Linux Server/File Share HDD Format Questions

IAmDarthMole · April 28, 2020

Hello,

I apologize if this has already been answered. I tried to do some searching for a bit but my exact question doesn't seem to be covered. If I missed it I apologize.

I'm currently repurposing one of my old rigs as an in-home file share (possibly apps later, but for right now just sharing all my files). The files consist of documents, photos, videos, image editing projects, etc. I have iOS, Mac, Windows, Linux, AppleTV, and Roku machines that will be accessing the file share.

I'll be running Ubuntu Server on the file share and will have some old hard drives acting as the storage. I have 2 x1b drives, a 500 gb, and a 3tb drive. My plan right now is to use LVM (Logical Volume Management) to combine the 2 1tb and 1 500bg into one volume and then setup a backup solution where the data is mirrored on the 3tb drive. I'll also have an offsite backup solution for redundancy.

So far I've set up Samba to share the files, created the samba password for the account, and then shared one of the mounted drives for testing. It works with iOS, my Mac, and also my Windows machine. The thing is the hard drive in question is formatted in Ext4. From what I've read my Windows machine should be having issues with the drive being Ext4 but I can read and write to the drive and can even stream videos stored on the drive on the Windows machine without any issues.

My question is what file format do I use for the drives? Do I use Ext4 or NTFS? As a follow-up, does Samba remove the issues Windows has with Ext4 or am I just getting lucky with no issues appearing so far?

Thank you in advance for your time and help!

fuzz0r · April 28, 2020

All my drives that are shared through samba are EXT. Windows has no problems reading it.

If you directly connect the drive while formatted as EXT to a windows machine it probably won't be able to read it. But through samba it's no problem.

IAmDarthMole · April 28, 2020

1 minute ago, fuzz0r said:

All my drives that are shared through samba are EXT. Windows has no problems reading it.

If you directly connect the drive while formatted as EXT to a windows machine it probably won't be able to read it. But through samba it's no problem.

Thank you very much!!!

Sauron · April 28, 2020

6 minutes ago, IAmDarthMole said:

does Samba remove the issues Windows has with Ext4 or am I just getting lucky with no issues appearing so far?

Samba is a standardized access protocol, it doesn't matter what the file system underneath is so long as Samba supports it - the Samba service will take care of sending the correct file system commands upon request from the client.