Linux Mint 21.1 upgrades

Clément Lefebvre announced the official release of Linux Mint 21.1 Vera and we review the contents. In our article, we reported that the official guide to upgrading from previous versions will soon be published, while it is true that this is an easy process for those who have done it before, it is also true that this may be ‘if it was not done, the case for those who are going to do it for the first time, and few or none have been on Linux for a while.

For this reason, it is an official service and worth waiting for it to be released because it can inform us of any known problems and how to fix them. This was not in the Linux Mint 21.1 download guide, and we started with the one we already downloaded from Vanessa (21), but nothing is said about other versions. The process should be the same for all supported, but we leave the data there.

How to upgrade to Linux Mint 21.1?

Make a backup. Timeshift periodically makes copies of the entire operating system, so all our data is always safe if we have an external hard drive or space elsewhere.

To prepare for the upgrade:

1. You should turn off the display and update the operating system packages, which should be updated if necessary. Since this is an Ubuntu distribution, this should be done by opening a terminal and typing the command “sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade”.
2. After backing up and upgrading all packages, the next step is to start the upgrade process to Linux Mint 21.1.
3. You should open the update manager, click on the update button and check if there is a new version of min update or mint-upgrade-info. If they are, they will be installed. If not, you can move on to the next thing.
4. You should now run the system update by selecting Update/Upgrade to “Linux Mint 21.1 Vera” (see the FAQ section if the option is not displayed).
5. Follow the instructions on the screen. Updating the software is like restoring the operating system and is not lost. The main thing is to go through each step. If during the process we are asked if we want to save or change the configuration files, we should choose to replace them.
6. At the end of the process, all that remains is to restart.

News and recommendations

For those who like how it looked before, this can be changed in the theme settings. The Linux Mint 20.2 image is available under the name “Mint-Y-Legacy.

In the FAQ section, Clem explains:

• If the update does not appear, check for the latest version of minupdate (5.9.6 or higher) and mint-update-info (1.2.0 or higher) and restart Update Manager by opening it again from the Requests menu.
• If the latest version of minupdate and mint-upgrade-info is not available on your servers, you should switch to the default repository.
• This rarely happens, but if you hang up and cannot log back in, switch to the console with CTRL+ALT+F1, log in and type “killall cinnamon-screensaver” (or “killall mate-screensaver” in BUDDY). CTRL+ALT+F7 or CTRL+ALT+F8 is used to return to the program.