General :: Reinstall Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Without Erasing Partition
Feb 5, 2011
I've had problems with my Ubuntu partition on my computer, so I have decided that I might have to format the partition or reinstall Ubuntu.
My problem is that I have files on my partition that I would like to save. I've tried every tool I've found that allows Ext2 to be read in Windows, but none of them work for me. The best I have gotten is that I would be able to see the folders in /, but that is it. I was wondering if it was possible to reinstall Ubuntu without having to erase the partition.
I had to delete my swap partition in order to reinstall win XP, but now I need to reinstall it. I run Ubuntu 10.04 and read that there is a command $ sudo mkswap /dev/sda1. I have about 19 GB of free unpartitioned space left on the hardrive that I want to make into a swap partition. I'm not sure whether I should use sda1 or if the book uses it as an example and if I use it it could wipe away my existing partition with ubuntu installed on it.
I am trying to install Gentoo. Currently I have windows 7 on my primary Hard Drive.I decided to add in a second HDD that I got for free and use linux on that.I got through my entire install and at the end I accidently wrote grub to my second hard drive.When I rebooted it went straight to windows.So I have some questions. When installing to the secondary HDD does my boot partition and swap need to be on sda? or can they reside on sdb?Also I tried to re-issue the grub-install command and it said bash: command not found. How can I get grub to re-install? I tried to emerge it and same issue no command found.Do I need to redo the entire reinstall?My last question is If I have more then enough HDD space how much is too much for linux? Most people say 30 GB is all you need from what I have read but I assume 160 GB is going to go to waste?
I tried to just have two partitions (recovery and ubuntu), but because of the different file systems, and the placement of the hp recovery partition, it has to be right in the middle. This is basically what I want to do:
1) Reinstall Hardy Heron on a new (smaller) partition from the free space partition. 2) Once it's working properly, format the rest of the hard drive (getting rid of the recovery partition) and create a single ext3 partition. 3) Install another distro on this new partition.
Does anyone foresee any complications with all this slicing and dicing of my hard drive for which I should/could prepare?
I want to wipe out my Windows partition and reinstall due to sluggishness. I plan to use Windows instructions as if it was on a hard drive by itself. Will this affect the multi-boot capability or the Linux partition in any way? Would it be easier to reformat and partition the entire hard drive and re-install both OSes? I use OpenSuse 11.2 and Windows XP.
I am attempting to erase a directory called apps. When I run rm-rf apps it looks like it erases it for the moment. When I log back on to the server the directory is still there, though it is highlighted in green.
A friend of mine has just given me an old 80GB hard drive provided that i erase the hard drive. So could someone tell me that if i used Code: shred -vz -n 3 /dev/hda to erase all data contained on the hard drive Would i then have to reformat the hard drive so i could install a Linux OS on it?
In a wide family of "ancient" text editors, by pressing ^T you erased from the cursor up to the beginning of the following word. If we use '_' to represent the cursor, the thing was like this:
Code:
If I now hold <CNTL> down and press <T>, the result will be
Code:
Want to feel at home with vim. Many times I have consulted and even tried to systematically study vim's man page. Sometimes I consulted it with profit, sometimes not. This is one of the latter.
In a wide family of "ancient" text editors, by pressing ^T you erased from the cursor up to the beginning of the following word. If we use '_' to represent the cursor, the thing was like this:
Code: want to feel _ at home with vim. If I now hold <CNTL> down and press <T>, the result will be Code: want to feel at home with vim. Many times I have consulted and even tried to systematically study vim's man page. Sometimes I consulted it with profit, sometimes not. This is one of the latter.
I tried to to install Kubuntu on a usb port to make it portable. I used my buddies laptop and when the program asked if i wanted to erase the Hard drive I made it erase the USB port and install on there. When I was finished windows would no load up from the Hard drive on the Laptop and the message I got was a code and grub rescue. How can I recover Windows with out erasing the files?
GNU bash 3.1.17. I say there must be, in bash, a keystroke combination that does this: I type say, two words at the prompt. Then I press HOME. And now, holding down some control key, I press a key that erases from current cursor position up to the first blank (the space between the two words). If I am right, which is the key combination? You could as well refer me to the bash manual section where the different combinations, one of them a control key are listed.
Is it possible to mount a 2nd hard disk without erasing the data that is already on it? If so, what command must I enter. The system recognizes that the disk is there, I just can't access the data because it hasn't been mounted.
So I was bored yesterday, looking at some free unpartitioned space (I meant to use it as emergency space, just in case) and I thought that it'd be really nice if I could make a ~250 MB partition just for GRUB, so I decided to see if I could do it. The partition has been made as 256 MB (just to be nice ) and ext2. (I'm also running lubuntu, if you need to know)
How do i do reinstall ubuntu 10.10 without affecting my windows 7 os on the other partition?I think i broke my ubuntu OS beyond repair from trying to fix my wifi card driver
I am having lots of problems with fresh install of ubuntu 10.04.1 LTS (dual boot with Win7) and would like to reinstall, however if i just insert the ubuntu CD and boot off of that, when i go to install it wants to create another partition that uses space from my partition for win7. How can i reinstall on my current ubuntu partition?
I'm trying to re-install Grub2 on a dual boot (Win/XP & Ubuntu 10.10) system which will not boot. I am following the guide here:
Code: [URL] This guide explicitly states that the procedure will re-install GRUB to the Master Boot Record, overwritng whatever is there. However, the final step results in this warning message: "grub-setup: warn: Attempting to install GRUB to a partition instead of the MBR. This is a BAD idea....."
I guess I agree - that's not what I want to do. Where is the defect in the procedure and how do I overcome it? If I try alternative advice, available in the forums, by using the command
Code: sudo grub-install /dev/sda then I receive the error message
Code: grub-probe: error: cannot find a device for /boot/grub (is /dev mounted?) Looking at the mount command output, I think the required device is mounted.
I installed Mint 8 on my sister's laptop (after her existing Vista, and I did so on a separate partition created during the normal setup process in Gparted) and she now wants to try out another distro and take off Mint, so how would I go about this? Would I boot from the distro's live CD, determine the correct partition, (I'm thinking of Gparted here) and then... what?
- Would I have to mark the partition to be deleted, delete it, then ask it to install on a similar-sized partition? - Or would I not delete it, just mark to format it as ext4 or some other file system and it would then just install the OS of that live CD over the existing partition? - What about the swap partition - does that need any changes at all? - Will Grub/Grub2 et al normally be updated to reflect the replaced OS? - I may do this on my own desktop machine in the future: I may want to consolidate all my existing partitions into one easy to manage massive partition. Is this also easy to do? - How can I determine which OSs are on which partitions?
I'm wiping out / on an Ubuntu box but want to keep everything in /home/, which is mounted on a different partition. Using Code: ecryptfs-unwrap-passphrase ~/.ecryptfs/wrapped-passphrase I have unwrapped the passphrase, resulting in a ~25 character alphanumeric string. Is it possible for me to install from a disk and give the installer the (current) passphrase so that it will automatically mount my home directory?
My gateway netbook was dual booted with windows 7 and ubuntu netwbook.,I was attempting free up some space on my netbook and decided that the ubuntu partition was expendable.I deleted it and sufficient to say I now can't boot boot up, I just get an error message, can't remember exactly what it is.I am getting a new computer and would kind of like to be able to recover the files on the computer.I have a USB netbook boot drive and am wondering how I would be able to install ubuntu without loosing the files.I have the usb key plugged in am now at the partition stage of the installation.
I am using an old username which I have been tied to since my first install, any time I have tried to change it in the past lead to problems such as duplication of files and permission access.
I have a small / partition and a larger /home partition where I store media etc, and on freshly reinstalling Ubuntu 10.10 on / today I was tempted to use a preferred more accurate username and change the computer name - would there still have been consequences to this, if so can they be addressed post install, or can I some how simply just change my username and computer name without confusing my system from here without reinstalling?
*I carried out the re installation using my old usual username and computer name.
i accidentally on purpose deleted my boot partition and rewrite something on it. Now i'd like to know how can i restore it. All i have now is the live cd. It's really bugging me that i can't have something nice for more than a week i'm seriously thinking to give my money back to old billy the kid or better to get an abacus and some sheets of paper and never again touch a computer.
How do I ensure that my home partition does not get deleted the next time I reinstall Ubuntu, as I can see there is a choice between formatting the whole drive and manually partition it, but if I reinstall won't I delete the home partition as well?
I have moved /home to it's own partition and all is good. Testing is on sda1 and /home on sda2. However a bit later I wondered what would happen if I had to reinstall testing, would I then have /home on both partitions?
I tried to install rawhide by enabling the rawhide repo and doing a yum update. Lets just say it didn't go so well. My system wont start the GUI when I start the computer. It just shows the Fedora boot animation and stays there. So anyway I need to reinstall Fedora 14. I wanted to reinstall Fedora without having to backup and restore all my data (my home directory). So I did some Googleing and found that if I had my home directory on a separate partition that I was set to go. All I had to do was format "/" and just tell it to use the "/home" partition I already had and not to format it and I that was it. So I went to try it myself and found that it was not as straight forward as it seemed. Well at least for me.
I clicked on "lv_root" assuming that was supposed to have "/" as its mount point. I clicked the edit button. I selected "/" as its mount point and told it to format it as ext4.Then I clicked on lv_home and clicked on the edit button. I made its mount point "/home" and clicked "ok".I clicked "Next" and I get this error "Bootable partitions cannot be on a logical volume". What do I need to do to fix this? I assume this has to do with the "lv_" at the beginning of the partition names.
