Newbie - dual boot with Win 10 on SSD and Ubuntu Mate on HDD

Hello, I wish to try Ubuntu Mate [UM] for the first time on a Win 10 laptop with the Win OS installed on sdb (which is an SSD). As my sda is a much larger drive, I tried to install UM there.

I chose the 3rd option (Something Else) during disk partitioning and everything looked like it went well enough but when I reboot, the Win 10 gets boot up without Grub playing any part.

The partitioning scheme I used is as follows:

sdb (SSD with Win 10 that already has an EFI partition flagged as "boot") - size is only 100MB

sda -
(a) moved original NTFS partition with data to make room for EFI partition described in the next step below
(b) created another EFI partition meant for UM bootloader, size is 200 MB. This occupies the slot vacated by moving the NTFS partition in (a) above.
(c) created Root, Swap and Home partitions

I went back to BIOS and only the original Win OS bootloader is listed.

I had considered re-installation by pointing the installation of UM bootloader to sdb instead (to share the Win OS bootloader partition but since the partition size is only 100MB, I'm concerned it's not enough and I may break it).

I'd appreciate any advice. Thanks!

Hi :slight_smile:
I think your install is ok but UEFI BIOS has issues to recognize the work you done on UM.
You need to inform UEFI about your new boot option.
You can give a try to your UM install this way :
Go to UEFI BIOS config, navigate to boot from file.
Navigate to the disk with UM and choose the boot file.

I found this link that may be helpful :slight_smile: :
https://superuser.com/questions/1247300/how-to-make-uefi-bios-start-grub-not-windows

Thank you much, Olek! You are right about me needing to go back into Bios. I missed the submenu under Boot OS. :sweat_smile:

However, now I find two "ubuntu" entries, one for sda and one for sdb (same drive as the Win bootloader, which is strange because I only selected installation of bootloader to sda during the partitioning process) but only the entry on sdb brings me to a Grub command line prompt. The ubuntu entry on sda boots straight into Windows.

If I type Exit at the grub prompt, then the "expected" grub menu appears. Here again, I'm presented with 2 Ubuntu entries and the Win OS. If I choose the ubuntu bootloader on sdb, it loops back to the Grub command line prompt, again.

If I select boot from the EFI file however, there are submenus under "ubuntu" and "boot" and selection of entries either restarts the PC immediately or loops back to the Grub command line prompt. I actually do not understand the meaning of the entries I selected, just trying out to see if any works.

I shall upload some pictures of what I experience above.

I'll be back....

Sure :slight_smile:
I hope someone from the community with a UEFI dual boot give opinion too.

I'm running a single UEFI boot to UM and never really done a UEFI dual boot, so my experience here is limited :slight_smile:

Here goes...

  1. The boot order with ["ubuntu" at sdb] brought me to the Grub prompt below. The boot order with ["ubuntu" at sda] boots directly into Win 10.

  1. When I select [Boot from EFI File], I'm presented with 2 options. The first option is as follows:

  1. What follows is the second option selected from the [Boot from EFI File] entry:

I tried a few of the entries but they either reboot the system directly, or I find myself back at the Grub prompt.

Ideas? :grin:

Hmmm, Is there a option to register a new boot item inside your bios ?

I found also this :

Step 4: Disable fast startup in Windows [optional]

Windows 8 introduced a new feature called “fast startup” for quick boot. While it is not mandatory, it would be better to have it disabled.

Go to Control Panel > Hardware and Sound > Power Options > System Settings > Choose what the power buttons do and uncheck the Turn on fast startup box .

If you need more hints, follow this screenshot tutorial to disable fast startup in Windows.

Step 5: Disable secureboot in Windows 10 and 8.1

This is the most important step. The new secure boot feature of Windows 8, originally intended for security feature for rootkit viruses, prevents dual booting of Windows with Linux. To dual boot Windows 8 with Linux, we must disable secure boot in UEFI.

....

Once the installation is completed, restart the computer, you should be welcomed by a purple grub screen. Enjoy Ubuntu along with Windows 10 in dual boot mode.

Note: If after installing Ubuntu, you boot directly in Windows, check in UEFI settings for changing the boot order.

Form this post : Beginners Guide to Install Windows With Ubuntu in Dual Boot

Thank you, Olek!

This article at itsfoss was actually one of the articles I researched before attempting the installation. I had the Secure Boot turned off in the Bios before installation.

However, I didn't think Fast Startup was going to be an issue so I didn't disable it. I can try to reinstall UM later with Fast Startup disabled.

<<<Is there a option to register a new boot item inside your bios ?>>>
If what you meant is about changing the boot order, yes, I did that after your initial/first feedback, otherwise, I would not have been presented with the Grub prompt even. The machine just booted directly into Win 10 without offer of any option.

However, if changing the boot order is not what you meant, then how do I register a new boot item? There are currently 3 options for me to select in Bios. There are 2 "ubuntu" entries and one "Windows".

Some good progress to share, Olek.

I decided to boot into a live session, install boot-repair and ran it to see what happened. At the very least, I'd get some details out of it.

Well, it didn't work completely because at the end of the session, an error was reported. However, I got enough details to enable me to boot into the UM I installed. :grinning:

Of course, I can't find a way to change the boot order directly to [sda2/EFI/ubuntu/shimx64.efi file]. What I can do instead is select [Boot from EFI File] from the Bios boot menu. The steps I took to boot into the UM installed are as follows:

Voila! I've booted into the UM I installed on sda. Now I need to figure out how to repair the Grub2 from within UM. :smiley:

P/S. If you're interested to see the full error report generated by the Boot-Repair utility, it is available at http://paste.ubuntu.com/p/gvGhNMnVPb/

It's quite interesting to see what bootloader entries are found at both sda and sdb, even though I still don't know how to make them work.

Hi back :slight_smile:
I know that there is a other way to boot linux from the default windows boot.
If you keep holding shift at windows boot, it will propt you a hidden menu to boot something else.

Hold Shift and ask the computer to reboot from windows. It should give you more choice at next boot.

Can you give a try ?

We probably are both noobs at windows, this guy have you need :slight_smile: :

Thanks for checking back! :grin:

Yes, hold Shift down while restarting Windows provides some advance options, including resolving Windows boot setup. The Windows bootloader works. I just need to point to the right EFI file to boot into the normal dual-boot Grub menu with Ubuntu and Windows listed as options so I didn't go down this route.

What I need is to for Grub to initiate the correct EFI file, which is currently still a problem. I had purged and reinstalled the Grub. There was no error message this time but the situation has not improved much. I'm still presented with the Grub prompt and need to manually cycle through the EFI file and entries shown yesterday [ EFI => ubuntu => shimx64.efi ]

Still need to work on this.

As for the video, this is useful for Legacy boot and unfortunately my Win 10 is in UEFI so can't use this method. Besides, the setup in the video has only one single drive, whereas the PC I'm working on has one SSD and one mechanical hard drive.

Appreciate the thought though.

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