A question about disks upgrading from Mageia version 7 to 8.

[Linares]

Hello.

This is the layout of my hard drives.



Do you think I can update version 7 to 8 without problems? Or do you think that the process will remain half complete due to lack of free space on hard drives?

I know many will think that a fresh, clean installation would be better. But this has the drawbacks that I spent a lot of time configuring my Mageia 7 to make it visually my liking, and with a clean installation I would have to repeat this whole process for which I don't have time. I also have my doubts that for this new installation there would also be enough disk space.

I also know that it would be better to buy a new hard drive with higher capacity, but right now I can't because of the economic situation.

[doktor5000]

Sorry but that's not the layout, it doesn't show what filesystems you have mounted where. It might help if you could post the output of

Code: Select all

lsblk

[Linares]

This is my lsblk.

Code: Select all

NAME        MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda           8:0    0 931,5G  0 disk
├─sda1        8:1    0 902,4G  0 part /media/win_c
├─sda2        8:2    0  13,1G  0 part
└─sda3        8:3    0    16G  0 part [SWAP]
sdb           8:16   0   3,7T  0 disk
├─sdb1        8:17   0    16M  0 part
└─sdb2        8:18   0   3,7T  0 part
sdc           8:32   0   1,8T  0 disk
└─sdc2        8:34   0   1,8T  0 part
sdd           8:48   0 931,5G  0 disk
└─sdd1        8:49   0 931,5G  0 part
sr0          11:0    1  1024M  0 rom 
nvme0n1     259:0    0 119,2G  0 disk
├─nvme0n1p1 259:1    0   260M  0 part /boot/EFI
├─nvme0n1p2 259:2    0    16M  0 part
├─nvme0n1p3 259:3    0  73,9G  0 part /media/win_c2
├─nvme0n1p4 259:4    0   987M  0 part
├─nvme0n1p5 259:5    0  14,7G  0 part /
└─nvme0n1p7 259:6    0  29,4G  0 part /home


I know that some forum members will think that I should delete the Windows partition to have more space in the Mageia partition, and of course I would like to, but I need that operating system because while working and studying I use applications that do not exist in Linux, they have no equivalent, and they cannot be emulated by graphical theme, such as Topaz Gigapixel AI, Topaz Photo AI and Luminar 4 among others.

[doktor5000]

This is my lsblk.

NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda 8:0 0 931,5G 0 disk
├─sda1 8:1 0 902,4G 0 part /media/win_c
├─sda2 8:2 0 13,1G 0 part
└─sda3 8:3 0 16G 0 part [SWAP]
[...]
nvme0n1 259:0 0 119,2G 0 disk
├─nvme0n1p1 259:1 0 260M 0 part /boot/EFI
├─nvme0n1p2 259:2 0 16M 0 part
├─nvme0n1p3 259:3 0 73,9G 0 part /media/win_c2
├─nvme0n1p4 259:4 0 987M 0 part
├─nvme0n1p5 259:5 0 14,7G 0 part /
└─nvme0n1p7 259:6 0 29,4G 0 part /home

IMHO you should probably get another 128GB SSD to put your Mageia installation on there if you want to keep your windows installation as it is.

The / partition is too small, and also the secondary windows partition seems really small to me as you already have a 900GB windows partition.
Apart from that, your swap partition should either be removed depending how much RAM you have, or also put on the SSD as otherwise that induces some slowdown.
I don't really think it's feasible to have a windows and linux installation on an 128GB SSD and actually have some space to actually use both.
Not sure what you use the 74G windows partition on the SSD, but I'd probably get rid of that.

[Linares]

Thanks as always for your wise advice.

In the 74Gb partition (win_c2) I have the minimum essential files of Windows 10 itself, in the minimum space that I can allocate to it. When I decrease that space (I have already tried) the system becomes unstable and with errors.

The 900 Gb partition is purely data and documents that I need to work/study, there are no operating system files there, even though it's called win_c.

Regarding RAM, I have 32 Gb. Will I notice a drop in performance if I delete the Swap partition?

At the moment, the conditions for acquiring another SSD are not met here. How could I move my current Mageia system to the 900Gb partition that has 300 of them free?

[doktor5000]

Regarding RAM, I have 32 Gb. Will I notice a drop in performance if I delete the Swap partition?

No.
Although if you want to use standby/suspend to disk then you would still need swap as the resume device.

How could I move my current Mageia system to the 900Gb partition that has 300 of them free?

Moving is a bit complicated, depending if you've done something like that before already - but then you'd probably not ask.
It's easier to take a backup and reinstall. Also you cannot directly install on the 900GB partition, you would need to shrink that partition and create new linux partitions on the freed up space.
See the second screenshot at https://doc.mageia.org/installer/8/en/c ... itionDisks