Making a storage unit out of a HDD that currently has a partitioned Linux install.

[Username]

Hello all,

I currently have two hard drives:

1) 3TB w/Arch Linux installed. It's partitioned into /boot, /, /var, /usr, /home, /data (or something like that. I forget).
2) 128GB SSD w/Arch as well, but done much better.

I want to dump the Arch install and all the extra partitions on the old Arch install and use it as a storage unit (for accessing my music library) while I use the SSD as my actual OS.

My original thought was to copy all the files that I want to a spare hard drive and wipe it clean. The problem is the 3TB drive is almost completely full, I don't have another one to copy the files onto, and with the holidays coming I would rather not spend money on a spare 3TB hard drive.

Now, I was considering moving all the files onto /data and using a GParted live CD to delete all the other partitions and expand /data to take up the entire drive. My questions are:

1) Is this even possible?
2) Are there considerable risks to doing this?
3) What are the alternatives?

Thanks in advance for any and all help.

--Username