Proper way to remove Windows completely

English Install/Boot/Login
1

Hi, guys.

I’m about to take the leap and install Leap.
Presently, I’m on 13.2, although that is actually irrelevant as I want to do a new install and not an update.
But, I also want to recuperate the Windows 10 partitions for openSUSE by removing any semblance of that horrible OS.
The system is using EFI presently.
What would be the proper steps to remove Windows (and also my current openSUSE (I will be backing up my user’s home folder before doing so))?

2

Tricky with EFI

You can simply delete all the partitions but there may be entries in the EFI flash memory that may need removing. If you do keep the EFI boot partition and Linux partitions remove the Windows directory from the FAT EFI boot partition

You can use efibootmgr to edit the flash (man efibootmgr for details)

3

Hi
I always boot from a rescue USB device and use wipefs and gdisk to clean out and re-create the efi and system partitions

For example;


lsblk

NAME   MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda      8:0    0 111.8G  0 disk 
├─sda1   8:1    0   200M  0 part /boot/efi
├─sda2   8:2    0    57G  0 part 
├─sda3   8:3    0 619.9M  0 part 
├─sda4   8:4    0    30G  0 part /srv
├─sda5   8:5    0    20G  0 part /data
└─sda6   8:6    0     4G  0 part [SWAP]

wipefs -a /dev/sda6
... 5
... 4
... 3
... 2
... 1
wipefs -a /dev/sda
gdisk /dev/sda
x (expert)
z (zap)
y (wipe gpt)
y (wipe mbr)
gdisk /dev/sda
n
1
260M
type ef00
2
40 GB
type 8300
{etc as you require}
mkfs.vfat /dev/sda1
efibootmgr
{to see efi entries}
efibootmgr -b N -B N
{where N is the entries for windows, openSUSE etc}

Reboot and install systems of choice…

4

Thanks guys. Those were the answers I was looking for. I should be doing the leap on the weekend sometime. If I need help, I’ll be back. :wink:

5

The deed is done. There wasn’t any incident during installation. But: I have no idea where the icons folder is now (use to be .kde4/share/icons). As well, there is no sound (even though I tried setting it up in YAST’s sound module) and I can’t get veromix (it pulls in the necessary supporting files on installation) to appear in the widget chooser.

Any ideas will be welcome to help me finish this installation.

6

KDE configs are now in ~/.config

If sound does not work in Yast it no other program will fix it. You must get it working there.

Most times there may be several sound devices so try changing the order

I think you need to run veromix from the menu to start it in the system tray. On the other hand if pulse is not working vermix won’t work.

ps -A | grep pulse

will see if running

7

Thanks for the response. I did get sound to work (this is tentative as I’m multitasking and doing other things as well) just before reading your post. Found the proper location for the icons folder ($HOME/.local/share/icons). Tried to run veromix but it doesn’t show up on the menu.

8

How did you get sound to work? I’ve just installed Leap 42.1 and am getting no sound either, so I’m rather interested in your experience.

9

I just gave the 'puter a good kick! :wink:

But seriously, to be honest, I don’t remember what I did.
I should have noted it in my last posting, but I was on a multi-tasking spree and it simply forgot to do it.
That being said, there are a lot of posts that have helped others (in fact, it may have been through one
of those posts that I was able to fix my particular problem).
A search with good keywords should be able to get some idea where you should take this.

Sorry I can’t be of more help.