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I have windows 10 on my main SSD, but space is limited. I'm fine for the time being but will need extra space some time in the future.

I am looking at dual booting with linux soon, so want to purchase a new HDD. If I assign the entire HDD to linux, would I be able to access that HDD for file storage whilst using Windows on the SSD? I could store things on that HDD that I dont use often (like photos I rarely look at, for example).

Alternatively, I could partition the HDD, use one partition for the linux boot and the rest for my cold storage, but if I an do it without I would prefer that.

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Accessin a "Linux" partition from Windows is challenging. Have a look at How to read ext4 partitions on Windows? on how to read the typical Linux partition.

If I were doing this, I might be inclined to partition the Linux install in such a way that it does not use LVM, has a relatively small (10-30gig) root partition, with the rest blank. I'd then create another partition formatted as VFAT or NTFS and mount it on /home as this will be visible in both Windows and Linux.

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  • Won't NTFS's lack of support for Linux file permissions cause problems in /home?
    – gronostaj
    Commented Dec 5, 2017 at 10:03
  • @gronostaj The idea is to create a different partition for data that can be shared between OSes. It's not /home, the answer clearly says "mount it on...".
    – user772515
    Commented Dec 5, 2017 at 10:25
  • You are both correct. Of course, in a single-user system you may be able to get away with forcing the uid and gid to your typical user.
    – davidgo
    Commented Dec 5, 2017 at 10:27
  • Thanks for the answer and comments. So I will likely partition the HDD and put Linux
    – pingu2k4
    Commented Dec 5, 2017 at 11:26
  • Can I just clarify? I would set an area as swap area, then mount /home with a format of VFAT or NTFS? Would I also need to mount / somewhere? I just watched this tutorial: youtube.com/watch?v=qNeJvujdB-0 and they dont mount /home, and also there doesnt appear to be an option for VFAT or NTFS.
    – pingu2k4
    Commented Dec 5, 2017 at 12:58

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