help makerspace linuxCNC lathe and mini mill, need to evaluate

It just occurred to me, we never explicitly told you that when using LinuxCNC everything can be fixed, reinstalled, configured and reconfigured, functionality added at any point in time, etc.
So, from the start as a general guide:
-boot the PC, use a USB stick or two just to be on the safe side to copy stuff into, preferably use USB stick that do not get used often as they might fail,
-On each PC, open file explorer, navigate to /home/user_name/ , there is a folder named linuxcnc (emc2 on the Ubuntu 10.04 one), right click on that folder and choose "compress"
-copy the compressed file to the USB, but do create a separate folder for each machine.
-if affordable or possible, find/get a HDD, download the official ISO file from the link below, install into that HDD. Linux can be installed on any PC, so use another PC or remove the existing HDD from one of the machine PC's and label it, then insert the "new" hdd and install.
linuxcnc.org/downloads/
-boot the newly installed PC, use the USB with the saved configs to copy them to the "new" HDD, uncompress them each on its own folder.
-copy contents (linuxcnc or emc2 folder) of the machine the PC is attached to from the extracted folder to /home/user_name/
-open linuxcnc, configs, folder with the machine name, there are several files, one of them ends with .INI, right click on that file, choose "open with" and in the text entry near the bottom enter linuxcnc, open
-a warning should come up about converting the files to new post 2.8 version, click ok
-even if it fails with a crash report, close the report and repeat the same again by right clicking on the .ini file

All this is so you have backups, the above will work 99% of the time, only when there are added non standard features there might be some editing needed.
There are also some new issues that might come up, like latency warnings due to changed kernel, but all of that is fixable.
Some more info, Linux and subsequently LinuxCNC can be moved from a PC to another PC or laptop or whatever without reinstalling always (only when using some awkward hardware it might fail), it can be used as a external USB and boot and work, etc.
So say a PC dies, yank the HDD out, put in to another PC, boot and use the machine.
Say a HDD dies, if you have the config backed up, new install, unzip, copy, run the machine.
In any case, no matter what happens to the software/PC side, everything can be back up and running in less than half hour if you have the ISO and back ups.
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This might be why we take everything regarding it so lightly, and this is why we enjoy using it, so sorry for misunderstanding your call for help.