How to dual-boot Windows 8 and Linux
get Windows 8 and Linux booting from the same machine without too much trouble. Ashton Mills explains.
You’ll need this
To its credit,
Windows 8 adds much more than just the Modern UI.
There’s the underlying changes for memory efficiency, graphics
performance (particularly elements like images, for which the Modern UI
heavily relies on) and of course, the range of system-wide improvements
like more informative copy dialogues and the ever-so-sexy Task Manager.
It also revamped, for the first time, both the dreaded BSOD screen
and in many ways, its reluctant partner: the
Windows boot manager. Under
the bonnet the
Windows boot manager works much the same as it did in
Windows 7, with the added difference that’s it’s a heck of a lot nicer
to look at. No longer are you presented with merely an ASCII-based
white-on-black boot menu, much like GRUB for
Linux; instead, there’s a
soft blue background with large icons and fonts that mimic the Modern UI
— and it’s mouse driven to boot (HA! See what I did there?). Such that,
for some of us here at APC, we actually prefer the look of
Windows 8’s
boot manager than the traditional
Linux one, even if slightly prettified
in distributions like Ubuntu.
So, while you can easily set up a dual-boot system by installing
Windows 8 first and then
Linux, you’ll be left with GRUB to manage your
boot. If you prefer the look of the
Windows 8 menu, here’s how to
dual-boot Windows 8 and
Linux using the
Windows 8 boot manager.
Step 1: Installation order
Installing Windows 8 and
Linux on the same system doesn’t change —
always do
Windows first and then Linux second. However, the only
difference now is to install GRUB to the root partition (or a /boot
partition, if you set one up) instead of the MBR of the hard drive. For
example, you might configure your installation to look something like
the diagram below.
When you do this, you initially won’t be able to boot to Linux once
the installation finishes. This is fine, as we’ll fix that in a moment.
You can configure your installation to look something like this.
Step 2: Install EasyBCD
Reboot and once Windows 8 has loaded, drop to the desktop and head to
neosmart.net/EasyBCD.
Click on ‘Register’ at the bottom of the page and optionally fill in
your details if you’d like to help support EasyBCD. This isn’t
necessary, though, and you can click ‘Download!’ to download EasyBCD
whether you register or not.
EasyBCD has been around for some time and provides flexible control
over the Windows Boot Configuration Data (BCD). This includes the boot
menu, for which Windows is actually quite a capable tool. It’ll happily
boot a range of Windows operating systems and much like GRUB, it can be
configured to chain-load non-Microsoft operating systems — with a little
help, anyway. One of the features of EasyBCD is the integration of both
a GRUB boot image and GRUB chain-loader, allowing you to boot Linux
from the Windows boot menu.
EasyBCD has been updated with Windows 8 support, making it a snap to
use the new Windows 8 boot menu to boot both Windows and Linux.
The contents of the BCD loader for dual-booting Windows 8 and Linux.
Step 3: Chain-load GRUB
Start EasyBCD and back up the current BCD configuration file by
clicking ‘BCD Backup/Repair > Backup Settings’. Next, click ‘Add New
Entry’ and under the ‘Linux/BSD’ tab, click on the ‘Type’ field and
choose ‘GRUB2’ (if using Ubuntu). Under the ‘Name’ field, change it to
whatever distribution you’re using and for ‘Drive:’, set it to
‘Automatically locate and load’.
Hit ‘Add Entry’ and you’re done! If you
click on the ‘View Settings’ button, you should see a new entry for your
distribution or ‘NeoSmart Linux’ if you didn’t change the name.
Adding a new entry to boot Linux.
If you’re using another version of Linux, check to make sure which
version of GRUB it’s using. If the original GRUB is being used, you’ll
need to select ‘GRUB’ instead and, since it can’t be automatically
located and loaded, set the partition you installed GRUB to in the
‘Drive:’ field. Later, if for whatever reason this isn’t working, you
can try ticking ‘Use EasyBCD’s copy of GRUB’.
Finally, if you forgot to change the name for the entry or want to
change it later, click ‘Advanced Settings’ and under the ‘Basic’ tab
rename the entry before clicking ‘Save Settings’.
Naturally, you can also use EasyBCD to alter other boot menu settings
such as reordering the list, setting the default operating system and
changing the timeout. All of these can be found under the ‘Edit Boot
Menu’ section. Don’t forget if you run into any problems, you can also
restore your original Windows 8 boot menu settings from the ‘BCD
Backup/Repair’ option.
And that’s it! Enjoy your dual-boot Windows 8 and Linux system with a more modern and cleaner boot time interface.
Other tips: Cheating Windows 8’s cheat
Once you have more than one operating system installed alongside
Windows 8, you may notice some interesting behaviour with the way
Windows 8 boots. When you’re presented with the boot menu, this isn’t a
first step before choosing what operating system loads. As part of its
changes to decrease boot times,
Windows 8 actually loads in the background
and the boot menu is more a formality: if you click to boot
Windows 8,
you’ll instantly be presented with the login screen; if you choose to
load another operating system, your machine will reboot before loading
into the other OS.
It’s a bit of a hack on Microsoft’s part to create the illusion of
speed and while it doesn’t bother us too much (having SSDs for boot
drives helps), you can bypass this behaviour with a neat little tool
also made by NeoSmart: iReboot.
EasyBCD has an option to install iReboot under ‘Useful Utilities’, but we found this didn’t work. Instead, head to
neosmart.net/iReboot to download and install the latest version.
Once installed, a tray icon will appear to you let choose from your
boot menu what operating system you’ll load at your next boot, making it
possible to
reboot once to
Linux, instead of twice when rebooting from
Windows 8. Neat!
source ; apcmag.com
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Windows,
Windows 8,
Linux, Microsoft, advantages of Microsoft Windows 8.1, Cheating Windows 8’s cheat,Install EasyBCD,Windows 8 and Linux booting,dual-boot Windows 8 and Linux,
