Recovering configurations after a fresh install

Andrew Ash andrew.ash at gatech.edu
Sun Apr 6 19:09:18 BST 2008


On Sun, Apr 6, 2008 at 1:21 PM, Eric Weir <eeweir at bellsouth.net> wrote:
> A while back I asked for guidance in installing a second hard drive on
>  my system and moving my /home directory to it. Well, I screwed up the
>  process by taking the master drive from the Windows system I was
>  cannibalizing instead of the slave. Ubuntu wouldn't read it -- actually,
>  wouldn't complete the boot process. When I put the drive back into the
>  Windows machine Windows wouldn't boot and I had to get help recovering
>  my data.
>
>  Now I'm ready to take a different tack: I plan to take both hard [40 GB]
>  drives from the Windows machine, do a fresh install of Kubuntu, then
>  copy my data files from the10 GB drive on which Ubuntu/Kubuntu was
>  originally installed.
>
>  I have two concerns: [1] I have a pretty decent CRT monitor, but had to
>  get help configuring it after the first Ubuntu installation. I'd like to
>  retain the data needed to restore that configuration after the fresh
>  install if necessary. [2] Over the first two or three months of working
>  with Ubuntu/Kubuntu I acquired several non-Canonical repositories, and
>  I'd like to be able to reinstall those after the reinstallation of Kubuntu.
>
>  Any suggestions regarding either of these?

[1] Monitor configs (X server) are stored in /etc/X11/xorg.conf and
other files there with suffixes are backups

[2] Repository information is stored in /etc/apt/sources.list

If you backup those two files, that should be most of what you're
looking to keep.  Newer versions of Ubuntu (maybe starting with
gutsy?) no longer use the xorg.conf file and autodetect everything
instead. You may not even need the xorg.conf, but it's better to have
it than not, of course.

>  Thanks,

You're welcome.  Good luck!

Andrew Ash

>  Eric Weir
>  Decatur, GA USA
>  eeweir at bellsouth.net



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