How to manage Linux server storage across sda1 and sda2

Question

I've recently upgraded my EC2 server from a m1.small to a m1.medium (old EC2 instances I know) so I have more storage as I recently maxed it out.

When I look at the space available through Terminal I have extra space available on a /dev/sda2 directory

Is there a something I have done wrong when upgrading the server or will the storage automatically balance between the two if I reach 100% on /dev/sda1?

When I run a check I get the following information back:

I've got 1% of 374Gb on /dev/sda2 available but I'm unsure how servers access this memory if /dev/sda1 reaches 100%

I'm a novice at server management so apologies if I'm doing something wrong.

Answer 1

I think you are confusing disk space and memory.

On AWS, different instance types have different memory, cpu and network performances, but the storage space is unrelated: you can extend disk space on a EC2 machine without changing its instance type, by attaching a new disk. I don't understand if your question is about disk space or memory, and I don't understand how a new disk appeared on your instance by simply upgrading it - probably it was there from instance creation.

Anyway, there isn't an "automatic balancing" of storage space - you have to manage your own files and move some files/folders to the new disk before the old one gets filled. Working on Linux, you can leverage symbolic links to move large directories across disk without too much hassle.

Answer 2

1. you are using m1.medium, which given as SSD. So you just treat it as "virtual physical storage" given to you. So /dev/sda2 space is NOT extendable to /dev/sda1

2. The SSD storage given is call "instance store". Anything inside /dev/sda are not permanent. You can REBOOT the instance and nothing lost . HOWEVER, if you STOP or SHUTDOWN the instance, everything is gone. Do not pour important data in there.

   3. EBS volume normally are shown as /dev/xd* , which is extendable.

Please check out. EC2 instance store