Preparing for your move to Linux

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LINUX By Sandra Henry-Stocker For most of us, our Microsoft Office suite is far from the only thing we use on our Windows computer. What about email,
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lmacri, SueW, klang, doriel

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What about printing? CUPS doesn’t always provide necessary options/tools to format print documents.

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Yes, it is rather a pain, but once you find a “driver” for your printer, that should handle the chores.  Google is your friend  with this, but look for a definite driver for your specific printer.

 

Mark

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Hello,

Sorry if I’m only tangentially on target with this email.  I’m primarily a linux user, but I keep windows around so that I can support it as needed.  I just bought a new desktop which comes preloaded with Windows 10.  I was about to install linux (Open SUSE-17.3) but I looked at the bright and shiny drives that are in my computer and found no spinning disks at all. Instead there is a SSD and a NVMe M.2 drive, each with a 1Tb capacity.  (Oh joy, I wasn’t expecting that!)  I took a look at both drives and I noticed hidden partitions on BOTH drives.  A little research showed me that the hidden partitions are normal with Windows 10, but  (here is my question) should I see hidden partitions on both the SSD and the M.2 drives?

Thanks for any help with this.  It seems like a silly question, but I want to be sure I know what I’m dealing with before I start the linux install.

Again thanks for the help,

Mark

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This article is appropriate for Linux users who keep Windows for a few needs, not those whose environment is the inverse. I have been a Windows user since it was a runtime to let PageMaker work on Intel computers (1989) and lived in Windows since ver 3.11 (1993). At that time there was no “Microsoft Office,” just “Word” and “Excel.”

From the start, I was forcing the programs to do what I wanted them to do, not something generic for people who only knew a typewriter and adding machine. I have macros and memorized keystrokes that date back over 25 years and still work. Look-alikes (such as Libre Office) and cloud implementations are critical for people who can’t afford the Microsoft products or just need some basic functionality, but don’t have the versatility and features for content creators. Unfortunately, they also aren’t totally file- or format-compatible for more than basic designs.

The best option for data protection and inter-usability is a “file server.” This could be a NAS or long-deprecated computer with a pair of drives from 1 TB to 4 TB. It works fine with the minimal CPU and memory to run an OS. Combine that with full-system images of all your computers to readily restore apps and configurations along with at least weekly backups of the data drives and you should be good for most disasters.

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STOP!!!!

Before you start your install, Mark, do yourself a favor. Make a backup image of the Win10 partitions and wipe the drives completely clean. Then do the Linux install in a Microsnot-free environment.

There are horror stories in the Linux forums of mangled installs left over from Win10 updates and I can personally add my own to them.

My new laptop came with Win10 and I tried to keep it in the background since the utilities for the laptop work only under Windows. My dual boot to Manjaro was working fine until I went to do an upgrade of one of the NVMe drives. When I went back to boot to Manjaro, Win10 was trying to update itself and by the time I realized what was going on, it was too late. Manjaro had been removed from the boot sequence and the Linux partitions were locked down as read-only, even my attempts restoring backup images failed. After several days of unsuccessfully attempting to recover my Linux install, I threw in the towel and wiped the NVMe drives completely clean and started the reinstall from scratch — the only thing left of anything Microsnot is in a backup image of the system drive at the point when the laptop came out of the box. I’ve purchased a cheap NVMe drive to restore that backup image and run it if and only if a VM copy of Windows won’t work for the few Windows programs I need. And that drive will be the ONLY drive in the laptop. I won’t allow Windows to ruin my working Linux again.

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