Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

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mint-user-18

Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by mint-user-18 »

I have used Mint for a few years and I get frustrated that after a while as I get issues and am told to update to the latest version but I have always then had to do a complete fresh install, is there anyway that I can update from my current Linux Mint 17.3 Cinnamon 64-bit / Cinnamon version 2.8.8 / Linux Kernel 3.13.0-139-generic to Linux Mint 18.3 just by updating and not having to reinstall a completely new OS and having to re-import all my files in again, is there a simple way to just up-grade to Linux Mint 18.3?

I do like Mint and it is pretty easy to use until there is an issue, please do not take this the wrong way but it seems that software and program developers and publishers forget about older version compatibility.

The current issues I have I cannot seem to fix so once again my only option I think is to get the latest version.
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Moem
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by Moem »

I have upgraded by installing 18.1 alongside 17.3 but leaving the /home partition intact, and assigning it for the new installation to use. If your home is a separate partition, not a folder inside root, this method can be used. It's quick because all your files and settings will be carried over. Of course, you should still backup your files just to be safe.
I have then upgraded to 18.3 through the Update Manager.
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mint-user-18

Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by mint-user-18 »

How would I go about doing this, would it just keep my files in a folder ready to use in the new version, sort of how like how Windows does it?

There is nothing really that important that I don't already have backed up other than all my book-marks in my browsers etc.
Mute Ant

Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by Mute Ant »

"...can I update from Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 just by updating ..." No. If you were running Ubuntu 1404 it might possibly offer to upgrade you to 1604, then fail horribly.

On a lighter note (for me at least) there's nothing obviously defective in Mint 17. Whatever you are doing to break 17 will probably break 18 too.
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Pierre
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by Pierre »

whilst technically You Could Upgrade,
- you really should perform a Clean Installation of the LM18x instead.

ie: it's best to upgrade within a series: LM18.0 - LM18.1 - LM18.2 - LM18.3
rather than jumping to a New Series: LM17x - LM18.x OR LM18.x - LM19.x
8)
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by Moem »

mint-user-18 wrote: Sat Apr 28, 2018 6:11 am How would I go about doing this
Is your home a directory (=folder) or a separate partition? It depends on the answer to that.
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by Reddog1 »

If you have enough space on your HD, you can install dual boot, Mint 17 and Mint 18 and boot with the Mint 18 grub. Eventually you can copy files from the 17 install to 18 and then use Gparted to repartion, shrink and expand partitions. I've done it and this assures that I still have a working system if the new install is problematic. The way I've done it the last couple of times is to copy everything I want to keep from my old install to an external drive using a USB to SATA adapter (about $20 for one with a power supply so it can do both laptop and desktop HDs). I copy my home directory, including all of the hidden files--themes, icons and Thunderbird mail is there--and I also export my browser bookmarks. Be sure all of your Documents, Pictures, Videos, Music and Downloads that you want to save are on the external disk. Then I do a clean install of the new Mint and copy what I kept into the new install via the same USB to SATA adapter. I have everything and it is simple to set up my new Mint to look exactly like my old Mint and when I'm done my browser bookmarks and my email is all there, just as it was before except I'm now running a new system. I've also used this method to clone a working system onto a new computer (desktop to laptop and desktop to desktop).
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by Bolle1961 »

You can upgrade from 17.3 to 18.x (except KDE version).
Clem made a very good tutorial how to do it.
https://community.linuxmint.com/tutorial/view/2316
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by jimallyn »

Bolle1961 wrote: Sat Apr 28, 2018 4:35 pm You can upgrade from 17.3 to 18.x (except KDE version).
Clem made a very good tutorial how to do it.
https://community.linuxmint.com/tutorial/view/2316
Unfortunately, a number of users had problems with that and wound up installing from scratch anyway. I think most of the more experienced people would tell you to do a fresh install from scratch.
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by catweazel »

jimallyn wrote: Sat Apr 28, 2018 6:16 pm Unfortunately, a number of users had problems with that and wound up installing from scratch anyway. I think most of the more experienced people would tell you to do a fresh install from scratch.
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by slipstick »

I dual boot (actually triple boot with W7) with LM 17.3 and 18.3. I did this in order to make the transition from 17 to 18 easier, so I could take my time setting up 18 and still have 17 to use until 18 was up and running. Now I'm mostly only using 18, but keeping 17 as a backup. When I install 19, it will replace 17 and I will use 18 until 19 is up and running, and the same for 20 and so on. So I have a / and a /home partition for each installation (probably don't need a separate home, but that's the way I started and see no particular reason to change). In addition, I have a Data partition which is shared between the two systems, mounted to /home/Data on each one. I moved my thunderbird profile (xxxxxxxx.default) and my firefox profile (yyyyyyyy.default) to ~/Data/.thunderbird and ~/Data/.firefox (had to whitelist ~/Data/.firefox in the firejail config. file to get that to work) and connected them to the home .thunderbird and .firefox folders by symbolic links. This means I can use my browser and email client just as easily from one system as the other and not worry about syncing the emails or bookmarks. It was easy to copy the files I needed from the old /home to the new /home, as I can still mount the 17.3 /home partition from the 18.3 system. If I have forgotten how something was configured in 17.3, it just takes a minute to reboot into it and check.
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by scjet45 »

Yes, 17.3 to 18.3 is possible, as mentioned instructionally in other links in this thread.
I did it for a friend, using only Teamviewer.
I ended up with an 18.0 first, and from there, it's a simple post-upgrade to 18.3
In other words, reboot first, and ask questions later.
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by 69Rixter »

RE: scjet45

Absolutely and here's how: https://www.ubuntupit.com/top-10-best-t ... -3-sylvia/. Although it says 18.3, the set of commands will upgrade to LM. 18 from 17.3 if executed properly. You may(?) have to run "sudo apt-get dist-upgrade" a couple of times to get to 18.3

Rick
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by Mute Ant »

Notice it's the level 2-3-4-5 members that say it's "possible" and the level 10-11-12-13 members that say "don't bother". Anyway, I was wrong earlier, Ubuntu 1404 can upgrade itself to Ubuntu 1604 without any user knowledge... you just say yes, do it... my bad. The package that does the work is called ubuntu-release-upgrader and the command that starts the process is do-release-upgrade That won't know about repositories that are specifically Mint18, but most of Mint is Ubuntu-Underneath, all the difficult work has been automated.

[-] It takes 1500MB of downloaded packages and 2 hours to run.
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by kc1di »

While it's possible to do the upgrade to 18.3 I'm not a fan of doing it that way myself. Better to back essential files and data to an external source or the cloud and do a fresh install. That way if there is a problem your not dealing with a highbrid install that no one knows how to fix. Just prefer a clean install myself.
Good luck which ever way you choose to go.
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by Pierre »

well - - Just to Re-iterate: Yes - it's definitely possible But - it's Not Recommended

IE: if you have some machine, that is not your main machine
then - Yeah - give-it-a-go & see how you do go . .
- - just Don't Do This On Your Main Machine.
or - at least, until you have at least,, some experience in this method, of upgrading.
8)

[-] It takes 1500MB of downloaded packages and 2 hours to run.
that's the DownSide - - the economics of it - - it just may be quicker to get the New ISO
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by AndyMH »

I did a complete re-install when I changed 17.3 to 18. Just hope I don't have to do the same when we go 18 to 19.
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Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by OS_Researcher »

I've done it on 4 machines. Two laptops, and two custom built desktops. Had zero issues, and I intend to do it to go to 19. Did I get lucky?
mint-user-18

Re: Upgrade Mint 17.3 to Mint 18.3 possible?

Post by mint-user-18 »

Thank you for the advice everyone, I think I will have to do a fresh install of 18.3 eventually.
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