Problem adding a second SSD

elfroggio · 18 October 2025 03:02

Original situation: (working for quite a while)

Laptop with 1TB SSD in SSD-0
Manjaro (up to date)

New situation:

Same laptop with SSD (1TB) in SSD-0
Added a 2nd SSD (2TB) in SSD-1 (verified through the BIOS)

$ lsblk -a
NAME        MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINTS
nvme0n1     259:0    0   1.8T  0 disk 
└─nvme0n1p1 259:1    0   1.8T  0 part /run/media/froggy/big2tb
nvme1n1     259:2    0 953.9G  0 disk 
├─nvme1n1p1 259:3    0   976M  0 part /boot/efi
├─nvme1n1p2 259:4    0  31.3G  0 part [SWAP]
├─nvme1n1p3 259:5    0 734.2G  0 part /home
└─nvme1n1p4 259:6    0 187.5G  0 part /var/log
                                      /var/cache
                                      /

Problem 1:

the new ssd in slot 1 is reported as: nvme0n1
the existing ssd in slot 0 is now reported as: nvme1n1 but previously it was designated nvme0n1

Problem 2:

the new ssd need to mounted by hand, I’d like it available after the boot, without have to mount myself.

inxi:

$ inxi -Fxxx
System:
  Host: bogus Kernel: 6.12.48-1-MANJARO arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc
    v: 15.2.1 clocksource: tsc
  Desktop: Xfce v: 4.20.1 tk: Gtk v: 3.24.48 wm: xfwm4 v: 4.20.0
    with: xfce4-panel tools: xfce4-screensaver vt: 7 dm: LightDM v: 1.32.0
    Distro: Manjaro base: Arch Linux
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: Alienware product: Alienware m16 R2 v: N/A
    serial: <superuser required> Chassis: type: 10 serial: <superuser required>
  Mobo: Alienware model: 0MNHT9 v: A01 serial: <superuser required>
    part-nu: 0C91 uuid: <superuser required> UEFI: Alienware v: 1.15.0
    date: 08/06/2025
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT0 charge: 44.1 Wh (53.9%) condition: 81.9/88.2 Wh (92.9%)
    temp: 30.1 C volts: 11.4 min: 11.7 model: SMP DELL M9DG052E type: Li-poly
    serial: 421 charging: status: not charging cycles: 6
CPU:
  Info: 16-core (6-mt/10-st) model: Intel Core Ultra 9 185H bits: 64
    type: MST AMCP smt: enabled arch: Meteor Lake rev: 4 cache: L1: 1.6 MiB
    L2: 18 MiB L3: 24 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 400 min/max: 400/4800:5100:3800:2500 cores: 1: 400
    2: 400 3: 400 4: 400 5: 400 6: 400 7: 400 8: 400 9: 400 10: 400 11: 400
    12: 400 13: 400 14: 400 15: 400 16: 400 17: 400 18: 400 19: 400 20: 400
    21: 400 22: 400 bogomips: 135212
  Flags-basic: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel Meteor Lake-P [Intel Arc Graphics] vendor: Dell driver: i915
    v: kernel arch: Xe-LPG ports: active: none off: eDP-1 empty: DP-1,DP-2
    bus-ID: 00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:7d55 class-ID: 0300
  Device-2: NVIDIA AD107M [GeForce RTX 4060 Max-Q / Mobile] vendor: Dell
    driver: nvidia v: 580.82.09 arch: Lovelace pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 8
    ports: active: none off: HDMI-A-1 empty: DP-3,eDP-2 bus-ID: 01:00.0
    chip-ID: 10de:28e0 class-ID: 0300
  Device-3: Realtek Integrated_Webcam_FHD driver: uvcvideo type: USB
    rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s lanes: 1 bus-ID: 3-9:7 chip-ID: 0bda:557c
    class-ID: fe01 serial: 200901010001
  Display: x11 server: X.org v: 1.21.1.18 compositor: xfwm4 v: 4.20.0
    driver: X: loaded: modesetting,nvidia alternate: fbdev,nouveau,nv,vesa
    dri: iris gpu: i915,nv_platform,nvidia,nvidia-nvswitch display-ID: :0.0
    note: <missing: xdpyinfo/xrandr>
  Monitor-1: HDMI-A-1 model: BenQ GW2765 serial: B3F01079019 res: 2560x1440
    dpi: 109 size: 597x336mm (23.5x13.23") diag: 686mm (27") modes:
    max: 2560x1440 min: 640x480
  Monitor-2: eDP-1 model: AU Optronics 0x75ab res: 2560x1600 dpi: 189
    size: 344x215mm (13.54x8.46") diag: 406mm (16") modes: 2560x1600
  API: EGL v: 1.5 hw: drv: intel iris drv: nvidia platforms: device: 0
    drv: nvidia device: 2 drv: iris device: 3 drv: swrast gbm: drv: nvidia
    surfaceless: drv: nvidia x11: drv: iris inactive: wayland,device-1
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6.0 compat-v: 4.5 vendor: intel mesa v: 25.2.3-arch1.2
    glx-v: 1.4 direct-render: yes renderer: Mesa Intel Arc Graphics (MTL)
    device-ID: 8086:7d55
  Info: Tools: api: eglinfo,glxinfo de: xfce4-display-settings
    gpu: nvidia-settings,nvidia-smi x11: xprop
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel Meteor Lake-P HD Audio vendor: Dell
    driver: sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl bus-ID: 00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:7e28
    class-ID: 0401
  Device-2: NVIDIA AD107 High Definition Audio vendor: Dell
    driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel pcie: speed: 16 GT/s lanes: 8
    bus-ID: 01:00.1 chip-ID: 10de:22be class-ID: 0403
  API: ALSA v: k6.12.48-1-MANJARO status: kernel-api with: aoss
    type: oss-emulator
  Server-1: JACK v: 1.9.22 status: off
  Server-2: PipeWire v: 1.4.8 status: active with: 1: pipewire-pulse
    status: active 2: wireplumber status: active 3: pipewire-alsa type: plugin
Network:
  Device-1: Realtek Killer E3000 2.5GbE vendor: Dell driver: r8169 v: kernel
    pcie: speed: 5 GT/s lanes: 1 port: 3000 bus-ID: 2f:00.0 chip-ID: 10ec:3000
    class-ID: 0200
  IF: enp47s0 state: down mac: e8:cf:83:0b:51:56
  Device-2: Intel Wi-Fi 7 AX1775 /AX1790 /BE20 /BE401/BE1750 2x2
    driver: iwlwifi v: kernel pcie: speed: 16 GT/s lanes: 1 bus-ID: 30:00.0
    chip-ID: 8086:272b class-ID: 0280
  IF: wlp48s0f0 state: up mac: 44:38:e8:c3:f2:b7
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 2.75 TiB used: 116.28 GiB (4.1%)
  ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Samsung model: SSD 990 EVO Plus 2TB
    size: 1.82 TiB speed: 63.2 Gb/s lanes: 4 tech: SSD serial: S7U6NJ0Y902273R
    fw-rev: 2B2QKXG7 temp: 36.9 C scheme: GPT
  ID-2: /dev/nvme1n1 vendor: Micron model: 2550 1024GB size: 953.87 GiB
    speed: 63.2 Gb/s lanes: 4 tech: SSD serial: 24374C02C7B4 fw-rev: 25500201
    temp: 36.9 C scheme: GPT
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 187.5 GiB used: 10.93 GiB (5.8%) fs: btrfs dev: /dev/nvme1n1p4
  ID-2: /boot/efi size: 974.1 MiB used: 16.7 MiB (1.7%) fs: vfat
    dev: /dev/nvme1n1p1
  ID-3: /home size: 721.57 GiB used: 105.33 GiB (14.6%) fs: ext4
    dev: /dev/nvme1n1p3
  ID-4: /var/log size: 187.5 GiB used: 10.93 GiB (5.8%) fs: btrfs
    dev: /dev/nvme1n1p4
Swap:
  ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 31.25 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2
    dev: /dev/nvme1n1p2
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 55.0 C mobo: 46.0 C sodimm: 40.0 C
  Fan Speeds (rpm): cpu: 0 fan-1: 0
Info:
  Memory: total: 32 GiB note: est. available: 30.86 GiB used: 1.9 GiB (6.2%)
  Processes: 387 Power: uptime: 1h 33m states: freeze,mem,disk
    suspend: s2idle wakeups: 0 hibernate: platform Init: systemd v: 257
    default: graphical
  Packages: pm: pacman pkgs: 1167 Compilers: gcc: 15.2.1 Shell: Bash
    v: 5.3.3 running-in: xfce4-terminal inxi: 3.3.39

megavolt · 18 October 2025 04:05

This is not a problem, but rather the result of parallelization and speeding up using systemd. Block device file names are unreliable. It can work if the NVMe is detected and initialized at exactly the same time everytime. The slower one will therefore be the second and the faster one the first.

Use Symlinks which are created on boot time:

ls /dev/disk/by-*/

cfinnberg · 18 October 2025 06:50

Add the new drive to the /etc/fstab file with the UUID, like this:

UUID=aaaaaaaa-bbbb-cccc-dddd-eeeeeeeeeeee /Data       ext4    defaults,noatime,user,nofail   0 1

You can get the UUID with the command:

lsblk -no UUID /dev/nvme0n1p1

You will also have to adapt the mount point (/Data) and the file system type (ext4) to your needs.

jofi · 18 October 2025 06:52

Create a path/directory where the ssd should be mounted to. Then add an entry to /etc/fstab like

UUID=... /path/to/mount/point ext4 defaults 0 0

The device’s UUID can be found with blkid - you could also use /dev/nvme0n1 but as you know already this may change if you add yet another ssd. The ext4 is for the file system - change it accordingly in case you use something else.

Olli · 18 October 2025 07:48

don’t forget to update grub after editing fstab

sudo mkinitcpio -P && sudo update-grub

reboot

Teo · 18 October 2025 09:15

He actually just needs to reboot.

Another thing will be to chown the mount point to his user.

Aragorn · 18 October 2025 09:20

[Tutorial] Working with additional 'drives'

dmt · 18 October 2025 11:18

To sum up what others have said, and make a few suggestions of my own.

As we don’t know what filesystem it is, I’ve assumed ext4 for now.

Get the UUID from lsblk -f
Edit /etc/fstab and add this line UUID={UUID here} /media/data ext4 nofail 0 2 obviously replace {UUID here} with the actual UUID
Reload the config sudo systemctl daemon-reload
Make the mount point sudo mkdir -p /media/data
Test using sudo mount -a
Take ownership sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /media/data

If it mounts after step 5 then it’s all good - if not then your fstab entry is incorrect, correct it and retest with step 5 before continuing or rebooting.

I’ve chosen to place the mount point in /media as it should show up in the sidebar for file managers, so it should be more convenient. I used data as I don’t know what you’d want to call it. You can change these (but be consistent).

If the filesystem is different then you’ll have to adapt the fstab entry. If you want further help with the fstab entry then we’ll need to know at least the filesystem.

Sorry, but none of that is necessary when simply adding a data partition (not even the reboot).

Aragorn · 18 October 2025 11:48

But, one will need to run…

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

… after modifying /etc/fstab — systemd will nag if you don’t.

dmt · 18 October 2025 11:50

Indeed I forgot that one - I’ll add it in.

Thanks for pointing out the omission.

elfroggio · 18 October 2025 13:33

Very helpful, thank you for taking the time

dmt · 18 October 2025 17:42

You’re welcome.

system · 21 October 2025 17:43

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