From: adam@address.invalid   
      
   TJ wrote:   
   > Just bought a 1TB external portable drive.   
   [...]   
   > I'm leaning toward reformatting in ext4, but Linux is efficient enough   
   > these days that NTFS is a viable option, too - just in case I'm wrong   
   > and I DO need to use Windows to access the data someday.   
      
   My external 1 TB drive (USB/eSATA) currently has seven partitions   
   ranging from 30 GB to 500 GB, with a specific use (and appropriate   
   filesystem and mount point) for each.  AFAIK NTFS doesn't store Linux   
   permissions and attributes, so I don't think it would be a good choice   
   for Linux-specific stuff.  Most of the partitions are ext4, but the one   
   that holds my nightly backup tarballs is FAT32, and also has a Windows   
   program to extract files from tarballs.  (Mac OSX is *nix and already   
   has 'tar', 'gzip', et al.)  This way I can access my backups on a Linux,   
   Windows, or Mac system, whichever is most convenient for me to get to,   
   should I need to.   
      
   In short, I'd suggest making it into several partitions based on your   
   particular needs, and there's nothing wrong with leaving some of it   
   unpartitioned for now.  Allow a day or more for full r/w testing of all   
   the partitions, although of course you can use your computer for   
   anything else during that.  I'd recommend a thorough r/w test at the   
   start, before you have any important data on it and while it's still   
   easy to return or exchange should there be any problems.   
      
   Adam   
   --   
   Registered Linux User #536473   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)