reinstalling on SSD, adding /home (and swap???) later, was: Safest way to resize windows partition before installing

[M. Fioretti]

On Fri, Jan 10, 2020 12:36:22 PM +0100, Liam Proven wrote:
> On Thu, 9 Jan 2020 at 21:20, M. Fioretti <mfioretti at nexaima.net> wrote:
> >
> > if this makes sense (please tell if it doesn't),
> 
> IMHO, no.

Points taken, thanks for the detailed explanation. Here is my
answer/comments/further questions after all replies from both you and
Ralf so far.

1) I too have no interest in hibernate, suspend is good enough for me
too

2) copying to the SSD the install already made on the drive does not
   look the most productive option in my specific case, regardless of
   metadata and similar:
   
   a) working with the UBUNTU DVD from Linux Magazine gave me no
      problems, and was a quick/painless process, no problem in
      repeating it AFAICT

   b) I configured/configured almost nothing on the HD post-install,
   so I wouldn't have to recover anything on that front

   c) but I want to customize /modify the install wrt the first time
   anyway, AND I have to create a swap this time, and remap the whole
   / of the first HD install as /home

For all these reasons, reinstalling from scratch from the DVD to the
HD, with different options, and then doing

    mv /home/home/marco /home/marco
    rm -rf /home/usr /home/bin /home/sbin etc etc...

seems much more efficient overall. Or not?

The real issue at this point is this:

>  The T430 has a slot for an mSATA SSD; you don't need to waste your
> time fooling around with mounting the HD into the optical drive bay.
> http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:T430

>  Have *both* SSD & HD disks fitted when you install. Don't fool
> around trying to add swap later.

Initially I had completely missed the fact that the T430 has this
option. Don't know why. That's why I bought the 2.5" SSD, and the
caddy. I need to have the SSD for the OS, and the HD for /home. I
could send back the caddy and get an mSATA (which kind??? That's a
separate topic though) for the OS, start looking around for RAM... and
reuse the SSD in my desktop, something I was planning to do anyway
after getting the laptop done.

BUT: I am going for an SSD (and yes, more RAM as NEXT step) to make the laptop as fast as possible, but I read e.g here: 

https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/comments/6k4zzl/t430_upgrades_msata_or_full_size_ssd/

https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-T400-T500-and-newer-T/Why-ever-go-with-SSD-over-mSATA-for-primary-drive-T430-T430s/td-p/854581/page/2

a) that the mSATA interface in the T430 is SATA 2, not 3, but b) the
performance hit is not so noticeable in real world conditions, so just
get an MSATA and be done with it

At this point, my questions have become:

1) what is your experience/feelings/advice wrt the mSATA being only
SATA 2? How slower will it actually be wrt an SSD installed in the
main bay, or in the caddy?

2) if going with mSATA in SATA2 slot, where to put swap? Still in the
HD, I guess. No?

Thanks
Marco
-- 

M. Fioretti http://mfioretti.com                   http://stop.zona-m.net

Your own civil rights and the quality of your life heavily depend on how
software is used *around* you