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I have an SSD with 64 GB and a 6 GB/s 1 Terabyte hard drive. I want to use the SSD only as a boot device and maybe for swap storage. On the 1 Terabyte hard drive, I want to have the main file system. As in Windows, I liked to have at least 2-3 Partitions example for music games programs and so on.

Which partition layout do you recommend to me?

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  • 1
    Swap on the SSD can wear it out; swap on an HDD can be slow for seels. Zramswap can be useful.
    – nanofarad
    Sep 3, 2012 at 12:47
  • 1
    I recommend SSD caching: askubuntu.com/questions/252140/…
    – Gabriel
    Sep 14, 2013 at 8:45
  • Actually as long as you partition it correctly any way will do.
    – Braiam
    Feb 19, 2014 at 2:02

2 Answers 2

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64GB is more than enough for a root filesystem, a default installation will probably occupy about 3GB. When installing Ubuntu, choose for a custom partitioning scheme:

  • Put a partition on your SSD with mount point /
  • On your 1 TB data disk, create a partition with /home

Variations are possible. You can store all your settings and documents on the SSD and store large files like music and video on the 1TB disk:

  • Install Ubuntu to /
  • Create some partitions on your 1 TB disk, and mount those on /media/DESIRED-PARTITION-NAME.

Some folders in your home folder may become too large for the SSD, like ~/.wine. In that case, create a partition (or folder) on your 1 TB disk named "DATA" (with /media/DATA as mount point). Then, move the ~/.wine folder to the data partition:

mv ~/.wine /media/DATA/wine

If you've just installed the system and the folder did not exist yet, just create the empty folder:

mkdir /media/DATA/wine

Next, create a symbolic link from your home directory to the wine folder on the big disk:

ln -s /media/DATA/wine ~/.wine

The latter can also be performed after installation of Ubuntu to the SSD. Use GParted to create partitions on the 1 TB disk.

Related SSD questions:

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  • Thanks for your hints. But as i understand is that / is the root directory where all files and programs are installed right? I think 64 gigs are enough for programs and tools, but i am worried if i want to install some games. How can i example install wine and some games on my /home or maybe /games directory? Sep 19, 2011 at 21:34
  • Also, I'd recommend installing using LVM, so that you can more easily move things around later on.
    – poolie
    Sep 19, 2011 at 22:29
  • @AlexanderMarcev what games are you talking about (where do those games get installed to?)
    – Lekensteyn
    Sep 19, 2011 at 22:31
  • @poolie I would recommend against using LVM for a SSD. If you combine the SSD and a HDD with LVM, you'll loose a lot of your performance.
    – Lekensteyn
    Sep 19, 2011 at 22:32
  • like in windows i have a partition for games only. i would like to do this on ubuntu also, but as i see the ssd is to small so i have to get exmple wine and other games installed to my 1 TB drive.... Sep 20, 2011 at 4:22
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Do not put swap on the ssd. Put it on the hdd. Some pointers about swap and ssd: Installing Ubuntu on a SSD

Do make sure you enable trim on the SSD: How to enable TRIM?

My personal layout that works best for me:

  • / 20 Gb (sda1) (is on a 120 Gb ssd); gets formatted every time I re-install.
  • swap 4 Gb (sdb1).
  • /home 15 Gb. (sdb2) Holds only settings, no userfiles. I remove all directories after install and symlink them to /discword/; gets formatted every time I re-install. After format I recreate the symlinks and press F5 on my desktop to get all my video files back I had on my desktop.
  • /discworld (sdb3) is my data partition. Has a /discword/Downloads/ and /discworld/Desktop/ etc. Never gets formatted.
  • /disworld2/ (sda2) is the 100 Gb remainder of my SSD. Unused; never gets formatted.

You can set this up during installation with the something else option (i.e. manual partitioning).

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  • Why is sda2 created but empty? If it's for wear levelling, why not omit the partition altogether?
    – Lekensteyn
    Sep 19, 2011 at 20:40
  • I have no use for it yet :+)
    – Rinzwind
    Sep 20, 2011 at 4:39

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