i'm going to try to either reinstall FC4, or install suse 10. when i reboot with FC4, it hangs on "enabling swap space" or something like that. funny thing is, it actually booted after 15 minutes last night, but i tried it again, and didnt make it to the splash screen, even though i let it run all night.

so for now, i'm saying: screw fedora. i love it, but i had a major problem with it that i couldnt fix (even with help from here), and i have to know that my computer will boot up after every time i change something. so i'm thinking of giving suse 10 a try on my workstation. i'm using it in my laptop with great results so far.

so here's my question. i have a great deal of data in /home/myusername that i'd like to keep. how do i install suse and keep this stuff? what if i move the entire directory to /tempfiles or someplace like that, a place that doesnt get written over during installation? would that work? thanks much.

CJ

I have no direct experience with the distros you mentioned but generally when you install you get an opportunity to set new partitions or leave the old ones alone. If your /home directory is in its own partition you are probably good to go. I think you have a good idea to back them up to another location, though, just in case. Then try a custom install and be ready to bail if it looks like it insists on overwriting all your old partitions.

Upgrading is one of the situations that make you understand the value of a good partition scheme...Likewise, a good backup makes for peace of mind.

First, I highly recommend Suse 10.

Second, burn your data to dvd or cd and copy the stuff back once it's installed. Safest way!

yeah i really like it so far. i've had my laptop for a few weeks now, and so far, suse is my favorite distro. i hated ubuntu. i love fedora, and would stick with it on my workstation, if not for these problems i'm having. the one thing i hate about suse is, when i use multiple desktops, i cant get a window to move to another desktop, it just stays where it is. my workstation is a dual processor setup, and i run two folding@home clients simultaneously, i like to stick them on another desktop out of the way. prob just a bug in gnome.

if i could boot into FC4, i'd do that i'll try to use knoppix or the ubuntu livecd, but i couldnt get either one working before. i ended up mounting my ipod as a disk and moving everything to my windows machine *ugh* and burning from there. i dont know if i'll be able to do that from the rescue console this time, but i'll try. last time i could login to FC4, but not into gnome or kde, just the failsafe terminal. i'll think about it on the way home, and spend the day getting the workstation back up.

CJ