Like many others, I’m planning to switch from end-of-life Windows 10 to Linux. I’ve installed Linux systems before, so I’m not a complete beginner, but I wouldn’t say I have much experience either.
My question is:
I have a 128GB SSD that currently holds Windows. I don’t want a dual-boot setup, so I’ll erase the entire disk and install Zorin there. All my data is stored on a large HDD that’s encrypted with BitLocker. Can I use that drive as my /home partition while keeping the BitLocker encryption?
I’ve read about dislocker for mounting BitLocker-encrypted drives and I can handle that, but will the Zorin installer be able to access the disk during installation? I have my doubts.
I'm not really sure what is the best. Bitlocker is only for Windows, so it is better to remove the bitlocker encryption on the hdd.
When you want a single boot with Zorin, you could install Zorin completely on the ssd and keep your personal datas on the hdd, mount it automatically at boot and encrypt the hdd e.g. with veracrypt.
Sorry. That was a Misunderstanding on my Side. Wouldn't it be easier to install Zorin in the SSD and use the HDD as 2nd Data Drive like You now did? You could set it to Automount and it would be there on Start-Up. You could set up this after the Installation.
The only Thing here would be: How is the Drive formatted? NTFS?
In Zorin a Programm called Disks comes preinstall. There You can choose Your Drive and set it up to Automount. But I don't know how well this will work because of Bitlocker. Maybe You have to type in Your Password when it starts.
This directory exists for storing user data, but there are a few files and folders that are expected to exist in pre-determined locations. Messing with this will only give you headaches, so just pick another mounting point for this external hard drive.
However, I agree that you should consider using another method of encryption that isn't Windows-specific since you will not be using Windows. Even if you don't do it all at once, you can get yourself another drive and slowly copy over the files that you care about, and encrypt that drive using something else.
There are Linux-specific tools that you can use, but Veracrypt is a good tool because it's cross-platform. Meaning that you can plug that drive in a Windows computer and decrypt it from there.
Keep in mind, that you want to have copies of your data anyway. All drives inevitably fail, eventually. This is the perfect excuse to go through your important data and make sure you have copies of them in multiple locations.
After a bit of fumbling I decided to actually copy everything to an external HDD, reformat as ext4 and use it as a regular Linux drive. I had some strange hangups and I want to use rclone for most of my cloud drives. There are just too many things that could go wrong with keeping bitlocker.
I am familiar with veracrypt, but I am sure there is also native Linux encryption?
Oh, and I always do backups, because I am not silly!
There are tools like cryptsetup which is pretty much the standard used by most Linux distributions when they offer full disk encryption during the installation.
However, it's not as intuitive to use since it's command line-based. If you're already familiar with Veracrypt, I'd suggest sticking to it. In addition to being easier to use, it has the advantage of being cross-platform so you can decrypt this drive from another computer if you ever need to.
Other option is Cryptomator, but this is for file level encryption only. What I like about it is that it's very easy to use:
I might need to update this for Zorin OS 17, and the upcoming 18 version as well, but it should work roughly the same.
I am also familiar with cryptomator and have used it in Windows.
I will have to finish copying all the old data, before thinking further about encryption.
