Open the terminal ( Ctrl+Alt+T ) and use the following command to install the tool:

sudo apt-get install ntfs-config

Alternatively, you can install it from Ubuntu Software Center.

Before using, we need to tweak the tool a bit as there is a known bug which stops the tool from working properly. It looks for a directory which needs to be created. In the terminal, use the following command to create the mentioned directory:

sudo mkdir -p /etc/hal/fdi/policy

Now we are ready to use the ntfs-config tool. Launch ntfs-config. Remember, it needs administrative rights to run the tool. When you start the tool, it lists all the partitions that are available on your computer. The interface looks like this:

As shown in the picture above, there are three NTFS drives present on my computer. Check the box adjacent to the drive you want to automount. In the place for <Enter a mount point> you can put the name which you want to use for that particular drive for e.g., windows1.

If you want all of your NTFS partition to be automounted, just click on “Auto Configure” and it will take care of the rest of the stuff.

By the way, in case you do not know which drive is numbered what (i.e. /dev/sdaX which is not similar to Windows naming convention of drives), you can use the following command in terminal to find it out.

sudo fdisk -l

which outputs (for my computer) like this:

Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *        2048      206847      102400    7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda2          206848   215541759   107667456    7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda3       215544166   625141759   204798797    f  W95 Ext (LBA)
/dev/sda5       215544168   420340724   102398278+   7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda6       420340788   504296414    41977813+   7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda7       535547904   545062911     4757504   82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda8       545064960   625141759    40038400   83  Linux
/dev/sda9       504297472   529539071    12620800   83  Linux
/dev/sda10      529541120   535543807     3001344   82  Linux swap / Solaris

In the output, look for the column Blocks. This gives the size of the partition in bytes. In the example above, 102398278 bytes can roughly be estimated as 102 GB.

Once you select the mount point, it gives you option of enabling write support for the drives. Its up to you if you want this feature.

Save and close and you are done with a reboot. You will find your drive(s) automatically mounted at the start-up.

Your questions and suggestions are always welcomed. Do not forget to subscribe to the site for more helpful article to make your tech-life easier. Cheers :)

Image credit: Hard Disk Drive by Big Stock Photo

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Download NTFS mounter.

Open the dmg file and drag the NTFS mounter icon to the Applications folder.

Go to your Applications and open the NTFS mounter app.

You should now see a black cat icon at the menu bar.

Click on the black cat icon and (if nothing goes wrong) you should see your NTFS drive listed. Click the respective entry to mount your NTFS drive. That’s it.

Note: If you are using other ways to get mount your NTFS, you will have to eject the volume first before it can be mounted by NTFS mounter. Once you have ejected the volume, you can try to select it again from the menu.

Give NTFS mounter a try and tell us if it is better than MacFuse/NTFS-3G.

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A good way to workaround this is to make your Ubuntu automount your NTFS partition upon booting up. While this can be easily fixed by changing the fstab file, it involves hitting the terminal and edit the root file, which maybe a big turn off for newbies and it could possibly crash your system if it is not handled properly.

To fix this issue the simpler way, we can install the application PySDM and access the storage device manager with a simple to use and user-friendly interface.

PySDM is a Storage Device Manager that allows full customization of hard disk mountpoints without manually access to fstab. It also allows the creation of udev rules for dynamic configuration of storage devices

Installation

The package pysdm is found in the Ubuntu repository. You can easily install it via the Synaptic Package Manager (System -> Administration -> Synaptic package Manager). Alternatively, for those who prefer the apt-get way, here’s the command:

sudo apt-get install pysdm

Better still, click this link to install pysdm in your Ubuntu system.

Usage

Once installed, go to System -> Administration -> Storage Device Manager.

You will find your all your partitions listed on the left pane of the window.

The partitions are labelled in the sda1, sda2, sda3, etc format. To identify which entry is your NTFS partition, highlight each entry and check the Type field on the right pane. This will tell you the filesystem of that partition.

Once you have located your NTFS partition, click on the Assistant button.

Check the box The File system is mounted at boot time.

Uncheck the box Mount file system in read only mode.

Click OK to close the Assistant window, follow by Apply to save the changes. Restart your computer, your NTFS partition should automount by itself upon booting up.

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A good way to overcome this is to reformat the external hard disk to NTFS format. NTFS does not has a 4GB file restriction and can be accessed easily from Windows, Mac and Linux (with the help of NTFS-3G).

Mac and Linux users might be tempted to reformat the hard disk to either HFS (for time machine) or Ext3 format. It will work well with your computer, but in the event that your system crashes and you want to retrieve your backup files from other computer (that are not Mac or Linux), you might have difficulties getting it to read your files.

Update: Before you try this, please back up all your files from on your external hard drive. The process will completely wipe off all data on your hard disk. Thanks to cneil for reminding.

Reformat external hard disk to NTFS

In your Ubuntu Hardy, open up the terminal and install the following applications:

sudo apt-get install gparted ntfsprogs

Plug in your external hard disk.

Your system should detect the hard disk and automount it to your system.

Before you can do a reformat, you will have to unmount it. On the desktop, right-click on the hard disk icon and select “Unmount volume“.

Go to System->Administration->Partition Editor. On the top right, click on the dropdown box. You should see something like the image below. Select the entry that corresponds to your external hard disk.

On the main window, select the partition, right-click and select Format to -> NTFS. Click Apply.

That’s it. Your external hard disk is now in NTFS format.

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