need help setting up Dual-Boot on separate hard drives

Newbie Corner
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#1

Hello there,

I'm switching away from Windows 10 tomorrow and need a quick rundown on setting up Dual-Boot on separate hard drives correctly. All I found on the internet was for one drive with multiple partitions or already outdated (I think) and on some form of Debian.

Now to my case, I have four hard drives, one SSD with W10 and three 2 TB HDD with data I wanna keep, a fifth 1 TB SSD is joining for Manjaro.

Is it important (or at least safer) to unplug all drives for the Manjaro installation and plug them in afterwards?
Linux needs to be on #1 in the BIOS boot order right?
What are the steps in Manjaro on setting up Dual-Boot?

Thank you for the help!

#2

Yes it is always best to unplug external drives that are used for data on any install, just to be on the safe side.

1 Like
#3

Did you read this guide [HowTo] Dual-boot Manjaro - Windows 10 - Step by Step?

#4

Yes I have and its not about separate hard drives, or did I miss something there?

#5

i don't know principle difference is it one drive or two. Do u have some particular step where you are stopped?

#6

I have similar setup following the "one OS per drive" rule, and I didn't need to do anything special, no unplugging, no nothing - as long as Windows is installed before Manjaro. Mind, I'm using BIOS-Legacy, no idea about EFI.

Ideally, yes.

Normally, when you then install Manjaro, its GRUB will (or should) pick up the existing Windows installation and add it to GRUB menu.

#7

Good to know but I still unplug all drives, better save then sorry.
And just in case Grub doesn't detect W10 is this still relevant and the same in Manjaro? https://youtu.be/Xw__bTvQKsY?t=492

#8

Manjaro -Enjoy its Simplicity

So in keeping with Manjaro tradition, lets keep things simple.
Make all drives gpt or all drives msdos.
Make all OS's uefi or all OS's bios-legacy.
If gpt, use uefi.
If msdos, use biso-legacy.

Plug, unplug, same drive, separate drives, no drive? Doesn't matter.
But if any OS drive is external and to be removed, even occasionally, just add a "--removable" to its grub-install command if set to external mbr or to external $esp. Not simple? Yeah. Then use one drive.

Remember if you install another OS after installing manjaro. Keep manjaro bootloader as default.
How? Not simple? <sarcasm> Then remove intel-ucode from manjaro. </sarcasm> Ignore that.

1 Like
#9

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