Upgrade / OS question
I'll shortly doing a substantial upgrade on my PC - the works, new processor, motherboard, RAM, video card, etc. In particular, I'm ditching my Athlon 3200+ for an Intel Core Duo, and dropping an ATI card in favor of a Nvidia one. I believe the motherboards a different brand as well (and naturally, different model.)
The question: if XP and Kubuntu even boot, should I do a fresh install of XP and Kubuntu? If Kubuntu doesn't boot (ATI -> NVidia may throw it off) what can be done to coax it into booting? I can pull everything I need off automatically if I can just get enough working to run the SSH server. Pulling stuff off before the upgrade isn't an option, since the old video card is toast.
Neither is a big deal, since the XP partition is just games, almost all of which can be automatically redownloaded via Steam, and Kubuntu has a wonderful package manager that works similarly well, but it is a time sink.
Xbox Live: StaatsM
I have rarely gotten a machine to boot after "the works", especially motherboard. Even when you can get solid re-detection of hardware, I usually find the end result lacking. One could argue that its more work than just rebuilding the thing. Admittedly, I have been known to reinstall Linux just because I was tired of trying to fix it. . .
Can you put some random low end (read, easily detectable) video card in it long enough to get your stuff off? Or pull the drive and use another machine to retrieve?
"And the circle has been charged through the power of unphysics, which are physics so stupid they erase normal ones from your mind." -Wields-Rulebook-Heavily at rpg.net
Assuming your new mobo can see your hard drives and grub does its job you should always be able to get to a console, and even when X screws up and KDE won't come up properly you can use one of your virtual consoles to fiddle with the graphics and driver setup using modprobe and your X config. It's always a lot of hassle if you can't get to the internet, since I find even I (a unix noob) can solve pretty much any linux problem if I have the internet access to search for faqs and help files.
It will do good to heart and head
When your soul is in my soul's stead;
And I will friend you, if I may,
In the dark and cloudy day.
- AE Houseman, trailblazing XBL user
XBox Live
Let me know how the process goes Staats, I'm doing something very similar myself, except I'll be installing Kubuntu for the 1st time.
I'm also considereding (although I'm not sure why, except I have a free copy) of tri-booting w/ xp, Kubuntu, & Vista business. Anything I should be concerned with? I'm likely going to move everything to a backup drive and format the HDD before installing.
*Legion* wrote:
1. Never take an old installation to a new build. Too many things get screwed up. Always better to backup everything you want to keep data wise and then reinstall everything from scratch including all apps. It's a lot of work but much better in the long run.
2. If you plan installing multiple installation OS then you must have separate partitions for each OS. Also keep in mind space of applications to be installed after the fact. For me I like at least 60gb for each Windows OS install and I would think around 10gb for a Linux install if you are just messing with it. That's just personal preference.
I plan on installing XP 64bit and Vista Ultimate 32bit on my new machine and for that I'm putting each install on a 150gb partition. Basically 1 320gb drive partitioned into 2 drives. The rest of my drives are for personal documents, media and perhaps game installs. Games are getting so damn big now.
C: Windows XP 64bit 150gb
D: Windows Vista Ultimate 32bit 150gb
E: Secondary Program Files overflow HDD 320gb
F: Documents and Media HDD 320gb
G: Optical Drive DVD-RW
So that's my plans with 3 7200rpm, 320gb drives. I don't know if I will go 500gb or not.
Prederick wrote:
"When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross." - Sinclair Lewis.
So, GRUB completely freaked out, and I ended up wiping it. I did manage to boot into Kubuntu (from the Live CD/install disk, a damn fine invention) and get my stuff out though.
Xbox Live: StaatsM
Doh! Well, at least everything ended up okay.
Sometimes you can get a Windows box through it by wiping the ENUM key. With any flavor of Linux I've ever tried it on, EPIC FAIL. . .
Usually at least once a week or so, I find myself offering figurative tribute to the KNOPPIX folks, and their awesome vision. The LiveCD has got to be the biggest boon to the PC technician, well, ever.
"And the circle has been charged through the power of unphysics, which are physics so stupid they erase normal ones from your mind." -Wields-Rulebook-Heavily at rpg.net
For next time here's what MS recommends (not sure it would work in your case since you were dual booting). Posted to help those pervs who may be searching.
Do you ever walk alone like a drifter in the dark?
I have an XP/Kubuntu dual boot as well and I'm getting ready to switch to a Core 2 Duo system as well though I'll be going from Nvidia to ATI. I have my /home directory on a separate partition so I'll just reinstall (going from Feisty to Gusty in the process).
If you don't want to reinstall Kubuntu, I don't think it should be real hard to do. I'd revert back to the vesa driver for X first. There is probably a backup copy of xorg.conf in your /etc/X11 directory that you can copy back to xorg.conf (always make a backup of xorg.conf when changing anything in X). GRUB can be reinstalled by booting with a liveCD and running grub.
I always look here for guidance when working with GRUB
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/view/stable/chapter08/grub.html
If you are going to install Kubuntu for the 1st time and are planning to use it for real stuff, I highly recommend doing custom partitioning and making your /home directory on a separate partition. Then you can reinstall the OS and preserve all your desktop settings and user data. Generally I do about 30GB on the / directory, 2xSystem Memory for the swap partition, and the bulk on the /home directory.