cmc/cleberg.net

 1#+date:        [2020-01-26 Sun 00:00:00]
 2#+title:       Steam NTFS Fix on Linux
 3#+description: Procedures for mounting NTFS drives using ntfs-3g for Steam on Linux.
 4#+slug:        steam-on-ntfs
 5#+filetags:    :linux:
 6
 7* Auto-Mount Steam Drives
 8
 9If you want to see how to install Steam on Linux, see my other post: [[file:2020-01-25-linux-software.org][Linux
10Software]].
11
12Are you having trouble launching games, even though they've installed correctly?
13This may happen if you're storing your games on an NT File System
14(NTFS)-formatted drive. This shouldn't be an issue if you're storing your games
15on the same drive that Steam is on, but some gamers prefer to put Steam on their
16main drive and game files on another solid state drive (SSD) or hard disk drive
17(HDD).
18
19To fix this problem, you'll need to try two things. First, you'll need to
20install the =ntfs-3g= package, which allows for better interoperability with
21Linux.
22
23#+begin_src sh
24sudo apt install ntfs-3g
25#+end_src
26
27Next, you should set up the =/etc/fstab= file to automatically mount your drives
28on boot. To automatically mount your drives when the computer boots up, you'll
29have to create the folders you want to mount your drive to first. I store mine
30in the =/mnt= folder using names that I'll recognize, but you can create your
31folders wherever you want.
32
33#+begin_src sh
34mkdir /path/to/folder
35#+end_src
36
37For example:
38
39#+begin_src sh
40mkdir /mnt/steam_library
41#+end_src
42
43To automatically mount drives upon system boot, you will need to collect five
44items. The universally unique identifier (UUID) is the identification number
45connected to whichever drive you're using to store Steam games.
46
47Drives are usually labeled similar to =/dev/nvme0n1p1= or =/dev/sda1=, so you'll
48need to find the line in the output of the command below that correlates to your
49drive and copy the UUID over to the =/etc/fstab= file.
50
51#+begin_src sh
52sudo blkid | grep UUID=
53#+end_src
54
55Next, you'll need your user identified (=uid=) and group identifier (=gid=). To
56find these, run the following command:
57
58#+begin_src sh
59id -u && id -g
60#+end_src
61
62Now that you have collected the necessary information, open the =/etc/fstab=
63file:
64
65#+begin_src sh
66sudo nano /etc/fstab
67#+end_src
68
69Each drive you want to mount on boot should have its own line in the
70=/etc/fstab= file that looks similar to this:
71
72#+begin_src config
73UUID=B64E53824E5339F7 /mnt/steam_library ntfs-3g uid=1000,gid=1000 0 0
74#+end_src
75
76#+begin_src sh
77sudo umount /dev/sdxX
78#+end_src
79
80Now all you need to do is unmount your drive and re-mount it. You can unmount
81the drive by doing this (be sure to use the correct drive name here):
82
83You can re-mount all your drives by executing the following:
84
85#+begin_src sh
86sudo mount -a
87#+end_src
88
89If you don't know what your drive name is, or you're nervous about unmounting
90and re-mounting, simply reboot your computer, and the system will mount the
91drive for you automatically.