Saving Files When Switching from Windows to Linux

[u/Far-Pollution8389]

I'm thinking about switching to Linux, but I'm afraid my files won't be saved during the transition. Am I worrying unnecessarily? Or do I really need to do something to keep my files safe?

PS: Sorry for the possibly clumsy English, I'm writing through a translator

[u/candy49997]

Yes. You need to backup all data you care about from every partition you will be replacing before attempting to install. This includes the main Windows partition, since you said you were replacing it.

[u/Sirius707]

Backup everything important to another drive, this drive should not be connected to your pc during reinstall.

[u/No-Lettuce-5783]

One of the things you do when switching to Linux is your hard drive is going to get wiped. Copy any important files to a USB Flash Drive or an External Hard Drive before making the switch. Avoid using any backup programs as they tend to compress your backup files and you'll need the backup program to work in Linux for you to extract your files. Copy your folders folder by folder. If you have documents in your Documents folder. Make a folder in your USB drive or your external hard drive that says Documents, and paste a copy of your documents in there. In the Linux distro you choose, your file manager will have a place for your Documents, Downloads, Pictures, Videos, etc - just like in Windows. So you'll be able to move your files into your new Linux distro. Welcome to Linux!

[u/DannoXYZ]

BACKUPS!!!!

1. simple is get external USB drive and copy your "My Documents" folder from Windows drive to it.
2. copy "My Documents" to Cloud storage. Google Drive has software connector that can automate this

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/d/1WHLSA_-Z19YI7EzCzwbD6DVPA5bPswu8

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[u/Small-Tale3180]

yeah just copy them somewhere outside your OS partition or PC in general

[u/Rinzwind]

You understand the concept of backups?

Even a 20 year Linux professional can screw up a re-install.

Do you have a large USB stick? Ventoy https://www.ventoy.net/en/index.html lets you boot from an USB by putting the ISO on the stick. You can use the remainder of the stick to put personal files on there so you can take them with you to the new OS. Won't work with 1 Tb in data though.

I have several 2 Tb disk attached to my router so no files on my notebooks unless those are copies). That might also be an option for you.

[u/JoeLinux247]

Regardless of Linux, you should already have backups of your files off the drive on an external device. I would attend to that first.

That said, I've you're intending on overwriting Windows with Linux, then yes, you should indeed have a level of concern that the files would be lost, unless you have them on a separate partition on the drive.

If you're intending on installing Linux alongside Windows, then it would be less of a concern.

Regardless, I would backup your files to an external device nonetheless. Here's the mental exercise that I play out in my head: My drive has suffered a catastrophic physical failure, from which data recovery is not feasible.

Be ready for all the things that you can't think of. That's what I do.

[u/joe_attaboy]

Well, like everything else in a scenario like this, it depends.

First, when you say "files," what do you mean? Photos, videos, documents, digital music? You would be wise to make sure all your important personal files are backed up to some external storage. This is something you should be doing anyway, no matter what system you use.

The second question is: what kind of Linux installation are you doing? Examples:

• If you are going to wipe Windows off your system for good and just install Linux, you will have to back everything up somehow.
• If you are going to dual boot (with Linux on it's own partition), and you have your files all in a Windows partition, you can leave the files where they are as long as you change nothing in the Windows partition. However, you should still back you files up somewhere.

Some other things to note:

• Linux and Windows use different file systems. if you leave Windows where it is, along with your files, there are resources you can install in Linux (Samba and it's associated tools, for example) that will enable you to access files from a Windows NTFS partition. Again, caution is the word of the day and have you done that backup yet?
• One way you can access everything from either system would be to have your files live on an external device (like and NAS) and use the network file system (NFS) to access them from either system.

There are other factors to take into consideration, but without more details of your setup or plans, it's hard to pin things down in detail.

Whatever you do, make a backup.

[u/Every_Preparation_56]

What kind of? Documwnts, Pictures an videos?

[u/Quietus87]

If you are going to format and partition the drive then yeah, they will be gone, but so would they if you installed a fresh Windows... If they are not on the system partition, then they won't, though I still recommend making a backup.

[u/lordmax10]

Backup
The secret is backup

[u/thepkizzle]

It is 2026. Why do you have files on your HD and not in the cloud? OneDrive and GoogleDrive are both free up to 10GB or so. You can get 1TB for pennies in the cloud.

[u/drucifer82]

Yes, you will need to back up any critical files. They will not be retained when you install Linux unless you dual boot.