Linux + File Sharing with Windows - NTFS Partition

Conrad11

Conrad11

Conrad11

Soldato
Joined
12 Jun 2005
Posts
5,361
Hi there,

I want to change my File Server (not a dedicated file server) from Windows to Linux but not move/loose my files.

On the hard drive I use in my file server, the partitions are made up as follows:

1 x 13.9GB NTFS Partition - For the OS and programs.
1 x 265GB NTFS Partition - Where I keep all my files that are shared on, in relevant folders.

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Now I would like keep the big partition (where the files are stored) intact. Obviously, I can get rid of the 13.9GB partition for the linux distro.

Would it be straight forward to be able to share that partition for reading and writing under linux from either a linux or a windows client?

How would I go about sharing the partition for both linux and Windows clients? Do I need extra software?

What do you suggest?

Thanks.
 
Most distributions come with NTFS read/write support now (NTFS-3g), but I'm not sure I'd recommend using it in a file server, the support has only recently achieved proper stability, I think.

If you can get everything off temporarily while you reformat under Linux I'd do that, otherwise just get another hard disk for £30 or so, format that as ext3, copy stuff over and then use both.

Samba is the package you need for sharing files (also does authentication etc.) with Windows clients, it's straightforward to set up and well-supported, plenty of tutorials around :).
 
There are ways, but really the easiest and best way is get a USB HD they are about £50 or less and copy over the data, wap Linux on and copy the data back. Use the USB for backups.
 
Im currently using ntfs-3g to get access to my media files while in linux and have had no problems copying files either way, from what ive seen its been fairly stable for a while now.
Obviously performance wise its not as fast as natively from windows, but its pretty damn close :)
 
sorry to bring this up again.

How many users can I have concurrently streaming media? For instance if it was a 1280*720 XVID and I have a 100Mbps network.

Thanks.
 
So theoretically, with a 100Mbit connection and a 3000Kbps feed I could get over 30 users right?

At a guess, in practise, what would the actual number be, considering that the internet is running on the same network, and the connection is being maxxed out? (2Mbps)
 
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Don't forget that your users are all going to be accessing data on the one physical drive, so performance is going to get nasty pretty quickly when it starts being thrashed. I think that'll be more of an issue rather than your network contention.
 
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