Hey there, hope you've all had a nice new year so far.


I'll be starting mine with a much needed PC upgrade, changing basically everything except the hard drives, PSU, and case. It's got a Win10/Mint 19.1 dual boot set up (4.15.0-156-generic Kernel). I've read that it's possible to change MoBos without having to reinstall your Distro, but I didn't understand the explanation of how to do this on the Linux side of things (I'm still a Linux novice and I didn't have much experience with under-the-hood stuff beforehand either). I want to keep it dual boot when all's said and done just case I *need* Windows for some reason (retaining the Win10 installation seemed easier so I think I can handle that). So, what I'd like your input on is the following:



1) Is it actually worth the effort to try and preserve my current Mint installation or would it be easier to just do a fresh install? (I still have the bootable USB drive I originally installed Linux from, in case that matters)


2) If I decide to just do a fresh install, how might I import my settings over? Especially the settings for my DE (Cinnamon). I already have my Home directory backed up via Mints built in back up tool.



3) If I were to try and preserve the installation, can you ELI5 how to do that? I'd probably need step-by-step instructions... sorry if that's annoying.


finally 4) Is there any miscellaneous stuff you wished you had known before doing an upgrade like this? The kinds of problems or complications that might sneak up on a novice like myself?

Okay so with that in mind, here's all the technical information I could think to include, hopefully it's relevant. Sorry if I missed something:


System Info:
Mint 19.1 Cinnamon
Cinnamon V4.0.10
Linux Kernel 4.15.0-156-generic


lspci output:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 4th Gen Core Processor DRAM Controller (rev 06)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core Processor PCI Express x16 Controller (rev 06)
00:16.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation 9 Series Chipset Family ME Interface #1
00:19.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation Ethernet Connection (2) I218-V
00:1a.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation 9 Series Chipset Family USB EHCI Controller #2
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 9 Series Chipset Family HD Audio Controller
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 9 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 1 (rev d0)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge (rev d0)
00:1d.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation 9 Series Chipset Family USB EHCI Controller #1
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation Z97 Chipset LPC Controller
00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation 9 Series Chipset Family SATA Controller [AHCI Mode]
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 9 Series Chipset Family SMBus Controller
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation GM107 [GeForce GTX 750 Ti] (rev a2)
01:00.1 Audio device: NVIDIA Corporation Device 0fbc (rev a1)
03:00.0 PCI bridge: ASMedia Technology Inc. ASM1083/1085 PCIe to PCI Bridge (rev 03)


lsusb output:
Bus 002 Device 008: ID 0bc2:231a Seagate RSS LLC
Bus 002 Device 004: ID 046d:c048 Logitech, Inc. G9 Laser Mouse
Bus 002 Device 007: ID 046d:c227 Logitech, Inc. G15 Refresh Keyboard
Bus 002 Device 006: ID 0a12:0001 Cambridge Silicon Radio, Ltd Bluetooth Dongle (HCI mode)
Bus 002 Device 005: ID 046d:c226 Logitech, Inc. G15 Refresh Keyboard
Bus 002 Device 003: ID 046d:c223 Logitech, Inc. G11/G15 Keyboard / USB Hub
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 8087:8001 Intel Corp.
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 8087:8009 Intel Corp.
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub


Current parts:
CPU – Intel Core i5-4690K CPU
MoBo – ASRock Z97m Pro 4
GPU – Nvidia Geforce GTX 750 Ti


New parts:
CPU – AMD Ryzen 7 3800X
MoBo – ASRock X570 Phantom Gaming 4
GPU – ASUS AMD Dual Radeon RX 6600 8G


Thanks in advance

It will be a matter of your current kernel options and the new mobo chipsets. If the chipsets of the new mobo are already in your current kernel, you should have no problems with the PC upgrade.

What I would do is try it. Get the new mobo, install everything and boot your Mint distro. Worst that can happen is that you end up with a kernel panic, which means you will need to figure out what is missing on the kernel, add it and recompile the kernel. Looking at your kernel, is fairly old, which means you might need to recompile or do a fresh install.

Knowing what mobo you are going to buy, you can find out the kernel options you will need and compile them before even doing the switch, so when you switch mobos, you will boot as normal. If you feel fancy enough, you can disable what is no longer needed.

If you decide to start new, to maintain your settings, just copy over your home directory to the new installation and you should be fine. Please keep in mind not all the configs are stored on your home directory, but also on the /etc directory, which you will need to back-up before you start.

As a personal note, I moved from an i7 2700K to an AMD 3600 without doing a fresh install, but modifying the kernel to add the options for AMD and chipsets BEFORE doing the migration and once booted from the new system, removed the options no longer needed from intel and the old mobo.

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This sounds like something I should definitely try next time around just as a learning experience, when I'm a little more comfortable with my own competency. For now what I'll do is try it like you suggested, in case it Just Works™, and if not I'll go with the fresh install.

This is exactly the kind of thing I would've missed if I hadn't checked with a veteran first.

I assume backing up the /etc directory is just a simple copy/paste job (obviously preserving file structure) like when I'm installing game mods? Or do I need to do something more involved?

Lots of moving parts here - but given the experience above, all is not lost ...

Random ramblings:
- do Win10 first; if it erases the disk the issue is moot.
- Mint 19.1 should be updated regardless IMHO - clean install of latest is a good opportunity to get a current kernel with any needed support.
- move /home to a separate partition first - it can then be used for either/both (linux) systems.
- install latest Mint (20.2 currently ?) on new partition using old /home - don't format !!!.
- if the new system crashes you can reboot back to the old system - is using swapfile, no issues likely.

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UPDATE:

It's been an... interesting... couple days but I'm pretty sure I have everything working now (on the Linux end anyway). I'm documenting what I did here for any future users in the same situation.

To answer my original question: My existing Mint 19.1 installation booted up totally fine... you can certainly change from the MoBo I had to the new one I bought (see my first post for both of those) without reinstalling Mint. However, Windows 10 got pissy with me and decided it's unlicensed. If you linked your license to your microsoft account beforehand you're supposed to be able to just switch over to the new hardware but I couldn't because the log-in window to do this wouldn't load/render. I assume this is because my GPU didn't have it's drivers yet, which I tried to install with AMD's installer, but the installer wouldn't recognise an unlicensed copy of Win10 as a valid OS... I still haven't figured out what to do about that but at this point I don't really care anymore and this is Linux forum so it's off topic anyway ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

While my Mint installation did boot up fine, I just could not get 19.1 to make use of my graphics card (the Dual Radeon RX 6600), I tried everything I could think of. I downloaded the Ubuntu version of AMD's proprietary drivers but their instructions on how to install them confused me and every package seemed to have some kind of dependency conflict I couldn't resolve. What I could install didn't work and the GPU remained unused. I tried a driver called Mesa(?) that someone on the Linux Mint forums claimed worked better than other stuff. No dice... I even tried all these things on a completely fresh install of 19.1, still no luck. Thus, I ended up taking syg00's advice and installing Mint 20.2.

Thanks for telling me this, I had no idea you could use the same /home directory on multiple installations. /home was already its own partition so this was easy to implement and I didn't have to restore from a back up to keep my files

one thing I did have to troubleshoot was to recreate the users which didn't carry over (is that info stored in /etc?). Until then files in /home were referencing broken filepaths. In other words, because /home/<family_Member> didn't exist yet Mint couldn't find/use/whatever any files that had been inside directory. When I added users using the exact same usernames, the filepaths were "repaired" and Mint figured it all out.

I still didn't have a working GPU at this point but I found that a user on the Linux Mint forums was able to get their Dual Radeon RX 6600 working after they upgraded their Kernel to 5.11. I followed in their footsteps and that was the key to the whole thing.



I was going to leave it at that but then I realised someone might come along who can't/doesn't want to upgrade to Mint 20.2. So I took the liberty of trying the Kernel upgrade on 19.1 to see if it works there too, just in case the information saves someone else some time...
Except 5.11 wasn't on the list of Kernels to switch to. The newest was 5.4 so I tried that. Didn't work, so I think you might be out of luck if you want to keep 19.1.

So yeah tl:dr is upgrade to Mint 20.2 then upgrade the Kernel to 5.11. Reboot and it should work .

Thanks for the help, folks!

Isn't that just typical of Microsoft! It makes you realise just why we need free software.
Yes, the users are stored in /etc/passwd and the actual passwords (confusingly) in /etc/shadow. Your best bet is to copy those over from your saved /etc directory.
It's probably not a good idea to use the same home directory on two Linux distros that you are dual-booting. You might want to use different configurations for some of the software. In such cases, the best option is to have your personal files on a filesystem mounted somewhere else and have a distro-specific home directory on each root partition for configuration files. But if you only boot one Linux and you want to upgrade it (or replace it with a different distro), having a separate home partition that contains both configuration files and personal data files makes life a lot easier.

Sorry, shoulda mentioned recreating the same users, in the same order so the uids match at install.
Pity about the kernel, I wouldn't use Mint on latest kit.

Glad you got is sorted.

I've had to fight M$oft in the past as I change bits regularly. Eventually you go over some limit that drops you in the sewer. Now I just keep Windoze on laptops and try to only change maybe a SSD.

hazel, this is not a true (normal) dual boot, but a fallback for the install. Works a treat. Back in the day I used to flip-flop releases using same /home successfully.

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I have no idea how this may have changed with Windows 10/11/etc but on Windows 7 and below, WGA 'decides' whether or not the licence is valid based on a combination of how many 'points' change at boot (the proposed change in the first thread would absolutely fail that - it looks at things like CPUID, memory size, GPU(s), system agent ID, etc to decide if it is in the same system) and a timer - so you can do incremental upgrades without WGA ever re-arming and deciding you need to buy more licences, but you can't do total swaps like this (because per their EULA, these are two separate machines which require two separate licences - you can argue about what constitutes 'a new PC' all you like, but Microsoft will draw a line with ship of theseus style 'builds' (and this has always been true)).

To the original question: I would not have attempted this in the first place, specifically the GPU and motherboard will need a newer kernel to be supported (as you ran into - in the future you can sort of 'think around' this by looking at when your kernel was released versus when your hardware was released - it would be impossible for something from the past to support something from the future), and it's never been advisable to jump Windows installs over between machines (and that isn't just because of licencing concerns). Keep your user data on a separate partition and re-install the OS as needed.

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As I understand it, with windows you can usually upgrade/replace most parts on a system (everything except the mobo). It seems that MS ties the license to the IDs on the mobo itself so replacing that is an issue.

I have never had that issue since I normally do not have windows installed anywhere except my laptop. Replacing a mobo there means it is time for a new laptop. I only replace the laptop when the old one dies or becomes unusable for some reason so their licensing has never bothered me.

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This (bolded) is 'new' then - historically you could replace more or less any combination of parts as long as it didn't exceed the 'points' within a given period of time (in other words, you could replace the GPU or upgrade the RAM capacity just fine, but doing both at once may trigger). Replacing the mainboard with the same model shouldn't be an issue, unless they're generating a unique ID/serial # against it (that's a very different scenario than what was proposed in this thread though). Changing boards was an issue because for most systems they rely on significant 'built in' hardware that combines to count as too many 'points' against WGA.

Generally this isn't something I'd expect typical use to run into (and like you say on a laptop far less likely to be a problem), but if you're swapping hardware out often (e.g. for troubleshooting or upgrading or you just like to tweak on things) it can be a real pain. I know 'back in the day' if you had a retail copy of Windows, it was considered 'transferable' and the only restriction was that you couldn't have it activated on multiple machines at once (unless it was a volume licence), which was their answer to this (e.g. "just pay a lot more"). It's much easier with linux where you can more or less swap things around to your heart's content as long as it's up to date enough for the hardware in question (and probably some other qualifiers for specific edge cases but you get the idea).

You cannot just blanket paste /etc back in, because it contains password hashes and other system information that will only be valid for a specific install. You should be safe for most 3rd party configuration but double check before replacing files that already exist after a fresh install.

This is misleading. Yes, the passwords are in the shadow file, and yes, they do relate to users. But if you wanted to MOVE those users (with their passwords), of course you'd need the password hashes and 'other system information'.

Or were you thinking of other things???

I was warning of using something like rsync to copy over the old /etc to a new install. That would overwrite the existing shadow file, which would probably brick the install.