Be Careful with External Hard Drive Booting (within LINUX, etc)

[mjolnir]

I recently nearly lost all my DAW computer because of a glitch during an offline install of a Linux OS. I followed the protocol to the letter and nothing should've gone wrong, but somehow the installer deleted my boot loader from my internal (non-removeable) drive while I was installing to the external / alternative drive. I specifically was avoiding that problem, but it happened anyhow somehow.

I just wanted to let you guys know about this, whether you use Linux or not, it could happen.

I wasn't able to figure out how to get any LiveCD's or installers to reinstall or repair my boot loader on the internal NVMe drive. (Partially because GRUB2 doesn't know what an NVMe drive is even though the drive formatters and the OS'es do.)

I couldn't use GRUB for some odd reason, and other programs gave weird errors about "overlay"'s and sh** I can't comprehend.

Ultimately, I had to reinstall / erase the entire OS and internal drive.

Luckily, I had a backup of most, but not all of my stuff.
I didn't lose my tunes or my REAPER config, but I lost my Desktop Environment's customizations and configs and my custom icons and other niceties.

I also lost my web browser configs.

Most importantly, I lost my DAW's optimizations for audio; meaning, I have to do them all over again. But I did archive the instructions, so it won't be quite as difficult.

One severe pain in the arse though, is that I have to reinstall all my VST's and that took a few weeks last time. Now I have to do that all over again. Parts of it might be faster, but there's no guarantees.

I've got both Windows and Linux VST's working side by side, so I have to be careful to put each one in the correct place.

I'm not complaining, not asking for help; I just wanted you guys to know in case you ever seek to do similar.

So, be careful if you wanted to install a second OS to an external drive like I was doing. The installer might put stuff in the wrong place if it gets confused like GRUB's OS prober maybe did. I had no idea it could do that.

I will still be making music though.
And it's a chance for me to filter out some of the less fun VST's.
But I kinda already had done that during the 2 week install earlier this year. Sigh.

Peace.
Sincerely,
mjolnir (909mjolnir, 909 County Fair)

[WackyZoundz]

Thanks for the warning.

[maanga]

I almost had one like this in a Lenovo notebook.
Added a msata drive with the regular main SSD and tried to install win 7 32 bit on the Msata.
The 32 bit installer was attempting to install in the boot sector of the main SSD.
Before the installer could do anything bad, I removed the main SSD and proceeded install on the Msata.
After complete install, put back the main drive and now have dual boot.
Regards.

[Boone777]

O yeah the fun with boot loaders...I always leave extra space in advance on my second boot disk, what works for me when a messed up boot loader appears is to install a brand new os on an extra partition.
Selecting the boot partition is the crucial step and I find some distros are better at handling that, are at least they have a clearer way of presenting your options when installing.
I then use the grub of my new install as my new main bootloader. MXLinux works for me. Also chances are it's now updated to a newer grub or some extra bug fixes from the new installer.
That new os is basically useless, so you can reinstall over it if boot goes wrong again.

[audiojunkie]

Windows is infamous for deleting/overriding boot partitions. The internet forums are full of comments about them. Most of these threads post workaround solutions for making Linux and Windows work in harmony. Since I no longer dual boot, and my main system is Linux, I know longer remember the steps for resolving this issue. But I do know that solutions exist.

[dellboy]

Windows is infamous for deleting/overriding boot partitions.

I have always experienced it the other way around, with Linux grub overwriting Windows boot loaders. In fact I currently have a Linux grub boot loader in my laptops UEFI bios that I am unable to delete. I have been googling to find out how to get rid of it.

[audiojunkie]

It wouldn’t surprise me if I were to find out that both Windows and Linux do it these days. It’s probably both operating systems’ attempts at self repairing.

[dellboy]

It wouldn’t surprise me if I were to find out that both Windows and Linux do it these days. It’s probably both operating systems’ attempts at self repairing.

The Windows self repairing tool is useless,it never works for me. I booted the Windows USB OS setup,and selected to repair the UEFI,all it did was to load up the bios and do nothing.

[EnGee]

Windows is infamous for deleting/overriding boot partitions.

I have always experienced it the other way around, with Linux grub overwriting Windows boot loaders. In fact I currently have a Linux grub boot loader in my laptops UEFI bios that I am unable to delete. I have been googling to find out how to get rid of it.

Few years ago I deleted the Linux partition and wanted only Windows. I wanted to get rid of the grub loader, so I searched then I found this tool which I used to make the Windows loader the default one in the MBR (of course you need to be able to boot into windows partition and install this utility first):
https://easybcd.org/

[dellboy]

Few years ago I deleted the Linux partition and wanted only Windows. I wanted to get rid of the grub loader, so I searched then I found this tool which I used to make the Windows loader the default one in the MBR (of course you need to be able to boot into windows partition and install this utility first):
https://easybcd.org/

I do have Windows as my main boot OS, and it boots to that by default. If I want to use Mint Linux, its just a matter of holding down F12 and selcting it. The problem is that my previous Linux OS, Ubuntu, somehow managed to write itself into the UEFI eprom on the mainboard, (or so I assume) and its that entry I want to erase. Sometimes I boot up and all I get is an annoying grub screen.

[EnGee]

I do have Windows as my main boot OS, and it boots to that by default. If I want to use Mint Linux, its just a matter of holding down F12 and selcting it. The problem is that my previous Linux OS, Ubuntu, somehow managed to write itself into the UEFI eprom on the mainboard, (or so I assume) and its that entry I want to erase. Sometimes I boot up and all I get is an annoying grub screen.

I installed the grub on the main SSD. Windows boot manager is also there, but in the BIOS, in the boot options order, Ubuntu is first and then Windows boot manager is the second.

I can boot into Windows directly if I choose the Windows boot manager to be my first choice. Anyway, in the grub menu (for my first choice to boot), I did upped Windows to be the default and Ubuntu (mint) to be the second. I also renamed Ubuntu to Mint in the menu. I used a grub editor called "Grub Customizer". Of course I still can press F12 and choose my boot manager or what SSD or USB I want to boot into, but I don't need to do that for every day startup.

[anttimaatteri]

i boot windows via the "bios" option after i made my debian 12 system and added the win10 disk i completely cloned beforehand on a bigger drive

[j_e_g]

If you're installing linux to the same hard drive as contains your Windows installation, be careful when you get to the linux installation step where it asks whether you want "automatic (guided) partitioning" or "manual partitioning". If there's only one choice of guided partitioning, then it will typically erase your copy of Windows. You want to choose only a guided option that leaves your existing partitions intact. If no such option is offered, then you should either:

1) Install Linux to a different hard drive than the drive containing Windows. Then the guided partition won't erase anything on your windows drive.

2) Choose manual partitioning. Consult docs on how to use the GParted program.

If after installing linux, you find that your computer boots up without showing you an option of booting Windows, then just boot into linux.

Open linux's terminal window, and install the program os-prober. For example, to install upon Mint/Ubuntu/Debian/AVLinux systems, type the following line, then press the Enter key:

sudo apt-get install os-prober

Then run os-prober by typing the following:

sudo os-prober

This program will fix your boot screen so that when you reboot, you'll see Windows listed.