[SOLVED] Mint won't boot up properly - Timeshift was the cause

[austin.texas]

Huge sigh of relief, and large beer to celebrate.

Thanks to everyone who offered help, and above all to austin.texas. Give that guy a medal for straightforward, common-sense advice!

I don't need the medal... but I will take the beer !

[michael louwe]

FYI,

I have just installed Timeshift on my LM 17.3 Cinnamon box via Software Manager. On the initial setup wizard(= >Administration >Timeshift), I have set it to disable all scheduled snapshots and opted to manually create them.
... The 1st snapshot or restore-point created manually took about 12 minutes to complete and 5GB of disk space being used(= reflects the size of my system files in the Root partition). Rebooted. The 2nd incremental snapshot created 30 minutes later took only 1 minute(= scanning for changes) and minimal disk space being used. I then deleted the 1st snapshot with little change in used disk space.
... I plan to manually create snapshots before installing updates and/or programs, keeping about 3 snapshots covering the last 3 months.

My logic behind disabling all scheduled snapshots is to avoid unknowingly shutting down the computer while Timeshift is running in the background as scheduled, especially during the creation of the 1st snapshot.

I have a dual-boot system. Timeshift only takes snapshots of the Linux Mint system and not the Windows system. For dual-boot systems, I think restoring will require the reinstallation of the Grub bootloader.

So, for LM 18.3 which has Timeshift preinstalled, the LM partitions should be at least 30GB.

[br1anstorm]

I think I can safely mark this thread "Solved" now. But my experience, and Michael Louwe's recent post, do highlight the need to review and almost certainly change the default settings in Timeshift on first install.

Scheduling manual snapshots keeps you in control and avoids the risk of interrupting an automatic process by shutting down. Choosing carefully where to save those snapshots for any possible restoration is also crucial. My view now is that it's probably better to store them somewhere other than /root.

Exactly how Timeshift manages or restores the [Grub] bootloader and related stuff like intramfs, and when to ask it to do so, is still a bit of a grey area - at least for me. As Michael's post indicates, Timeshift doesn't do anything with Windows in a dual boot. But the question does remain: if you have more than one Linux OS in a multiboot setup, does Timeshift snapshot them all (as the comment I quoted in an earlier post suggests)?

Moral of the story? Timeshift may be a useful program. But Handle With Care.....

[austin.texas]

Timeshift may be a useful program. But Handle With Care.....

I haven't been tempted to experiment with Timeshift simply because I am content with my current backup strategy for the / partition - fsarchiver
FSArchiver Tutorial

[br1anstorm]

We risk going off topic now, and maybe it would be better to start a new thread..... But there is clearly an important debate to be had about program options both for 'system restore' [snapshots] and for 'backup' [of documents and files].

A quick glance at the FSArchiver tutorial and site suggests that it's designed to be managed by command line in the terminal. For non-experts like me, a good GUI is almost essential. On this, Timeshift, Systemback and Back In Time are more appealing - but I confess I don't know which would be the wisest choice!

[jamied_uk]

Im on a virtual machine and cant boot into the mint and no boot options fix the issue even tried fsck and chdsk w.e and it dont work saying file sys in use help someone i have a web server i need to get up an running¬! what commands can i do in konsole? networking also fails to work cant even ping google after enabling networkling confused! recently all linux been playing up including kali and mint 19.! not happy at all and dont know how to fix it!