dd can dump the image to a file on any another disk/filesystem, it doesn't have to overwrite what's there. Just make sure the drive has enough available space to hold the entire size of the source drive (not just the used space, the whole thing).

The larger question here should be what does Fedora do that any version of Mint can not do? The basic Linux kernel is the same. IMHO: The main thing you want in a client side Linux machine is usability. I think that you should at least try updating to the latest version of Mint first. Then if its just horrible, try other distros.

Fedora does have some unique features like BtrFS. I have run Fedora before and managed to get all the media codecs up and running. It took several hours, visits to dead links and repositories that didn't work, reinstalling Kaffeine and Xine half a dozen or so times and several other petty annoyances to get the multi-media to work. You only have to do this once, however.

https://btrfs.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Getting_started

The preupgrade and upgrade commands can keep your system up to date way better than Mint does. Yes, if you DO get the multimedia to work, the upgrade process will not break your codecs and will update those repositories just like anything else.

What exactly is it that you want?

It sounds like you have a lot of specific opinions and concerns about exactly what you want and how you want it. Therefore it sounds like a job for Linux From Scratch or Slackware as some possible suggestions, but really the suggestions that you try distributions to determine which one is best for you are the best ideas.

What I would suggest is to buy an entirely new hard drive and once you've determine which distribution you like, install it on that new hard drive, keep the data from your old hard drive, but also keep that old hard drive with the Maya install as long as you feel it's relevant to maintain the integrity of that install. This way you'd get a ton more free space because you'd get a newer hard drive and you could always go back if that was really important to you.

Thanks for the help guys... I ended up going with Korora 21. I like it a lot! A few hiccups getting things up and running but it is setup nicely.

Reason for leaving Mint:
1. Wanted to change.
2. I like the yum manager better than apt-get
3. I've had a couple of programs that kept crashing under mint (I've tried 3 versions)
4. Fedora repositories have more updated programs.
5. Wanted a change.

Thanks for everything. For the backup I went with Clonezilla to backup my Mint / filesystem. Then I just copied the /home/username directory as a backup.

So far so good!

1 members found this post helpful.

Just so you know, Fedora is switching from yum to dnf, which is similar, but it would be a good idea to familiarize yourself with it.

Thanks for the heads up. I'm assuming that the same will be true for CentOS then?

How is multimedia support and overall speed and performance as compared to regular Fedora? Can you encrypt the hard drive partition easily through a GUI suring setup?

I can't tell you how anything is to regular Fedora because I didn't install it. But, I can tell you that I have not had any Korora/Fedora issues and all seems to be running well performance wise. I'm happy with it.