Windows NTFS Partitions Read/write support made easy in Ubuntu Feisty

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This program allow you to easily configure all of your NTFS devices to allow write support via a friendly gui. For that use, it will configure them to use the open source ntfs-3g driver. You'll also be able to easily disable this feature.

Current Stable 0.5.5

Project Home page :- http://flomertens.free.fr/ntfs-config/

Requirements

windows with Feisty dual-boot installation and external hard drive (Optional)

Install NTFS-config in Ubuntu Feisty

Now You can install NTFS-config from Ubuntu Feisty repositories

sudo apt-get install ntfs-config

This will install all the required packages for ntfs-config including ntfs-3g

Using Ntfs-Config

If you want to open this application go to Applications--->System Tools--->NTFS Configuration Tool

Now it will prompt for root password enter root password and click ok

It will show the available NTFS partition as follows in this example /dev/sda1 in NTFS partition

You need to select the partitions you want to configure,add the name of the mount point and click on apply.In this example i have ticked the check box next to /dev/sda1 and click under mount enter the name you want to use i have entered as windows now the mount point showing as /media/windows and click on apply.

Select the NTFS Write support which is suitable for you i.e internal or external

In this example i have tick the check box next to Enable write support for internal device because i am using dualboot with windows.If you are using external hard drive select external option and click on ok

Once it finished you should see the mount point on your desktop as follows

You can see the windows mount point files as follows

If you want to unmount you should be root to unmount and then right click on mount point select Unmount Volume

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47 Responses

  1. fnark says:

    thanks a lot

  2. Great article for the most part.

    In the seventh step though, you advice being root to unmount via the desktop as shown in the screenshot. This is not advised! You can alt+f2 and run gksudo umount /dev/sda1 or whatever your /dev of the ntfs drive is, but won’t sudo kick in when you try to unmount from the desktop icon as a normal user?

  3. nico says:

    hi, i used ntfs-3g before on edgy, i could mount and unmount as normal user. but in feisty i can’t do it. know why?thanks..

  4. Thanks for the tip/overview on how to do this – here’s one for you… ‘Windows’ is spelt wrong in the title of the page 🙂

    Regards

    Matthew

  5. admin says:

    thanks matthew i have corrected that now

  6. Snipes says:

    I just started with Ubuntu: Feisty Fawn a couple of days ago (complete n00b). When I connected my external NTFS harddisk (via USB) it mounted automatically. I haven’t installed NTFS-config manually, so does that mean that it is part of the standard installation? Or is it because I connected it with USB?

    PS My first entry in a non-windows forum! Started with Linux Slackware nine years ago, but couldn’t get it to work properly, so I stopped. But now I got Ubuntu to work I can finally stop using XP 😛

  7. to4i says:

    Creat job! Thank you

  8. Larry says:

    I never get a screen for drive detection because one of my two drives fails to (re)mount:

    $MFTMirr does not match $MFT (record 0).
    Failed to mount '/dev/disk/by-uuid/8610670D10670391': Input/output error
    NTFS is inconsistent. Run chkdsk /f on Windows then reboot it TWICE!
    The usage of the /f parameter is very IMPORTANT! No modification was
    made to NTFS by this software.

    Then I: [apt-get remove ntfs-config] and did a reboot which did not fix the drive mounting error. I then re-installed through automatix – same error appears – then uninstall through automatix. But now re-start allows me read-only on the faulting drive.

    I don’t have a working copy of windows on this computer though. Any suggestions?

  9. Buhl says:

    hey there..
    i get this screen when I’ve typed in the command line:

    buhl@bsb:~$ sudo apt-get install ntfs-config
    Reading package lists… Done
    Building dependency tree
    Reading state information… Done
    E: Couldn’t find package ntfs-config

    I don’t know what went wrong?

  10. admin says:

    @buhl
    you need to make sure you have enables universe,multiverse repositories in /etc/apt/sources.list file and then update the source list
    sudo apt-get update
    and now try to install

  11. Larry says:

    I think I figured out my error (from above). My ntfs partition is huge – like 163 gb huge. I recall a limit for max size of like 120 gb.

  12. chris says:

    Hi.
    I am using kubuntu Feisty. I have an external (usb) 2.5 hdd and a partition on it is nfts. when i try to mount the ntfs partition, i get
    “hal-storage-removable-mount-all-options refused uid 1000”
    any ideas? thanks in advance!

  13. Paulie says:

    Yeah, a really great program, although ntfs-3g worked like a charm on edgy.
    Thanks for the tip!

  14. Paulie says:

    Tip for kde users: to be able to run the program from the menu, edit the item and chage gksu to kdesu 🙂

  15. Anthony says:

    I can mount the same physical drive sda using the above method, however when trying to mount a second sdb it will not allow me to mount. I can however manually mount/umount just fine (although not in rwx).

    Feisty Fawn
    ntfs-3g
    2.6.20-15-generic #2 SMP (64 AMD) Dual core

    Am I missing anything here….

  16. Siddhu says:

    Brill, mate. Absolutely brill!

    Thanks a million for that! 😀 Now, I can throw dratted Windows out of the window. 😉

  17. pandora says:

    Hi guys,

    NTFS works beautifully for me. Only problem is it always ask for the password. Is there anyway to by pass this? I have all my data in an ntfs partition which is shared between feisty and xp. So as you can imagine, untill I enter the password, Amarok starves without songs, Open office cannot find any of my docs and simply my system paralyses! Any ideas?

  18. atique says:

    many many thanks

  19. questerz says:

    Will this work with Kubuntu-Feisty?

  20. admin says:

    yes it should work in kubuntu feisty also

  21. Vasilis says:

    Hi! Nice Guide.

    I have the same problem as Larry. While my first ntfs partition 30 GB (on the same hd with ubuntu) gives me read/write permission, the other one 250 GB (on a separate hd) doesn’t give me write permission. About the max size of 120GB that Larry mentioned, I read some posts on ntfs-3g forum that speak about TB!!!.
    So, before trying re-partioning & splitting has anynone a clue about the actual max size of ntfs partitions? Or is it any configuration that I have to make to solve the problem?

    Thx

  22. Wayne says:

    Doesn’t work for me at all in feisty. When I try to mound /media/windows it says “/media/windows contains an invalid character. you must choose a name, not a directory.”

    Then it happily goes to the next page for enabling write support but the internal drive is grayed out.

    I tried creating the windows directory under /media but I get the same error. Glad it worked for some but I’ll just go back to the fairly simple manual method outlined in the Unofficial Ubuntu Guide: http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu:Feisty#How_to_Mount_NTFS_Partitions

  23. JimM says:

    I just tried to install on kUbuntu feisty using the standard package manager. It appeared to install with no problems and shows as a menu item under “System”, but when I select it nothing happens.

    Any suggestions?

  24. Steve says:

    @JimM

    Paulie’s entry from above:-

    “Tip for kde users: to be able to run the program from the menu, edit the item and chage gksu to kdesu”

  25. jaime says:

    If I delete a file from my NTFS drive, will it go to some “trash” directory or will it be permanently deleted?

    thanks in advance,

    – Jaime

  26. cwoneil says:

    In Response to Larry’s Comment on May 3rd. There is a really great program called BART PE. Which is a bootable windows Pre-installation environment CD which can be used to run chkdsk /f as instructed. This saved me from a physical drive failure once. This should solve the problem on the drive so that Linux will be willing to mount it.

    You will need a working windows system to create this CD.

    Good Luck.

  27. iansane says:

    RE: Jaime

    When I delete a file on my NTFS from Ubuntu, it creates a trash file on the NTFS and puts the file in it. Don’t know if this will change by configuring the trash bin on Ubuntu to delete instead of trash. It’s like when you delete something on another partition using windows, and it creates a recycle bin on that partition. I had to log into the windows partition and show hidden files to see it.

  28. iansane says:

    Can some one tell me how to stop my Ubuntu from auto mounting my windows partition? I’ve read a few things about how to make it automount but nothing about how to stop it, and still allow me to use sudo to mount. I don’t want other users to see it. I just want to use “sudo mount” and “sudo unmount” (I mean umount, don’t know where the logic is in removing the “n” from unmount but oh well.) from my user account. I know how to do that but at reboot or startup, it automounts so every user can see it.

  29. iansane says:

    This is very similar to the problem with windows where so many people just use the admin account as their regular account. Until I can figure out all of the sudo commands, I have to keep going back and forth between my user account and root so I had to allow root login from the welcome screen.

  30. Mark says:

    I also get the grayed out internal box (but external is okay). No password prompt, but the mounted NTFS drive is read only. Apparently i dont have the ability to change it in properties, but there is only one login.. (just switched to ubuntu 2 days ago from winxp…so i’m still very new)
    thanks for any help!

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