[rosshuts]

Hi All,

First off apologies if this has been solved in another thread but I haven't been able to find an answer apart from some old (2007 etc) threads with such old versions of software etc.

My setup is a mini-itx system with up to date hardware etc.

I have installed the lastest 32bit of Ubuntu with the latest updates as of today and also installed the latest version of XBMC.

I have an external 2TB E-Sata hard disk that is formatted in Ext4 and I have some MKV files on there.

I have setup my movie file source in XBMC under my gnome session (normally my XBMC is set to start as the default session so that XBMC loads up straight away with no password entry etc - bascially the perfect linux based Home Media Centre).

XBMC finds everything find and have been using the Mediastream Skin and Scraper and its all working lovely - can play movies from the external e-sata drive etc. Anyway, have rebooted/logged off and made sure XBMC starts up first and then go to play my films.

This is where the problem is, It's not finding the external drive as I assume its not mounting it when XBMC starts up.

Now I am a total newbie when it comes to linux so please be gentle. I have looked on google and someone mentions to edit the gnome file and to make sure nodiscmount has not been commented out, but its not in the config file to begin with? Again its an old article pointing to old versions of Ubuntu and XBMC.

I could take this as an excuse to get a NAS box and watch films over the network, but I don't have the money and happy with the setup as is and certainly don't want to go back to Windows as I am really happy thus far with the Ubuntu media center setup.

Can anyone help?

Really appreciate anyone's help in this matter.

Cheers,
Ross.

[dashford]

Have you looked at fstab? It should provide you with what you need by automatically mounting your external hard drive on startup.

You'll need to find the disk's UUID which you can get by typing in the terminal:

Code:

sudo blkid

Create a folder for the external hard drive to mount to (using /media external as an example directory, feel free to pick your own):

Code:

sudo mkdir /media/external

Having that you should next edit the fstab file:

Code:

sudo nano /etc/fstab

Insert an entry for your external drive with the following parameters separated by tabs:
UUID, mount point, type, options, dump, pass

From the information you've supplied it should look something like (using tabs instead of spaces),
UUID="XXXXXXXXXXXXXX" /media/external ext4 defaults 0 0

I'm not sure if you might need to rescan your XBMC database as XBMC might have mounted it automatically in another directory.

That should be enough to get it working, write back if it doesn't work and I might be able to help further!

[rosshuts]

Hi Dashford,

Many thanks for your response and apologies for the delay.

I tried your instructions and it worked perfectly and didn't take any more than a couple of minutes to sort out!!

Thanks very much for your help, really appreciate it.

Saves the need to get a NAS box now - although not sure if that is a good thing was a good excuse to get another toy!

Thanks again!

[dashford]

No problem, good to see it working.

A NAS would be a good solution, I'm sure you could find another excuse to get it! :p

[Magnus J]

Hi

I have the same problem.

It was a very good explanation, BUT it still doesn't show up in XBMC. Other mounted (internal) drives shows up but not my external. It's mounted and shows up in Ubuntu and even when I enter "Videos" in XBMC but not in "Add source".

I would be grateful if there is a solution.

Best Regards,
Magnus