How to replace one Linux with another from a dual boot

General Linux Question
1

At this moment I am using both Win10 and Linyx Mint

I am looking for an alternative for Mint.

Was thinkng of Lubuntu, or maybe you have a better idea.

Please can you help me to wirte me how I can change just Mint into another distro?

Or do I have to empty the whole computer and start from scratch?

– A reader from Holland

2

It’s an interesting suggestion. While I cover it in a separate tutorial, I’ll briefly describe to you the steps here.

The procedure is simple. Create live USB of the other Linux distro, boot from it and choose “Something else” when it asks for the partition. In here, you can delete the Linux partition and recreate the partitions for the new Linux. Note that the files in Linux partitions will be removed so make a backup of those files.

I hope this helps.

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3

Besides abhishek’s suggestion for how to do it. You may want to download several distributions with different desktops and burn them to different usb sticks and try them live for a day or so then decide which one fits your needs best. Lubuntu is a nice one. But others may work better for you.
I like xfce de and currently use Mint xfce. But xubuntu and others are good also. Good luck in your search.

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4

Thanks I was wondering about that. Can you direct us to the full article Abhishek please? Thank you in advance :grinning:

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5

It will take some time before I could write such an article :frowning:

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6

Here is my suggestion, stop killing yourself when you obviously want to try out a few of the millions of different LINUX distros out there. Not to mention, who can blame you? Here is what you do…

  1. Install a solid LINUX distro as your main OS like Ubuntu. It has solid support, lots of applications, and lots of how-to videos available for you. Plus, LINUX will use a lot less resources than Windows.
  2. Next install VirtualBox software so that you can create and run Virtual Machines.
  3. Now install the Windows version of your choice into a virtual machine.
  4. Next install any number of LINUX distros into a VM to try out as you please without risk, without hassle, with minimal data loss, a lot less time spent setting up and/or removing a VM.
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7

FYI, the tutorial is almost ready and I’ll publish it once the accompanied video is ready. The tutorial also shows you how to keep the old home partition in the new distribution.

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8

Thank you and thank you for this place here as well

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9

The article is finally published: https://itsfoss.com/replace-linux-from-dual-boot/

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10

I love your article, but I have a question: If the dual boot system has grub installed in the /boot/grub folder INSTEAD OF the MBR, won’t Windows no longer be detected? I ran into that before and had to re-install Windows with UEFI

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11

Your issue is related to mixing MBR with GPT and not to the GRUB folder.

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12

I’m a newbie, so please excuse my ignorance. When I install OpenSuSE and get to the boot loader section, it tries to install Grub, BUT it gives me the options of MBR, GPT, or root directory. Maybe I don’t understand what you mean, Akito and my memory is not that good. Could you clarify for my benefit?

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13

You probably should open your own thread for your issue. Else it would be hard to follow this one if it is mixed with different topics.

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14

I guess we can directly install another distro in the linux partition instead of deleting the partition and creating a new one. Pls correct me if I am wrong.