Install new main board & keep Linux or install OS again?
 

Main board is failing, have video problems & have lost some ports. Just install new main board & continue or install Linux again after new main board?

If install Linux again, can updates be kept or must all be slowly downloaded again? Kubuntu 7.04 in Asus Z80K, AMD64

Well it can't hurt to install the new board and attempt to boot, right? If all goes well, you can avoid another lengthy upgrade process...and if all goes "not-so-well", you can reinstall.

Since *buntu typically uses a generic kernel build, you can probably get away with swapping out the board and trying again (as long as you aren't switching architectures (i.e. originally amd64, trying to install a PIII board/CPU, etc...)). You might have to tweak your BIOS a bit, but other than that it *should* work.

edit - are you installing a new board that is the same as the old one? If so, you're probably good to go. If not, you might need to modify some config's if *buntu doesn't auto-detect stuff properly. Post again and tell us how it goes.

Install new main board & keep Linux or install OS again
 

Did Kubuntu store updates complete? If so, how can I set new install to use existing updates? How can I download updates to DVD, to save second install time?

New main board is same as old bad board. Does Linux examine hardware each system start; will it find correct amount of video memory with new main board or still assume 256MB (of 128MB) is available? With port interface hardware replaced will Linux find USB ports?

If I am asking old questions, where or how should I have found answers?

Most answers can be found at http://www.google.com ...but since this is a Linux Questions Forum, and you're asking a Linux Question, I'll just go ahead and answer it...heh

Typically the "user-friendly" distros do automatic hardware detection upon boot. You can replace the board with no problem (*knock on wood*) and boot the existing system on it. Just plug all of your hardware into the new board and boot it up.

Since the actual install is on a hard drive, and Linux does autodetection, you should be able to drop the new board in place and fire it up like nothing happened.

If you have some hardware troubles (for instance, if Linux doesn't autodetect the usb ports, etc...) post again and let me know. Video memory might need to be tweaked, but it shouldn't break the system (and if it does, I'll help you fix it).

1. You CAN just replace the mainboard.

2. Assuming you use the on-board ethernet, you WILL need to reconfigure the ethernet interface after switching. If it's the same model of mainboard, that's the only thing you'll need to fix.

Basically, Ubuntu uses udev which by default assigns a unique and new device name to any ethernet device with a MAC address it hasn't seen before. Most likely, this means your current install uses "eth0", while the new mainboard's ethernet interface will be assigned a new name, "eth1". Personally, I think this default behavior is retarded--99% of the time, a computer has just one ethernet device, and 99% of the time when a "new" MAC address is encountered, it's actually just the user replacing a bad motherboard or ethernet card. The desired behavior in those cases is to use "eth0" if there's just one ethernet card. Who cares what the MAC address is?

I know a way to fix this by manually editing udev's configuration files. I think Ubuntu uses the same udev config filenames as Debian (which is what I use). The file you need to edit is something like /etc/udev/rules.d/something/z20_something. Basically, after swapping motherboards you'll see at least two entries in this file, with two+ different MAC addresses and two+ different device names (like eth0 and eth1, maybe). Change the device names to all be "eth0", and then reboot.

That's it!

Thank you very much for pointing that out, IssacKuo...I've dealt with that problem before (seeing eth1 instead of eth0), but I didn't know the underlying cause. Thanks for the explanation!