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Tips on running multiple distros together on my laptop?

Hello all, sorry for such a newbish question, as I should probably know how to properly partition a hard drive, but I really don’t know where to start. So what I’m looking to do is install a Debian distro, RHEL, and Arch. Want to go with Mint LMDE, Manjaro, and Fedora. I do not need very much storage, so I don’t think space is an issue. I have like a 500+ something GB ssd and the few things that I do need to store are in a cloud. I pretty much use my laptop for browsing, researching, maybe streaming videos, and hopefully more programming and tinkering as I learn more; that’s about all… no gaming or no data hoarding.

Do I basically just start off installing one distro on the full hard drive and then when I go to install the others, just choose the “run alongside” option? or would I have to manually partition things out? Any thing to worry about with conflicts between different types of distros, etc.? hoping you kind folks can offer me some simple advice on how to go about this without messing up my system. It SEEMS simple enough and it might be so, but I just don’t personally know how to go about it lol. Thanks alot!!

ultra ,

Not really a solution to what you need, but you should consider distros other than manjaro, it does some shady stuff, has ddos’ed the AUR multiple times (even though the AUR is “unsupported”) and let the security certificates for their site expire (their solution: to turn back your clock to update the system). You should try endeavour instead.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Very interesting and also such a shame. Manjaro seems to have most support and definitely looks and feel the greatest that I’ve tried, all well being newbish friendly

lloram239 ,

You can use one big BTRFS and multiple subvolumes, that allows you to share the free space across all the distributions. If the distribution supports that, that might be the easiest option, though not all of them do (Guix didn’t last time I tried).

Using distrobox or a VM is also an option and saves you the dual booting, which will get old fast.

ulu_mulu ,

Do I basically just start off installing one distro on the full hard drive and then when I go to install the others, just choose the “run alongside” option? or would I have to manually partition things out?

If you install one distro on full hard drive you won’t have room anymore for the rest, if you want multiple operating systems on your machine you need to partition manually with some planning ahead on how to allocate the space.

Any thing to worry about with conflicts between different types of distros

They don’t interfere with each other, they don’t even “see” each other once you booted into one, they only share the boot manager.

That being said, what you intend to do was the only way to learn many years ago when computers weren’t as powerful as they are today (I did learn that way), but today ANY PC can manage virtual machines, they are much more practical and can save you a lot of time when you mess things up, because whatever you do is confined within the VM and doesn’t affect your PC as a whole.

Install Virtualbox, have a look at how it works and use that to do all experiments you want, you can even learn to multiboot inside a single VM, without the risk of messing up your system.

sparr ,

You should be able to share a significant fraction of your home directory.

redprog ,

All these people saying don’t do it - clearly, they’re trying to learn something and are not necessarily after a fully usable, encrypted production system. Instead of telling them it’s too complicated, we should encourage to play around and figure it out, so in the process maybe they find out on their own why this configuration might not make any sense in most situations.

So @op, just go for it, you’re going to learn a lot from this!

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Thank you. Its seeming that the VM route is more doable. I’m just curious if a VM for a linux distro will keep everything as is, like your files and filesystem, settings, tweaks, configs, etc. I essentially want three workstations. I dont want to keep starting over on a clean slate ya know? And if so, do you have a recommended virtualization platform that you would recommend for this project?

transientpunk ,
@transientpunk@sh.itjust.works avatar

VMs are persistent unless you configure them not to be.

VirtualBox is the go-to easy-mode virtualization software. You’ll likely quickly outgrow it as you learn it’s limitations, but, it will teach you all the concepts you need to know, and they’ll largely be transferable to more robust systems like esxi or proxmox.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Thanks again

Pantherina ,

So Question: What do you actually want to achieve?

Do you want a rolling, semi-rolling or stable releases? More tested or even LTS packages, or the latest?

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Uhmmm so it would be interesting to learn about rolling releases and thats where my choice of manjaro could fit in. Sometimes I simply get bored of debian/Ubuntu but its what I’m most familiar with. The goal is to learn and USE other distros. Not just browse or hop around but I want to use the three main distro types all on one system. I want things to remain in tact like a normal workstation installed on your desktop. Idk much about virtualization, but I’m under the impression that they wipe your disk or a certain distro clean after each use. I do NOT want that.

caseyweederman ,

I run Debian with a bunch of virtual machines for exploring other distros. This might not be a good solution for a laptop though.

Pantherina ,

I went a huge journey.

  • mint, crashed
  • manjaro, weird reputation but very nice
  • mxlinux: damn old packages back then
  • kubuntu: broke
  • kde neon: lol also broke
  • fedora kde: broke
  • fedora kinoite: have it the longest, didnt break yet

I like immutable as you can reset your system. You can see most of your deviation from “what works” using rpm-ostree status.

And sorry but its all Linux, it doesnt work differently if you are not a server admin or tweaking SELinux, custom polkit rules and stuff like that.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Thanks. The time I was using Manjaro, I liked it alot but am also confused by the weird negative reputation…

Pantherina ,

I mean they are based on Arch and their “stable” is simply that they wait to ship packages. I dont think this is the best way, unsure if they also handle bugfixes like that.

So its basically preconfigured Arch with a weird repo. If you want the AUR, it is said to break on Manjaro.

BautAufWasEuchAufbaut ,
@BautAufWasEuchAufbaut@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Did somebody already mention distrobox?

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Yes! I have to do some research on it

Zucca ,

Choose one:

  • XEN
  • virt-manager
Macaroni9538 OP ,

Gahhh so virtualization is the best route huh? What about lxd/lxc, KVM, or other containers, possibly gnome boxes?

Zucca ,

virt-manager uses QEMU/KVM by default. Some distros do work in containers too.

Xen turn your PC into a hypervisor. Where you can switch your OS without much hassle.

Making each OS boot on bare metal will make you cry if you want to be able to boot several different OSes.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

That is very surprising to hear. In my mind, if I keep the distros minimal, it seems itd be a simple enough task on the surface. But I guess there’s more that goes into it

SnailMagnitude ,
@SnailMagnitude@mander.xyz avatar

Why?

Triple booting is a pita, moreso if you don’t know how to partition a disk. I’d want any laptop encrypted, which adds further complexity to the triple boot.

If you wanna browse, research, watch videos and tinker just install a distro. If you wanna spend time switching your system off and on again over and over and over again to find out what’s working/broken go for the triple boot.

Docker could be worth a shot. You can ‘docker pull fedora/arch/debina/whatever’ and can play around with the base systems. Alpine takes up about 6mib so isn’t too resource intensive if you need to nuke it a few hundred times to get up and running.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

But with virtualization or containerization, is there persistence for the distros? I think thats the right word. Like does it remember everything I tweak or install? I’m not necessarily wanting to just browse new distros, I want to learn them and use them too and if a VM wipes the image every time, thats not useful for me

nitefox ,

Yes it does

Macaroni9538 OP ,

I’m sorry yes it does wipe after each use or yes it does keep things in tact?

nitefox ,

Keeps things intact. Try Parallels (I use it at work and it’s not free, but I’m pretty sure there are some great free alternatives)

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Parallels as in parallel computing? Or are those different terms?

nitefox ,

It’s a VM software

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Oh gotcha! Thanks for clarifying. Another thing to look into. Thanks

Pantherina ,

So… I guess it should work but you will end up with looots of partitions and pretty sure you have no idea what is what.

But if you plan on nuking it in the end, here is how to do it:

  • install a Distro to full hard drive
  • use some partition manager like KDE-Partitionmanager (the best of all) or Gparted and resize the big ext4/btrfs/zfs whatever storage partition as small as you want
  • install the next distro into the empty space
  • shrink that distros storage again, repeat

And please report if some crazy stuff happens with Grub or if you get secureboot working!

Macaroni9538 OP ,

If I utilize this route, do you believe it’d be more trouble than anything or should it hypothetically work just fine?

ColdWater ,
@ColdWater@lemmy.ca avatar

Buy a fuc ton of flash drive and install every distro into that flash drive

Macaroni9538 OP ,

But why though? I already have a ventoy usb drive for just exploring other distros, but I’m looking to actually learn and use other distros, just not one at a time :) It would ideal to have three workststions, one for each major distro I.e. arch, rhel, debian

ColdWater ,
@ColdWater@lemmy.ca avatar

You can use it normally if you have large and fast enough drive

throwawayish ,

Perhaps consider watching this excellent video guide on dualbooting and multibooting by DorianDotSlash. It was what I used as a reference the first few times I engaged in dualbooting and/or multibooting.

PipedLinkBot ,

Here is an alternative Piped link(s): piped.video/watch?v=Crleyglb4mo

Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Thank you so much

Maoo ,
@Maoo@hexbear.net avatar

Why do you want to do this? If it’s just to try out different distributions, I would suggest using per-distro virtual machines or USB drives instead.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Well its more than just trying them out, in want to learn and actually use them too. Like as work stations, not just like a live image where you can browse around. Sometimes in get bored of my debian distro and I dont want to just delete it and reinstall another type, ya know? I’d rather have all three where I can actually use and work on them and they all stay in tact and keep all my settings and files and programs, like how a normal desktop installed distro does. More of a learning and adventure thing than anything. One day I could focus on manjaro and then the next work on fedora or if I get bored and just want to casually use my computer I could just hop on my more comfortable debian distro. Idk maybe it seems weird to others, its just how my brain works. I want to be proficient in the big three, plus opensuse eventually too.

Maoo ,
@Maoo@hexbear.net avatar

Using a USB device might work well for this! You can do basically exactly what you want but your whole OS is on a USB drive. You’ll get native performance for everything except disk read/write. If you use a fast device with a fast USB interface you might not even notice.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Do you have a recommended virtualization platform for such a project?

Maoo ,
@Maoo@hexbear.net avatar

There are a few that are nice.

QEMU-based options work well. Boxes for GNOME uses this.

My backup option is always virtualbox with guest additions installed.

transientpunk ,
@transientpunk@sh.itjust.works avatar

Tips on running multiple distros together on my laptop?

Sure. Don’t.

Just use VMs instead. Partitioning your hard drive to boot multiple operating systems from is asking for trouble if you don’t know what you’re doing.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Thanks, though it’s actually that tricky? I honestly figured it would be more simple, but hey I guess not. Ehh I just don’t want to get into VM quite yet; I’ve got alot of other learning to do first. But people dual boot windows and linux all the time with no problems, what is so different about dual booting or in my case triple booting three linux distros?

Ooops ,
@Ooops@kbin.social avatar

They actually don't. They try and it works for some time. And then the next Windows update intentionally fries their dual-boot. Then they go back to Windows.

Or they understood enough about the details and how to minimize the risk (basically running Linux with an linux boot manager that then chain-loads Windows boot files from another disk, so Windows is mostly oblivious about the other OS... and even then Windows likes to screw with the efi record) that they are mainly running linux. And later they tend to ditch Windows completely of just keep a virtual machine if they really need it for some proprietory stuff.

At least those scenarios above cover 95% of all people "dual-booting" I know...

In comparison, dual- or triple-booting Linux is indeed a bit less problematic. But the same thing applies: You mainly run one. And given that Linux distributions are all nearly the same, with just a few differences in pre-configuration and defaults, there's not much point to it.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Thanks for the info. Since im an explorer and learner and want to try new things, I figure I ought to step out of my debian/ubuntu bubble and start to familiarize myself with Arch and Fedora (or RHEL I guess?). but I just personally want then physically installed instead of some image in the cloud, ya know? It’s just actually implementing this plan is a tad confusing for me.

520 ,

Who said anything about the cloud? It's all on your local machine. The VM 'hard disks' are just files on your computer.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

That’s my bad, I tend to kinda lump cloud, VMs, and containers together and sometimes use catchall phrases. I know they’re all different and I should clarify.

520 ,

No worries. For easy reference:

Cloud: someone else's computer
VM: walled-off compartment of your PC
container: not-so-walled-off compartment of your PC.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Perfect! thank you. And I always thought containers and VMs were opposite, like a container is more ingrained into the distro. TIL!

520 ,

So, with a VM everything inside it runs on a completely separate software stack completely different OS, Kernel, etc. It's very much pretending to be another machine.

With a container, it's running from the same kernel as the host, and the compartmentalisation is handled by the kernel basically. By default they can't really see each other, but the kernel can see both.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Do the distros remember and keep everything the same way though? like do they remember all your settings and apps and what not? Idk why, but im under the impression that they wipe each time. probably way wrong lol

520 ,

So, docker images don't save their changes by default. The idea being that the image is supposed to be a reliable image that can fix any snafus with a simple revert of the system disk.

It's really easy to save changes though, just use docker commit <container id>. You can also mount host folders to folders in the guest, where they are as changeable as anything on your host.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Ahh I see. I definitely do want to learn docker but I think that may be too tricky for me right now. I do tend to get sidetracked and go off into little experiments though and end up not getting anything done lol

Boterham ,

Everything is saved like on a “real” system.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Well perfect! Idk why I was under the impression that each time you spin a VM, its like a temporary session…

520 ,

VMs are as easy as installing applications. VirtualBox and VMware do great jobs in guiding users through the process.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

perhaps I will take a gander if I can’t figure it out manually.

transientpunk , (edited )
@transientpunk@sh.itjust.works avatar

There just isn’t any reason to do it manually. You don’t learn anything useful that you can’t learn on a VM. And it adds complexity to your system that doesn’t need to be there.

As others have stated, the main risk comes from having Windows as one of your partitions, as Windows doesn’t care if you are working with other systems, it only cares about Windows.

I know SOLID principles are meant for object oriented programming, but, they have merit in many areas. One of the more impactful ones is the principle of single responsibility “…[X] should do one thing and therefore it should have only a single reason to change.” Adding in additional responsibilities increases entropy and increases the likelihood that if something goes wrong, you won’t be able to pinpoint what caused it, and therefore how to fix it. Situations like that are antithetical to your stated impetus of learning.

However, if you used virtual machines, not only are you now abiding by the principle of single responsibility, but you are also giving yourself access to standard industry tools and techniques that will serve you well in your learning journey. For example, when dual booting, if you royally mess something up, you are now left with a useless hunk of computer until you either figure out what you did and how to undo it, or you just give up and reinstall your OS. With VMs, you can just take a snapshot before you make your changes, and if shit hits the fan, you just revert to your snapshot and retry. This gives you the chance to figure out not just what happened, but why, and how to avoid it, all without losing access to your main system.

Not only that, but multiple VMs can be running simultaneously and can be used to simulate networks of interconnected machines all running disparate software with different goals and responsibilities.

It’s obviously your computer and your choice. But, I’m trying to save you the headache many of us had to go through on our learning adventures. Just use VMs.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Thanks a lot. I’m just looking for more permanent solutions. Idk a whole lot about VM, but isn’t your image wiped after each use? I dont want to keep tweaking settings and configurations, I want them to be like my own personal desktop where you install your own programs and make your own configurations and tweaks and they actually remain. Is that possible for VM distros? I would like to actually learn and use the other distros as work stations too. Not just trying to peak and toy around with other distros. If that were the case, I’d use my ventoy drive

transientpunk ,
@transientpunk@sh.itjust.works avatar

So, for a bit of a crash course, a virtual machine is just that, a machine that is virtualized. So, anything you can do with your physical machine (your computer) you can do on a virtual machine. (You could even dual or triple [or more] boot a VM)

Just like a normal computer, changes made to a virtual machine are persistent unless you configure them not to be. So no need to worry about losing changes. (Though, I would suggest taking a snapshot of your newly installed distro as soon as you finish the initial installation, it will be useful if you need a clean starting point for something you want to do)

I suggest you download a couple of Linux distros you want to play with, download VirtualBox, and setup a virtual machine for each distro. You can also setup the VM to run in full screen mode, so it feels like native.

There are tons of guides online to help you out, and a large number of computer nerds here that will help you too.

The one limitation with VMs is gaming. You can get around that limitation once you’re more well versed with them, but just don’t expect to be gaming on a VM for quite a while.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Perfect! so you feel that Virtualbox is the way to go then?

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Is there a specific VM software or method you would recommend for this project?

transientpunk ,
@transientpunk@sh.itjust.works avatar

VirtualBox is the simplest and must accessible option for beginners. It’s not very well aligned with Linux ethos, but it is easy to use and is well documented with many users to help if you need it. It also does a good job of walking you through the installation process when setting up VMs.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Perfect, thanks for all the replies lol

Franzia ,

VMs are so much easier and more fun than dual booting. The best part about VMs is you can use both at once and they’re the same system. Dual booting forces the OS’s apart, and it’s difficult to set up.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Do you have a recommended virtualization platform for such a project like this?

mvirts ,

Honestly to me it’s not bad, plus I think on a Linux system for home use it’s nice to always push your comfort zone a bit. I use 4 partitions generally: boot files, distro #1, distro #2, and home data on a separate partition. This works for me because I like to tinker with one Linux installation while I have the other in case I need to get real work done while I’m in the middle of fixing the other install. Currently I run Ubuntu and nixos, booting from grub2 efi and letting nixos manage grub installation.

Even when it’s totally borked grub2 is very capable of giving you tools to boot manually, and we all have magic reference books in our pockets 😹

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Awesome, thanks for the reassurance :)

Abnorc ,

Thank you Stack Exchange.

doomkernel ,

It could be done if you partition your disk prior to installing but, if there is no particular reason, you could make a bunch of VM’s and daily drive one of the distros.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

ummmm I dont really think I can give a good reason lol, just the way I want to do it. I feel if they’re physically installed on my system, it would sort of force me to use other options, thus furthering my learning. I feel VMs or more impersonal and temporary. I use Ventoy for live OSs just to get a feel for things, but when it actually comes to daily use, I’d rather have them installed.

ares35 ,
@ares35@kbin.social avatar

pick one. you'll end up with a favorite you use all of the time anyway, and sooner than you expect--after rebooting into this-or-that constantly to run something specific that's set up in it, or when you get tired of duplicating efforts a half-dozen times in all of them. you'll soon forget which distro has which app set up which way.

the rest in VMs so you can be familiar with their package management, system layout, and such. You can spin 'em up, destroy 'em, run them simultaneously, try out a new package or application or configuration, whatever; and in that process, mess shit up (it happens) without any damage done to your daily-use OS.

you mess up your octo-boot system and it won't boot up. you need answers. your only pc is on vacay. what are you gonna do? use your phone's tiny screen and poke questions or searches into google or stack one letter at a time? nah, mate. don't make it difficult when it don't need to be.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

well damn lol… this is deflating. I honestly would rather avoid VMs for now. trying to focus more on the meat and potatoes of Linux and other topics. I took a deep dive down virtualization and I got lost quickly and broke some stuff haha not really sure if now is the time for me to learn it. I’ve sorta put it on the backburner for now. So no easier, alternatives? You think manually doing this is not a good idea?

Falmarri ,
@Falmarri@lemmy.world avatar

Just pick a distro. It sounds like you want to learn. I suggest arch. It does the least for you, is the least opinionated, but also has by far the best documentation (arch wiki is the de facto linux documentation).

The difference between the distros is otherwise simply what package management tool they use, and what packages are in their repository. Nothing else is different that’s of any importance.

Boterham ,

To be honest, VMs are probably the easiest way to do it, like many said already. You don’t need to deep dive into virtualization to set up a few VMs and use them to learn about different distros. No need to think about how to partition your drive, mounting swap partition, disable hibernation… Want to try out another OS? Just create a new VM and you a ready to use it. You can simply create shared folders between host and guest and enable shared clipboard, if you want. Switching between the different systems is much easier than shutting down and rebooting another OS. You can even run them at the same time if you want and your hardware is good enough. And aside from the better convenience, the potential to break something is much less compared to tinkering around with a multi boot system, imo.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Do you have a recommended platform for virtualization that would fit my project?

Boterham ,

I use VirtualBox, mostly because I started with that years ago amd had no reason to change. From what you described, it’s capable of your project.

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Perfect, thank you!

Macaroni9538 OP ,

Do you have a recommended virtualization platform for such a project like this? Looks like that will be the route to take. I just want them to be actual workstations that keep all your settings and everything in place, not just like a sandbox to play around with. Not only do I want to learn other distros but I would like the option of actually using them for daily use as well

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