Using *nix to save data from W10

[howto]

I've a thread running here ...

I must attempt to save data from sda3 Windows vol.

using Mint 18 Sara (Ubuntu).

- which boots fine (excellent-every device works).

I am not looking to 'repair'.

I'm having issues installing packages.

I an a *nix noob.

 

Please, help.

Please offer your suggestions in that running thread.

 

I rarly log-in, perhaps once-twice a day,

and I'm in the USA, East coast. 12 hour time difference.

May be a while to ack back to you, or see a PM.

 

I sincerely appreciate any help here.

 

- Ken

 

[doctormann]

This should be pretty easy to do as Linux should be able to see all the partitions on your HDD, including those formatted as NTFS.

 

Ideally, plug in a suitably formatted external USB drive - Linux will be able to see this too - and just copy the files across using drag and drop.  This may take quite a long time if there are a lot of files, especially if you only have USB2.

 

Your Linux desktop should have an icon 'Computer' - click this and you should see all the drives.  If you don't see this icon, go into the Linux menu, find 'Desktop' and enable the icon as it may not appear by default.

 

Don't forget to unmount the USB drive before removing it.

 

 

[dave_boo]

Learn to use and love "rsync".  Below is a sample command.

 

mkdir ~/Windows && sudo mount -t ntfs /dev/sda3 ~/Windows && rsync -avr --progress ~/Windows /*whatever*your*external*hdd*is

 

Note the space between ~/Windows and /*whatever*your*external*hdd*is.  This will dump everything with all the attributes onto an external drive.  

 

This provides a graphical display of all the copying done as well as gives any error warnings.

[ben2talk]

*nix and **nux are very different... Unix isn't Linux.

 

Quite often there's no need to install any software. It's definitely worth doing a 'Persistent USB install' so that any changes you make don't disappear when you reboot to USB... I'm sure I did this by installing to the USB, not creating a Bootable USB (it means that my black 4GB USB will only boot on my system - it isn't a normal 'Live USB').

 

 Once you get to your desktop, hit the 'Windows+E' (We call it 'Super+E') to get a browser and browse to your partition.

 

While you're browsing windows, take a look around. For example, the '/.........../Windows/Fonts' directory where all Windows users find their fonts does not actually contain any fonts. You'll find that Windows actually changed locations for many things (Most stuff seems to be cryptically contained in 20,088 folders contained in the Windows/WinSxS folder). If you try to open this with a file browser, you'll get a bit stuck... but you can browse with terminal (or possibly with a lightweight graphical browser like Thunar)

 

If you list that folder, there are 20,088 folder names like this:

Windows/WinSxS/amd64_acpi.inf.resources_31bf3856ad364e35_10.0.15063.0_en-us_c4c6b80301b3be36
 

7 hours ago, doctormann said:

Ideally, plug in a suitably formatted external USB drive - Linux will be able to see this too - and just copy the files across using drag and drop.  This may take quite a long time if there are a lot of files, especially if you only have USB2.

 

Your Linux desktop should have an icon 'Computer' - click this and you should see all the drives.  If you don't see this icon, go into the Linux menu, find 'Desktop' and enable the icon as it may not appear by default.

 

Don't forget to unmount the USB drive before removing it.

 

 

Just press Windows+E to get a file 'explorer'. We don't need icons to launch stuff - it's not Windows.

 

Mostly try to take care not to copy rubbish (like that WinSxS folder...) because it'd take forever and a month of Sundays... and be wary of clicking to open huge folders (the WinSxS folder is quite likely to freeze up your system for a while). I browsed it using the terminal.

 

So now, the aim is to recover anything you might need to re-use and get it backed up ready to restore. I'm hopeless with Windows, with Linux I do the bare minimum I need to, then reinstall and simply copy files back carefully - generally most things (install first, then copy the files back into the 'preferences' and data folders) tend to fire up and work as if nothing changed (mostly interested in getting torrents seeding again from multiple disks etc).

 

If you ARE using the Cinnamon desktop, you should also take a look at some other snazzy software just to show you how much easier and better it can get when you leave Windows for a while...

 

Certainly get rid of desktop icons - they're just so nasty - (Hit the 'Windows' key and type 'Desktop' and select the 'folder' icon that says 'Manage your desktop icons' - then select 'no desktop icons' because it's best to have them hidden - hit ctrl+E to bring up the browser, click 'Desktop' to see it.

 

Easystroke (gestures can do everything you can do with a mouse or keyboard or whatever else you can think of - draw an 'M' and Google Maps opens in a window, draw a 'K' and you get a skull and crossbones ready to kill any application you click on).

 

Take your time, and evaluate your need for W10 very carefully - despite the praise I read everywhere I do feel physically sick whenever I end up using it.

 

The only time it gets time running here now is for a major music resync on my phone, and then it's VBox.

[dave_boo]

58 minutes ago, ben2talk said:

*nix and **nux are very different... Unix isn't Linux.

 

Quite often there's no need to install any software. It's definitely worth doing a 'Persistent USB install' so that any changes you make don't disappear when you reboot to USB... I'm sure I did this by installing to the USB, not creating a Bootable USB (it means that my black 4GB USB will only boot on my system - it isn't a normal 'Live USB').

 

 Once you get to your desktop, hit the 'Windows+E' (We call it 'Super+E') to get a browser and browse to your partition.

 

While you're browsing windows, take a look around. For example, the '/.........../Windows/Fonts' directory where all Windows users find their fonts does not actually contain any fonts. You'll find that Windows actually changed locations for many things (Most stuff seems to be cryptically contained in 20,088 folders contained in the Windows/WinSxS folder). If you try to open this with a file browser, you'll get a bit stuck... but you can browse with terminal (or possibly with a lightweight graphical browser like Thunar)

 

If you list that folder, there are 20,088 folder names like this:

Windows/WinSxS/amd64_acpi.inf.resources_31bf3856ad364e35_10.0.15063.0_en-us_c4c6b80301b3be36
 

Just press Windows+E to get a file 'explorer'. We don't need icons to launch stuff - it's not Windows.

 

Mostly try to take care not to copy rubbish (like that WinSxS folder...) because it'd take forever and a month of Sundays... and be wary of clicking to open huge folders (the WinSxS folder is quite likely to freeze up your system for a while). I browsed it using the terminal.

 

So now, the aim is to recover anything you might need to re-use and get it backed up ready to restore. I'm hopeless with Windows, with Linux I do the bare minimum I need to, then reinstall and simply copy files back carefully - generally most things (install first, then copy the files back into the 'preferences' and data folders) tend to fire up and work as if nothing changed (mostly interested in getting torrents seeding again from multiple disks etc).

 

If you ARE using the Cinnamon desktop, you should also take a look at some other snazzy software just to show you how much easier and better it can get when you leave Windows for a while...

 

Certainly get rid of desktop icons - they're just so nasty - (Hit the 'Windows' key and type 'Desktop' and select the 'folder' icon that says 'Manage your desktop icons' - then select 'no desktop icons' because it's best to have them hidden - hit ctrl+E to bring up the browser, click 'Desktop' to see it.

 

Easystroke (gestures can do everything you can do with a mouse or keyboard or whatever else you can think of - draw an 'M' and Google Maps opens in a window, draw a 'K' and you get a skull and crossbones ready to kill any application you click on).

 

Take your time, and evaluate your need for W10 very carefully - despite the praise I read everywhere I do feel physically sick whenever I end up using it.

 

The only time it gets time running here now is for a major music resync on my phone, and then it's VBox.

Try creating a dedicated /home partition.  Somethings (i.e. settings for certain programmes) are not portable, but most of the stuff is!  It's super easy upgrading along the same distro path (Opensuse for me), and if you distro-hop it's not too hard to delete the ".whatever" and reinstall a programme (or rerun it's configuration) if it barfs because it's expecting a slightly different setting...

[ben2talk]

Try creating a dedicated /home partition.  Somethings (i.e. settings for certain programmes) are not portable, but most of the stuff is!  It's super easy upgrading along the same distro path (Opensuse for me), and if you distro-hop it's not too hard to delete the ".whatever" and reinstall a programme (or rerun it's configuration) if it barfs because it's expecting a slightly different setting...

No need, running a 240 gig SSD here - I back up stuff on my next hard drive /mnt/T4/Backups

The last time I decided to do a fresh install, I put in my USB and install do the SSD which takes about five or 10 minutes, then copy stuff back to my own home directory from /Backup starting with my .bashrc. and easystroke settings.

I always like to start with a proper fresh install, not using an old home directory. Every working folder in my home directory he's backed up and mirrored on the next drive.


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[dave_boo]

9 hours ago, ben2talk said:

No need, running a 240 gig SSD here - I back up stuff on my next hard drive /mnt/T4/Backups

The last time I decided to do a fresh install, I put in my USB and install do the SSD which takes about five or 10 minutes, then copy stuff back to my own home directory from /Backup starting with my .bashrc. and easystroke settings.

I always like to start with a proper fresh install, not using an old home directory. Every working folder in my home directory he's backed up and mirrored on the next drive.


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If that works for you.  I'd be worried about overwriting new config files with old ones on the copy back.  The persistent /home has worked for me.

 

Of course if I was upgrading the drive your way would be what I was doing...but I don't ever edit the ~/.bashrc as I am stubborn and use shell scripts instead.

[ben2talk]

If that works for you.  I'd be worried about overwriting new config files with old ones on the copy back.  The persistent /home has worked for me.
 
Of course if I was upgrading the drive your way would be what I was doing...but I don't ever edit the ~/.bashrc as I am stubborn and use shell scripts instead.

[emoji28]
mv .Config .Config.Original first


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[dave_boo]

19 hours ago, ben2talk said:

mv .Config .Config.Original first


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That's too much work.  Plus BTRFS and Snapper takes care of me.