, btrfs, etc. Make the file system on the partition created in step 1.
3. Use mount. To automount at boot, put the entries in the /etc/fstab.

Also, you will need a mount point. You may need to create a directory for the mount point with mkdir.

If mounting at boot, be careful of hierarchical mount. i.e. File systems /, /home and /home/mjr/disk3. Mounting /home under / is not an issue. / always mounts first. Mounting /home/mjr/disk3 needs to make sure that /home is mounted first. Keep your fstab in order.

Other useful commands:
"df -H" will show all you mounted files systems with size, used and available..

[RealUnimportant]

Making them all one big drive would be a mission, but just mounting them so everything is within the same filesystem is default *Nix behaviour; all the drives will look like folders within the main system once they mount properly.

As the 6TB drive is new it will probably need formatting before the system will be allowed to recognise it for file use. It doesn't look from the info you've posted that it has been prepared at the factory with a default format already, but if it had the chances are it would have been some flavour of Windows so for best performance a reformat to a *Nix-compatible format would be best. You can see in the panel you posted that there is no sda1 listed, which could be why that doesn't want to link.

The 3TB drive has /dev/sdb1 listed, so that can probably mount as-is but using /dev/sdb1 to refer to it seems to be the wrong choice according to the Mount manual pages. That said, I'm not sure it would have that listed if it wasn't already mounted?

[mjr]

Making them all one big drive would be a mission, but just mounting them so everything is within the same filesystem is default *Nix behaviour; all the drives will look like folders within the main system once they mount properly.

As the 6TB drive is new it will probably need formatting before the system will be allowed to recognise it for file use. It doesn't look from the info you've posted that it has been prepared at the factory with a default format already, but if it had the chances are it would have been some flavour of Windows so for best performance a reformat to a *Nix-compatible format would be best. You can see in the panel you posted that there is no sda1 listed, which could be why that doesn't want to link.

The 3TB drive has /dev/sdb1 listed, so that can probably mount as-is but using /dev/sdb1 to refer to it seems to be the wrong choice according to the Mount manual pages. That said, I'm not sure it would have that listed if it wasn't already mounted?

Ok, I have made some progress, but now I have other issues.

I was able to mount the 6TB as an NTFS, and it now shows up.

I was able to mount the 500GB and 3TB drives, but I'm getting a separate issue with them about not being able to access them without being a superuser. I think it's because one is ext4 and one is ext3, so I did some searching on the web, and added the user thing to the fstab so I can get to them (because I don't know how to "automatically" open them as a super user while I'm logged in).

I rebooted, and now I seem to be getting a really, really long file system check.

[mjr]

Ok, everyone...I hate to resurrect this but I'm having a slightly different issue now.

What I want to be able to do is share out my 6TB Ubuntu drive to my Windows machine.

I created a folder on my 6TB drive, called "six_tb" (let's say).

The Properties are as follows.

Basic:
Name: six_tb
Type: Folder
Contains: Nothing
Parent Folder /media/ntfs_sixtb
Free Space: 6.0TB

Permissions:
Owner Me (it literally says "Me")
Access: Create and Delete Files
Group (my Ubuntu Login Name)
Access: Create And Delete Files
Others:
Access: Create And Delete Files

Security Context: unknown

Local Network Share:
Share This Folder is checked
Share Name (see above)

Allow Others to Creat And Delete is checked
Guest Access is checked.

The "Modify Share" button is disabled.

So the folder on Ubuntu shows as shared.

But the problem is, on my Windows machine, I can't just go \\my_ubuntu_machine\six_tb

It gives me the message "Windows cannot access \\my_ubuntu_machine\six_tb"

What's odd, though, is if I just type in \\my_ubuntu_machine\

Then I get what looks like an "empty" folder. I'm tempted to put a file in it and see what happens.

So what gives?

Anything I should check?

Any assistance is greatly appreciated!

[RealUnimportant]

Put a file in it and see what happens. You shouldn't be seeing the drive as a separate object within that "folder" unless you're sharing the whole machine from a level above the drives, which would then allow you to see all the shared drives on that machine. It's the same the other way around, if you set C:\Users\Me\Pictures as a shared folder on MyPC, you'd not see anything above that point unless you also shared somewhere above that point.

[mjr]

Put a file in it and see what happens. You shouldn't be seeing the drive as a separate object within that "folder" unless you're sharing the whole machine from a level above the drives, which would then allow you to see all the shared drives on that machine. It's the same the other way around, if you set C:\Users\Me\Pictures as a shared folder on MyPC, you'd not see anything above that point unless you also shared somewhere above that point.

I think I figured it out.

I had to modify my samba config file, and install WSD (https://devanswers.co/discover-ubunt...ws-10-network/) to get it to work.

Though it shows up as "sambashare" (which I don't really mind too much). At least I know that's my shared drive.