Wednesday, August 5, 2015

Windows 8 / Linux dual boot fix.

For some time I had tried to setup my OEM windows 8 pc (UEFI) to dual boot Linux Mint. I could successfully install Linux and boot into it... that is until I decided to boot back to Windows.
Windows would constantly overwrite the boot record and I'd be stuck back at square one. Although my Linux partition is still intact, I couldn't boot into it.

Recently I found a post from an individual detailing the command to use from within Windows to fix the boot record as to boot to grub.

From Windows, hit [Windows + x].
Click 'command prompt (administrator)'
Type the following command:
bcdedit /set {bootmgr} path \EFI\ubuntu\grubx64.efi
After rebooting, I'm again presented with grub. Success.

Since that original post was so hard to find initially for me, I thought I'd include it here in case it helps anyone out with the same predicament. ... By the way, if you upgrade to Windows 10, it will screw up the boot record also, so you'll have to run this fix again.

1 comment:

  1. Hmm... Interesting... I have W7 professional running on a Dell Inspiron 1500 series Laptop.. I removed the original HDD and installed a new one, then I installed W7 (because I did not want W10 !). since then, when I boot up, it gives me a message "No bootable device"... however, if I press F12 during the DELL boot process, I get the options to boot as if I were in BIOS mode. So I can boot from UEFI or boot from USB Drive, or DVD/CD Drive . After pressing F12 and selecting UEFI, it boots as normal,... so I expect that if a dual boot with Linux was available, then it would give the options there...

    ReplyDelete