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I was using Ubuntu 16.04 on a dual-boot computer, fortunately.

I attempted to upgrade from 16.04 to 18.04. Now my computer freezes during the boot-up procedure. There screen fills up with lines of code, then stops. I can't get it to do anything else. Therefore I have to boot to Windows 10.

It appears I will have to replace the entire Ubuntu partition. The question is how to do that without losing all my files and pictures.

Anyone have any ideas?

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    You should not even be upgrading unless you have both Windows & Ubuntu data fully backed up. Hard drives fail, users make mistakes & upgrades do not always work. If you want to attempt repair post link from Boot-Repair's report. Or reinstall only with Something Else using same / (root) & /home partitions. Post the link to the Create BootInfo summary report. Is part of Boot-Repair: help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Info
    – oldfred
    Aug 17, 2018 at 21:33

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You need to acces to your Ubuntu user files from Windows. The problem is that natively Windows do not support EXT(N) filesystem, so you need a third-party software.

I recomend Linux Reader (I had problems with the most popular Ext2Read)

Linux Reader Window

There you can acces to your /home directory and save all your files selecting the "save" option:

Save

After that you can wipe the Ubuntu partition and do a clean install of Ubuntu 18.04. You better install it with a separated partition for your home directory so you don't have to do this again...

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  • Using an Ubuntu Live USB you should have full access to all your files and folders on the Ubuntu partition and can copy them to another USB stick, external Hard Drive or possibly even to your Windows filesystem.

You might want to check that 'fast startup' is off in Windows 10 (it puts the Windows filesystem in a sort of 'hybrid sleep/hibernation state' which means you can't access the partition from Linux in the normal manner.)

Fast start-up is handily located in the 'Power Options' section of the 'Control Panel', by clicking 'Choose what the power buttons do', 'Change settings that are currently unavailable' and finally unchecking 'Turn on fast start-up (recommended)'.

You should be able to save your files to a handy place on the Windows partition if fast start-up isn't active.

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