I just got a new laptop and installed Linux on it. I mainly run OpenSUSE.
Getting full encryption on both was a bit of a challenge and I had no idea what I'm doing. Will having the swap partition in the middle break things? Did I really need so many partitions (Mint and OpenSUSE don't show up in eachother's boot menu)?
I'm probably not gonna change this layout (because reinstallation seems like a pain) unless the swap partition's position is a problem. I'm just curious how many mistakes I made.
EDIT: I'm not upgrading my drive capacity. I do not need it.
Can’t speak to your exact machine but nowadays the license tends to be tied to the hardware.
If you are capable of manual partitioning then you should be able to reinstall Windows quickly if needed.
Problem for me is, I don't know how to install windows. Especially onto a partition of 70gb instead of whole disk
I got this laptop
I guess I could reinstall Windows, I really hate the idea of running the Windows 11 installer though.
Tbh I will usually simply swap out the OEM drive for a bigger and faster (and typically cheaper than the OEM upgrade option, per size) one the second I unbox it (optionally, go through the setup process before taking it out, so it’s ready to go next time you want to plug it in). This lets you not waste space on that “rainy day” contingency (which I’ve almost never actually needed). The one exception (and I keep a dedicated laptop around for this) is automotive diagnostic suites with proprietary USB hardware - I’ve got an old thinkpad still running windows 7. XP would honestly be better, because a lot of that shit doesn’t like “new” versions of windows.
I do not need more space. I need 25GB per Linux system and 64GB for Windows (which I'm going to backup anyway), plus 20GB of data.
I may keep Windows 10 on my Desktop too. It's nowhere near as scary as Windows 11.
Ok, sure, you do you. Simply offering a way to do this that works well for me.