On Wed, Jan 06, 2021 at 10:32:40AM -0800, Robert Furber via Support requests for the GRand Unified Bootloader wrote: > > On 2020-12-30 1:48 a.m., Chris Green wrote: > > : > > > Hmmmmm.. It is an old (2012) PC with BIOS. To my knowledge, it is not > > > aware > > > of UEFI and the BIOS is not aware of the PCIe NVMe SSD. However, after > > > booting, Gparted can see the NVMe SSD and I can copy files to it (after > > > partitioning and formatting). > > > > > It's the Linux kernel drivers that allow you to see the nvme disk. > > > > : > > Here's how my system like yours is partitioned:- > > > > Filesystem Type 1M-blocks Used Avail Use% Mounted on > > /dev/nvme0n1p2 ext4 48174 11681 33978 26% / > > /dev/nvme0n1p3 ext4 896193 313911 536690 37% /home > > /dev/sdb1 ext4 10016 176 9313 2% /boot > > /dev/sdb2 ext4 109596 27675 76313 27% /scratch > > /dev/sda1 ext4 938772 220811 670252 25% /bak > > : > > > > Mine boots pretty fast, /dev/sdb is what *used* to be my system disk > > and is a SATA SSD but my first pass at sorting this out had boot on a > > spinning hard disk and while it is somewhat faster on the SATA SSD it > > doesn't make a huge difference. There's not much has to be read off > > /boot. > My sense is that a lot of the contortions you went through was to retain > your old Xubuntu 19.04 HD so you could copy the contents its /home directory > to the /home directory on your NVMe drive. > Yes, that was somewhat important.
> I took a lazier approach: > > * removed my old HDD and replaced it with a 120GB SATA SSD > * installed my new 1TB NVMe SSD in the only PCIe slot on my old > motherboard > * installed the latest Ubuntu from a CD (the BIOS on my mobo cannot > boot from USB) > o partitioned and formatted /dev/sda for /boot > o partitioned and formatted /dev/nvme0 for [swap], / and /home > o ignored complaints and "failure to install" messages from > installation s/w > o rebooted and failed to instruct the BIOS to boot from the 120GB > SATA SSD > * despite this, PC booted as desired ..about 4 times faster than it > did previously from HDD > * connected my old HDD to the PC via an external SATA "toaster" drive > (drive is popped in like bread in a toaster) > * copied contents (including '.' or hidden folder/files) from its > /home directory to the /home directory on /dev/nvme0 > > Now, I have a very fast PC. > Yes, that's the idea! :-) > By the way, I am curious as to why you put /scratch (swap?) on your SATA SSD > and not on your NVMe SSD. > It's just a place to save things temporarily, a name for some spare space. -- Chris Green
