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Dual Boot Vista/Ubuntu (using two HDs)

O

oneils

Limp Gawd
Joined
Oct 18, 2005
Messages
475
Hello, I have a Vista system with an empty hard drive in it. I'd like to install Ubuntu onto the empty hard drive.

From what I can tell from Ubuntu's support site, this is possible. But this document only mentions xp, not Vista:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/H...n_two_HDs?highlight=(\bCategoryInstallation\b)

would this also work for Vista (Case 1)? That is will Grub list the vista drive as a boot drive?

Thanks for any help you can give.
 
Thanks very much!

Well, I just tried to install and it and I quit when I got to the disk partitioner. It scanned my hard drives I guess and only found one and the installer indicated it did not find any other operating system installed.

Does this mean Ubuntu could not find vista anywhere in my drives?

I have three hard drives

Disk O has partition C for Vista, and F for files
Disk 1 has partition D and is empty
Disk 2 has partition E and is full of files.

Did Ubuntu basically only find partition D (or disk 1) and automatically decide it would install there? or did it just not recognise Vista at all? Seems strange...
 
If you are installing using different drives for each OS, don't even worry about bootloaders...

The BIOS should prompt you to press a key to change the boot device (mine its F12), then just select the physical HDD the OS is on. Simple. Bootloaders only make real sense when two or more OS's are sharing the same HDD.
 
criccio said:
If you are installing using different drives for each OS, don't even worry about bootloaders...

The BIOS should prompt you to press a key to change the boot device (mine its F12), then just select the physical HDD the OS is on. Simple. Bootloaders only make real sense when two or more OS's are sharing the same HDD.
Click to expand...

Ok, but you'll have to explain this to me like I know nothing about this (which is the case). So you are saying load BIOS everytime to boot up? wouldn't it be simpler to use the bootloader?

Also, I still haven't installed Ubuntu because the install process did not recognise Vista, or so I thought? is this the actual case?
 
The BIOS is the text you see on the screen when you power your machine up (more or less...). It will say at the bottom of the screen something like "Press F12 to select boot device" (That is what it says for me). Then just select the drive you want to boot from. Easy.

Just make sure that when you, for example, are installing Ubuntu, unplug the drive with Vista on it. When its installed you can obviously plug everything back it.

With the OS'es on different drives this is the simplest solution.
 
Thanks. but the article i linked to above seems to indicate that keeping the windows drive plugged in is the simplest thing to do.

I guess i'm just trying to confirm that this is the case and that ubuntu will not install over windows.
 
If you keep the Windows drive plugged in, Ubuntu will detect windows and replace the Windows bootloader with GRUB and allow you to boot both OS'es. If you want Ubuntu messing with your Windows drive then just go ahead and do that.

I prefer to keep both OS'es completely separate and boot them by selecting their drive with the BIOS.
 
Ah, ok, now i understand what you are saying. I hadn't realised that the ubuntu drive replaces the windows bootloader. that's what i wasn't understanding.
 
Ok, really dumb question. If i want to install Ubuntu onto my empty drive, do I first have to format it in windows?

I tried installing ubuntu on the empty drive and everything seemed to work fine, but when I reboot, the bootloader didin't come on (i decided to just boot through that) and i booted straight to windows.

I did get the message along the lines of "disk must be checked for consistency, to skip check press any key" i skipped it. does the bootloader want to check the disk that ubuntu is installed on?
 
Ubuntu formats the drive as part of its install process. Do what I was describing and when you boot the machine, it will say something like "Press F12 to select boot device" (might be a different button for you).

Select the actual physical HDD you installed Ubuntu on and thats it.

Me thinks Wubi would have been a better option for you at this point.
 
Lol, well i guess wubi it is.

I've rebooted three times now, and the bootloader does not come up, i go straight to windows. I guess the install failed?

and I never the get the message you described for selecting a disk to boot from (or does that only come up when there are two oses installed?), i only get a message to enter bios. If i do it flashes way to fast for me to see it.
 
Well that was easy. I'm now posting this reply in firefox using Ubuntu that was installed through Wubi. My dumbass should have just done this from the get go.

Criccio I just want to thank you for your patience.
 
It will work fine, I did it myself a few times. Easiest way to do it is install Windows first on the second HDD, then Linux and GRUB (bootloader) on the first. It should take care of everything automatically from there!
 
oneils said:
Hello, I have a Vista system with an empty hard drive in it. I'd like to install Ubuntu onto the empty hard drive.

From what I can tell from Ubuntu's support site, this is possible. But this document only mentions xp, not Vista:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/H...n_two_HDs?highlight=(\bCategoryInstallation\b)

would this also work for Vista (Case 1)? That is will Grub list the vista drive as a boot drive?

Thanks for any help you can give.
Click to expand...



Looks like an old thread but dual booting from separate disks is not well explained anywhere, so here.....


Yes it works, BUT during install there is an obscure "advanced" option that lets you choose on what disk to put the grub boot loader. It uses meaningless and conflicting terminology for disks such as hd0, hd1, sdb1, sbd2, etc. You should use that to specify the 2nd disk, otherwise linux may overwrite your windows boot loader on your first disk.


Also, it appears that Ubuntu installer can't see any other other OS, which is scary!! It can but you have to click on each disk . It's a crappy installer, not very intuitive.

The bottom line -- yes you can install Linux on the second or any other disk, but it's a bit of work. I usually choose to install grub on the 2nd disk only and leave the Windows 1st disk untouched and use BIOS boot menu to boot each OS. That way if I delete one Linux version to try another, my Windows disk still boots independently.
 
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