Mess Up On Installation. What Can I Do Right Now?
 

I have gotten quite a lot of help to get my hand on Slackware from this community. I get it installed this afternoon/evening. It took four hours or so. The result, however, isn't what I want. There are two problems. First, only Slackware shows up on the boot screen (see the attached screenshot) for an intended dual boot installation. Second, all I have is a terminal for Slackware, where I can sign into a root account I created during the installation and sign out, but nothing else.

Prior to the installation, I made a partition type to Linux (option 83 from the list. Someone mentions "Linux filesystem" on option 20, but I don't see it.) and leave another partition with HPFS/NTFS/exFAT unchanged. Slackware is installed to the partition. Can those two problem be fixed? If yes, how to fix them?

It seems that your Slackware installation is ok. Console login is default.
Login as root and run 'adduser' to add more users.

Take a look at the documentation https://docs.slackware.com/slackware:beginners_guide

To add Windows XP at lilo boot screen edit the file '/etc/lilo.conf' and
add a section for it at the end.
this is taken from '/etc/lilo.conf_example

Slackware defaults to a terminal (text screen), not a GUI. You have to sign in as root and then add yourself as a user, with the adduser command. Once you do that, you can log in as yourself and start whichever GUI you selected at installation with the startx command. Yes, this is similar to how Windows was started back in the DOS days. This can be changed by modifying inittab and changing the runlevel from 3 to 4, but since you seem to be new at this, stick with the terminal and startx for now. One step at a time. :)

You should have set up two partitions at minimum: One for Slackware (I prefer two -- one for the root directory and one for /home, but that's up to you) using ext4, and one for swap, equal in size to your RAM (Yes, I still believe that's necessary!). If you want to keep Windows, it should have been defragged and shrunk (if necessary) using the Windows disk tools.

A UEFI partition will also be necessary on newer machines. If Windows already set it up, leave it alone other than to reduce its partition size. Don't install Slackware in an NTFS partition. That's for Windows and USB drives.

Yes do the adduser thing and log with your user. If you want to check your partitions from command-line (aka cli) you can type
When you want to fire only one command as root you can do

@Tonus this gives quite a good output :

# lsblk -o name,label,size,fstype,model

A swap space is useful but it can be a swap file, no need for a dedicated swap partition. There are plenty of tutorials on the web for "set up a swap file". And as partition for /home is not really necessary, no need for the OP to reinstall, hopefully.

It looks like the OP already did that, albeit with another tool

This doen't seem to be a new machine, and with Windows XP installed UEFI is unlikely.

vw98008 It is my opinion even after 20+ years running Slackware that defaulting to Runlevel 3, the Multi User Command Line, is actually, though daunting to those new to Slackware these days, is an important benefit. Immediately it makes Users aware that CLI command knowledge is important. It is also useful for those unsure of how to setup Xorg, especially for Graphics. For example, nVidia cards and AMD cards for users who prefer the Catalyst drivers, are best handled by installing those drivers outside of X. That way if for any reason your setup fails, it's far easier to fix from outside of the problem. For that you will commonly need some CLI text editor, like vim, emacs, nano, whatever you prefer. If you don't already have a preference now is a good time to learn.

BTW if you have an nVidia card and install via the NVIDIA-foo.run proprietary driver, it offers to add appropriate basic lines to /etc/X11/xorg.conf so the chosen driver is used. The nVidia docs will make you aware of any tweaks you might enjoy for top performance. One easy way to view those docs is to run the installer like this, "NVIDIA-foo.run --extract", which will create a tree with a Docs folder and files. There is also /var/log/nvidia-installer.log for information if you run into any trouble. That and "/var/log/Xorg.0.log" are very valuable tools for troubleshooting or tweaking proper setup of Xorg.

You certainly can login as root, use "adduser (name)" to create your main account and just hit Alt-F2 to get another login prompt to login as that User and just "startx". I prefer launching a Display Manger/Graphic Login/Chooser from the first root login. If you are on KDE v4 you could just run "kdm", "gdm" or "xdm" to get a graphic login where you can choose and try several WM/DEs. Both Xfce and KDE will have a layout fairly intuitive and friendly for an XP user.

Hope this helps you along. Good Fortune.

As you are seeing an NTFS partition, then your Windows XP is safe.

I would dearly like to see the output from 'fdisk -l', to see the partitioning in place on your disk.

It appears you have a legacy Windows XP install, using the old DOS partitioning system that only allowed for 4 primary partitions. Depending on your setup, your existing Windows install may be using a number of the primary partitions, at least one for the Windows XP install and perhaps other primary partitions holding a recovery image and a second primary drive. This can be overcome by making an extended partition on the last primary partition. This can be done using Windows tools or the 'fdisk' or 'cfdisk' tools on the Slackware installer. I think 'cfdisk' is easier for this.

For your Slackware install, I would suggest having a partition for the operating system (Linux type 83) and a swap partition (Linux type 82, sized at 2x available RAM). I disagree with @Didier Spaier, I think this is necessary for your setup, which likely has limited RAM. You can also consider another partition (Linux type 83) for /home (not required, but can be convenience).

My suggestion for what to do right now is to do a reinstall after addressing the disk partitioning, but taking more notice of the prompts that show. You are prompted to add users, but you skipped this. You are prompted for auto configuration of the lilo boot loader, accept this.

Do not feel bad. It took three attempts for me to satisfactorily achieve my initial Slackware install.

Setting up a swap file provides a swap space that can be used exactly the same way as a swap partition, with the added benefit that it can be expanded or shrinked at any time without re-partitioning. I didn't advise to not set up a swap space.

I've been partitioning my drives that way (swap, /, /home in that order) ever since I started using Linux back in '98. That was what was recommended to me when I first installed Red Hat 5.2 (and I forget now who recommended it), and I've kept doing it that way ever since.

Hard drives are large enough so that the space used for a swap partition isn't really missed, although I only allocate enough space to equal my RAM, not twice the size.

Depends. It's a lot easier to change distros (which I do on occasion) if I don't lose my /home directory when reformatting the / partition. When I worked in Windows, I created a D: drive and put the My Documents directory there. Saved me from losing a lot of work when Windows crashed. ;)

A lot of it is personal preference, but that's how I've been doing it for years and have had no problems.

When I did partition last night, one partition with HPFS/NTFS/exFAT type has a large portion of the HD. To my understanding, I shouldn't touch the partition (actually, I likely am not allowed to mess with the partition.) I only could change the partition type to Linux on a far smaller partition. If that is true, the partitioning practice is different from a dual boot Windows partition in which partition occurs in Windows and I can change the partition size.

And how you made room for Linux in this particular hard disk?

Did you had from start some free space, or you used a Windows or live system method like GParted to resize it?

If you just used just the cfdisk (from the Slackware installer shell) to "resize" the Windows partition, I am very sorry to tell you, but you damaged (probably almost) irremediably the data from your Windows partition.

Because the chances that your data (of the programs and other things) to be written exactly in the new size of your Windows partition, are likely the ones to win 1 billion dollars at lottery. Sometimes this happens, but it is really a very slim chance to happen.

I will try to reinstall it, possibly with the latest rolling release. But the new ISO size is much larger if I don't mistake it. I get its current live version and it is about twice larger than the 14.2 install DVD.

I haven't changed the sizes of those partitions. I don't know how to do so with Slackware.

There is no such thing like the "latest rolling release" because the Slackware has no rolling release.

The slackware-current is the development tree of Slackware, and while being generally stable, at particular time it may or may not work, being addressed to the experienced beta-testers.

Then, how you get the hard disk space to install Slackware? You had some free space on hard drive?

And very important: what size have the Linux partition you created and where you installed Slackware?

Thanks for the info. I won't go down the path and just fix up the installation.

I gave another try for half of hour or so without a luck.

I create a user and log into as the user. What I see is the same for root login, not GUI.

The command

yields an output showing sda 118.G and sda1 39M and sda2 111.7G. The sda2 is the Windows partition type which I leave it alone. If I only really have 39G for Linux, there isn't any meaning to do anything.

And in the lilo.conf file, I add
I still don't see a Windows boot option.

On what do you expect linux partition ? Sdb ?

After changing lilo.conf, you have to run as root
What does as user

Makes sense on having an 118G hard drive (probably a SSD of 128GB) and two partitions, one of 39M and one of 111.7G .

Unfortunately, 39MB is NOT equal with 39GB, and certainly you cannot install Slackware 14.2 or -current in a partition with a size of 39MB. Then you have a failed Slackware installation.

How I suspect that that 39MB partition is a boot partition for Windows, IF your 111.7GB Windows partition is encrypted, probably you lost your Windows with no way to recover it.

You have no way with this partitions setup to install Slackware and preserve Windows, then I recommend you to abandon for now to try to install Slackware and instead to try to repair your Windows. Did you have a full backup of Windows, BTW?

I apologize in front of you on behalf of other forums members, who had been mislead you in brooking your Windows installation!

BUT, probably you learned a valuable lesson: never follow blindly the suggestions made by unknown individuals on Internet without having a full&fresh backup of all your valuable data, including the operating system(s)

Thanks for your insight. Sorry, I mistyped the partition size. I don't have a backup Windows. If I can't recover the Windows boot, I have to reinstall Windows XP. It is disappointing for sure.

IF you are going to reinstall Windows XP, and you still want also to install Slackware, I suggest you to install first the Slackware, then the Windows.

A full installation of Slackware 14.2 occupies around 12GB, then I suggest you to create 2 partitions, at the end of disk, leaving a generous free space for (the future) Windows at the begging of disk:
- one of 40GB for the operating system - this is a reasonable size but maybe you want one bigger, if you intend to download a lot of files in future.
- one of 4GB for Linux SWAP -in fact, it should be equal with the size of your memory, when you have lower (or equal) than 4GB memory, half of memory size, if you have 8GB or more.

Another way is to create a NTFS partition for Windows, instead of leaving free space. Windows XP can run well from a single partition, if there is no encryption or UEFI - this UEFI thing is very important, as you should use a different way to setup your bootloaders and UEFI needs a small FAT32 partition of 30 - 100MB at beginning of disk. You should ask further questions on this case.

After you install Windows, it will break the Linux bootloader, then you should have at hand a live system or the installation kit, to repair your boot.

I test the installation. Here is my finding.

1) Slackware seem running fine with an exception on wired internet connection. It can access DVD drive, USB, as well as the hard drive.

2) the Windows boot seems messed up. I get an error after having the Windows boot and it prompts to an error check autmotically. And the PC can't fix the error.

Again, the output of "lsblk -o name,size,fstype
And in the lilo.conf file
Can the Windows boot be fixed based on the above inforamtion?

vw98008 I'm making an assumption that you are at least somewhat new to Linux and have used XP for quite some time. The importance of this is that implies you have little experience at any command line work and relate more to a graphical interface. That's fine. It just takes some consideration.

If this is true, I implore you to download something like the aforementioned Hirens or even just GParted live CD, "burn" and boot, so you can SEE how Linux lables your partitions instead of just guessing, for example, that Windows is seen as /dev/sda1. It might be since it apparently tries to boot but you need deeper tools to repair whatever is wrong with that partition/file system.

Perhaps a better method, since GParted comes with Slackware, is to just do this at your Runlevel 3 root prompt AFTER you have run "adduser vw98008 (or whatever you wish your user account to be named)

That will get you to the GUI login where you will see a menu that includes choices for WindowManagers/DesktopEnvironments, one of which should be default either by your selection during install or your running "xwmconfig" after install. Entering your name and password will get you to User Desktop where you can run "gparted" by just typing it in a terminal or the Search Bar in some launcher menu area, such as in KDE.

Then you can see exactly how your disk is divided and labelled. The advantage of a tool like Hirens is that it has BOTH a bootable WinXP environment and a bootable Linux environment you select in the initial Menu. The XP environment has partitioning and file system tools appropriate for repairs and also has bootloaders like EasyBCD that have a great deal more functionality than the windows bootloader. It may be useful until you become more familiar with dual booting to have some redundancy, in other words where Linux bootloader can boot Windows and Windows bootloader can boot Linux.

Until you can see where you are, you can't "find your way out". You have Slackware running. First get into a somewhat familiar environment, Run "startx" as your User, or run "kdm" as root. Then at least you can see.

I am really very sorry, but looks like that that Windows XP (or even bits of its data) does not exists anymore in your computer.

Because, apparently, you formatted as EXT4FS your Windows partition, then you installed the Slackware over - and this is about at least 12GB of data randomly overridden.

Then I doubt that you can recover even a bit of data from the former Windows partition, at your level of knowledge - and will be very hard even for an advanced Linux and/or Windows user to recover something.

IF you still want to repair your former Windows XP, I believe that you should reinstall it from zero.

Oops! My sincere apology. I missed the significance of the "lsblk" output. First that LuckyCyborg is correct in deducing that XP has been reformatted and overwritten and secondly the difficulty in getting by with a 120GB drive. XP by itself can be pretty small but if you install anything or actually use the system it can easily take up over half, if not most, of 120GB, especially if you are a gamer or save photos and videos.

Similarly with Slackware one can kinda get by with 30GB but very soon you will run out of space. This comes far too late (sorry) but those familiar with and dependent on Windows are best suited to use 2 drives and some even disconnect the Windows drive to avoid inadvertent mistakes.

As things are now, I suggest you get a 2nd drive to reinstall XP on it, if you wish to keep using XP. If for any reason you can't get a new drive, and feel too new at Linux, it's probably best to reinstall XP and use LiveSlack on a USB stick until you feel comfortable.

I have to reinstall Windows XP at this point and add a Linux distro such as Slackware later. To prevent any future mistakes, I need to provide the following information.

Motivation & requirement: want to have a better user experience on an old 32-bit PC. Windows XP is too slow even for browsing the web on the PC, but Windows XP is still needed for some usage situations. A command-line operation shall not be in the new OS setup (after the installation) because the old PC is for people without any CL operation skills. An addtional non-Enlgish language of the Linux distro will be preferrable.

Partition: 40G of 120G HD for Windows XP and 4G or the same size of memory for Linux SWAP. (how about root and home partition for Linux ?)

If I want to use Slackware as the secondary OS, I use to run the command "kdm" to eliminate any CL operations.

I love to see interest for slackware, but are you sure that it's what you're looking for ?

You could have a root partition of 20 GB and a home partition taking up the remainder of your hard drive. That would give you 4 partitions which would work.
No judgment here; are you paying for security updates for Windows XP? Microsoft is no longer supporting XP unless you pay for updates. If that XP install is not fully patched and connected to the Internet it's a security risk (just my 2 cents worth).
Best of luck sorting this out, mate.

How much RAM do you have? If you have less than 2 Gb, then you need to upgrade, preferably to the full 4 Gb allowed on a 32-bit machine before you do anything else.

I have an old nettop PC with 1 Gb RAM and Slackware 14.2 installed. Firefox does not run on it, even under a lightweight window manager like Fluxbox. I use it basically as a command-line music player, so a GUI is not necessary.

Install Windows first, and partition your drive as one 60 GB drive as your first partition, leaving the rest blank. After Windows is fully running, then boot your Slackware install drive, and run cfdisk. Windows (NTFS) should already be sda1 as the only partition. Create sda2 as a 4 Gb swap partition (Type 82), and the rest (56 GB or so) as your Slackware partition, sda3, type 83 (Linux). Then install Slackware the usual way.

If you create a symlink between your "C:\My Documents" directory and a directory inside your home directory, you'll be able to access your personal stuff in both Windows and Linux.

Forget about running KDE4 (of which kdm is a part) with low RAM. As you described, XP will barely run.

I agreed with everything you said up until the last line quoted above. Firstly perception of speed is subjective and based on what one is used to. A 386 felt fast when upgrading from most 286s. For reference up until 5 years ago I had an ancient Sony Vaio PII 400MHz CPU maxed out with 256 MB RAM with Slackware 12.2 on it. Granted it took FOREVER to get to desktop which was KDE 3x but once at desktop, while hardly "snappy" it wasn't too painful. It worked and if that's all one ever had, until broswers became the RAM hogs they are these days, one could get by. Comparing that to even 2GB RAM makes a HUGE speed difference. That said, assuming RAM for that box isn't hugely overpriced, going to 4GB is a good idea.

Most importantly, whether one chooses kdm, gdm, or xdm makes little difference. As long as OP chooses a lightweight WM/DE kdm is no big deal. It's just a Display Manager/Login/Chooser after all and it is probably not at all wise for one so new to Slackware to not go with Full Recommended Install. The ONLY cost for that is hard drive space, which with just a 120GB drive is an important issue but far less important than the complexity created by a newbie not installing KDE.

I also had a PC (eMachine) with a 400 MHz CPU and 256 MB RAM as my first Linux box. But I did notice a big difference between KDE (2 and 3) and lighter WMs like FVWM and WindowMaker. I tended to use the latter two most of the time because of this. It went through RH 5.1, SuSE 6.2, and Slackware 7.1, with the same results. I'd be shocked if a box that old could run even a basic GUI on Slackware 14.2 today, let alone any browser other than Lynx.

Actually, Slackware may not be what he needs. Something lighter like Peppermint Linux might work better for him.

@vw98008
Your treatment by this forum has been a clusterfuck compounded by your lack of willingness to read and understand what has been offered.
In your first thread, at post #3, you were given the correct advice, but were sidetracked by the mention of UEFI then Secure Boot, which were not applicable.
Following in that thread, in post #14, it was suggested that Windows XP could understand the ext4 filesystem. What nonsense!
Then, in post #16, well Windows XP is already installed, so WTF!
Then in post #18,'fdisk' is suggested, which has already been covered in more detail in the link post #3.

Now I move to the current thread.
In the first post, the you still had an NTFS patition containing your Windows XP installation.
You were badly advised in post #2, with an irrelevant link, where was more appropriate.
The lilo stanza should have been
I tried to get your partitioning information in post #8, without success.
The situation may have been salvageable at this time.

This thread then descends into nonsense about swap partitions versus swap partition files and lack of information on partition types and RAM size.

Poor advice leading to a borked system is inexcusable.
As someone who has been dual booting Windows XP and Slackware on 32-bit and 64-bit systems with 1GB of memory for years, and able to run a Windows XP virtual machine under QEMU in Slackware in a system with 1GB of memory, I am appalled.

I know I am insulting many people. That bang you heard was me slamming the door. Do not expect me back any time soon.

I guess you won't see this then allend, but it should be noted for anyone else that (apparently inadvertently) OP, as you noted, posted at least 3 different but related threads, and in none of them did he start off with hardly any information about what machine or OpSys he had. Just one example that you mentioned, UEFI and SecureBoot, were brought up because those are considerations for any system made in the last 10-20 years. Garbage In > Garbage Out.

BTW it should be recognized that while OP certainly added to his problems by not researching first and lacking in thoroughness, it is also entirely possible that English is not his first language, always a concern on a global Forum.

Thanks for your walking through this thread and provide a retrospect of the event. I was impatient with the task. My daily drive PC is dual boot, Windows 10 & Mint. I didn't expect those trouble I encountered of trying a dual boot on a 32-bit PC. My biggest mistake is that I should think of reinstalling the Windows after being told unvisiable Windows partition and partition needed to be done in on the Slackware. That was totally different from my experience of getting Mint on Windows 10.

Are you saying you have Mint on a shared MS partition?

It is a dual boot in different parts of HD or different partitions.

So what did you find so different installing the two?

The major differences are the installation process differences between Slackware and Mint (also Deepin). It is too easy to mess up on Slackware installation. And I get another one. I will post another question when I have time to deal with it.

Thanks for being honest vw98008. I hope you can take this constructively since it is by no means meant as any manner of condemnation.

You're absolutely correct. Slackware IS easier to mess up on, with the caveat that it isn't TOO easy to mess up for everyone, even though it seems to be for you and many others who are used to reduced power that requires less of you.

Have you ever seen this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNVrMZX2kms of comedian Eddie Griffin test driving a Ferrari? He wrecks pretty badly on the first curve exactly because he was inexperienced with that level of power. It wasn't that he was a bad driver. It's just that he was used to cars that are nowhere near as powerful or responsive. Slackware is like that. It requires that you know what you are doing and take precautions when you're learning and unsure. Put it this way... if you've driven a Toyota Corolla or the like for years you don't need training or even much concern or caution to drive a Kia, but you certainly will need considerable to attempt driving even a Porsche, let alone Lambo or Ferrari or a AA Fuel Dragster... maybe even a Land Rover.

An overly simple example is that before you delete or modify an important file, let's use xorg.conf as an example, you should make sure you can easily put it back to at least the previously working state. You could copy it to another location like your home directory, you could rename it "xorg.conf.org" while you create a new (untested) one, or perhaps simply know where or how you can restore the original from a website, install image, or whatever you find reasonable and memorable. Many editors make an automatic backup file of important files but you need to know that and verify it.

A more important example is your XP Partition. You should label your partitions with names that make sense to you so you will always recognize them for what they are, but at the very least you should know what file systems they are.

There is no shame in using an operating system that "holds your hand" and keeps you from making bad mistakes from ignorance, but it is a loss of power and understanding. If that is OK with you, if you prefer not being responsible for deep controls, that's perfectly valid. I just wonder what attracted you to an Admin oriented distro like Slackware in the first place. You seem unfamiliar with and uninterested in reading any manuals to become powerful. I know this is a roundabout way of saying the despised "RTFM!" but it really does seem to apply here and, as you now know. it matters. I'm sincerely sorry you lost your XP install and hope it had nothing critical on it. Hopefully you learned an important if costly lesson. Good luck.

The thing about a rope is one man will get tied up in knots, where another will use it great effect. Slackware's installed is to put it bluntly a lot of rope. Its basically a Linux Live environment, with Slackware's package manager and some handy scripts to ensure some critial initial configuration items get handled.

The *neat* thing has always been that it let you do stuff like partition and mount your block devices on your own. That means you could do things right away like intstall in a BTRFS subvolume or create some exhotic software raid setup, or any other thing you might imagine and still use the installer! Where the shall we say more soup to nuts approach to installers the other distros developed still fall flat on the faces if you go outside the dotted lines even today.

On the other hand yes, for people totally unfamiliar with the tools, not clear on PC architecture and boot process, or starting without a real plan for where they want to go, yes its easy to mess up and produce a 'system' that does not boot, inst installed completely, etc. Is also easy to foul up other platforms if you are installing along side.

When doing doing potentially destructive operations on Slackware, rule 0) is READ UP ON THE SUBJECT FIRST

Thanks for sharing your thought.

Thanks for sharing your thought.

Back to your last sentence "READ UP ON THE SUBJECT FIRST". For people who have some basic computer knowledge, a Linux installation process shall be intuitive. I didn't read any document other than the dual boot portion prior to install Linux Mint. I don't know the Linux Mint website provides such a document as I can't find it on the site. I did the same for Deepin installation, did not need to read the installation document. The Deepin office website does provide such a document, but it is very simple.

I guess that Slackware is for different people. For some, I can think of a statement something like "Linux is free as long as you don't value your time". Some people make videos on the topic published on youtube.

If you choose to run Slackware there is an unstated assumption that you will read the available documentation.
I suggest that you try tinkering with Slackware in a virtual machine, perhaps virtualbox. The reward of successfully installing, configuring Slackware is worth the effort of reading the documentation. Don't get too discouraged.

It sounds quite insulting. Everybody isn't as slow as you are, reading and understanding.

And if you want to install with some storage device, or from some media, or in some unique configuration like into a container image, or maybe onto x86 but not exactly PC hardware, etc the MINT installer is probably entirely unusable for you where large parts of Slackware's installer would still be helpful.

Nobody here is saying EVERYONE should use Slackware, and few here would say Slackware is the best option in ALL situations. Its like wood working sometimes a circular saw is all you need, other times a radial arm is very useful, but yes it requires more time to setup a cut and you should probably read the instructions first so you don't hurt yourself..Both things have their place.

While there are no doubt exceptions as general rule: The more flexible a tool is the more you need to know to use it, the more capable a tool is the great the harm mistakes can result in.

That was NOT what I mean.

For some of us, it is actually more time consuming using other distros. Yes, Slackware is not a distro that will hold your hand and provide you fancy custom GUIs to help manage installation or packages. That is a turn off for some people and there's nothing wrong with not liking Slackware because of that.

But for many of us, it is nice to use the upstream tools to manage our systems rather than some custom GUI that the distro developed to manage everything. We're in charge of everything on our computers and Slackware doesn't try to shield us from shooting ourselves in the foot. That has led to some broken systems or lost data for some of us (me included), but many of us turned it into a learning experience to learn that thing better to prevent it from happening in the future.

If you feel that Slackware is not the right distro for you, there's nothing wrong with that. There are a lot of flavors of Linux and if another one suits you better, then that is the better option for you.

If you are interested in learning more about Slackware and to learn the installer and partitioning better so you don't make a similar mistake again, we'd be happy to help you out with it.

Thanks for your advice.

There are few options for a 32-bit Linux distro. I don't say which distro is right or wrong for me, but in a matter of time, I need to spend in getting it up and making it run smoothly. Here is my other experience shows a difference between Slackware and other distros I have used. I connect a laptop hard drive with a USB adapter to my dual boot box. After booting up from the external hard drive with Deeepin, all three OS boot options are shown in the Deepin boot screen without any human intervention. Although that is a rare use case, the plug-n-play is a joyful use experience.

Sure. Enjoy Deepin.