LM21 installing in legacy mode on older hardware

[AndyMH]

The way the installer does an "erase and install" in legacy mode has changed with LM21. In the past the installer created a legacy partition table on the drive with a single ext4 partition for /. Now the installer creates a gpt partition table on the drive with a bios_grub partition for the bootloader, an EFI partition (for booting UEFI) and an ext4 partition for /.

If your hardware is old, it may not recognise a bios_grub partition = no boot.

This guide explains how to install mint the "old fashioned" way:
https://foxclone.org/guides.html

Lots of screenshots, newbie friendly!

[gregoryshock]

I have had no success at getting Linux Mint 21.3 to install on my 17 year old DG965OT computer from 2007! I just found this guide and printed it. I'm going to give it a try.

[gregoryshock]

The guide worked for me. But I changed one thing. I decided to try adding a swap partition. It seems to be working perfectly.

[MikeNovember]

Hi,

See viewtopic.php?p=2421065#p2421065 for a variant of the same principles, with three initial partitions sda1 "/", sda2 "/home/" and swap.

I used "other choices" to install Linux Mint 21.3 Mate over Linux Mint 20.3 Mate, I selected to format sda1 to ext4 as "/", use sda2 as "/home" and don't format it, and use and format swap partition.

There was no need for an initial format with gparted before to launch Mint installation.

Regards,

MN

[AndyMH]

The guide worked for me. But I changed one thing. I decided to try adding a swap partition. It seems to be working perfectly.

The installer will automatically use any swap partitions it finds. This can be a pain. I have mint on two drives, when I installed it on my backup drive it found and wanted to use the swap partition on my main drive. The only way I found in the installer to stop it was to create a swap partition on my backup drive and tell it to use that. I could have edited it after install, but that was more hassle.

I wrote the guide for the simplest install. In addition to a swap partition (which is no longer needed) I also have a home partition and always do a "something else" install.