mick crane composed on 2018-04-10 03:01 (UTC+0100): > Can you pop a hard disk that boots with a Debian installation on it into > another entirely different PC and will the kernel try to make sense of > its new hardware ?
IME, if the chipset and CPU are Intel, it doesn't matter how new or old, booting will be possible even with a minimal module set in the initrd. Xorg may or may not work without a newer kernel or driver version, but it won't prevent booting. Ethernet may or may not work, but simple reconfiguration for the different MAC address usually fixes that. I have nothing using Wireless, so can't speak to that. I've done this Intel to Intel type of transplant many times. Putting a disk from an Intel system into a system with AMD, VIA or GeForce chipset is almost certain to fail unless the initrd includes most drivers. This leads me to believe that a minimal module set initrd created on one chipset type and tried on any other chipset type is mostly likely doomed. However, when the disk can be prepared in advance to ensure most modules are included in the initrd, then the transplant should boot regardless, and only network and Xorg and/or Wayland might need manual reconfiguration. -- "Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Whatever else you get, get wisdom." Proverbs 4:7 (New Living Translation) Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks! Felix Miata *** http://fm.no-ip.com/
