A common method of running a Linux distribution, or distro, on a Windows computer with one hard drive is to install the distro alongside Windows on that same hard drive. This is called dual-booting and the whole setup is called a dual-boot system. This was relatively an easy and stress-free task, with little to no risk of problems with the setup afterwards.
That is before the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) replaced the BIOS in modern computers and Microsoft released an abomination called Windows 11.
While still a relatively easy system to set up, dual-booting between Linux and Windows 11 on a PC with one hard drive carries a greater potential for some headache afterwards. For example, a common problem with such a dual-boot setup is that the distro will fail to boot after a Windows update because the distro’s boot files were corrupted, a user may accidentally delete the Windows boot files, or the Windows boot files may be deleted during the installation process. In either case, the distro or Windows will fail to boot.
Here’s why that happens.
On a computer with a Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI), the operating system’s boot files are located in a system partition mounted at /boot/efi. This is standard, and any operating system, or OS, installed on that computer can read and write to that directory. So, by default, the boot files of any OS installed on the computer will be found in that location.
That is why an update to Windows 11 can corrupt the Linux boot files or a user can accidentally delete the Windows boot files. And that is why you should not dual-boot Linux and Windows 11 on a PC with one drive.
What, then, is the recommended way to dual-boot Linux and Windows 11 on a PC with a single drive?
On a laptop or desktop computer with one hard drive, the recommended way to set up a dual-boot system is to install the distro on an external hard drive, making sure to install GRUB, or whatever the distro’s boot manager is, on the /boot/efi partition of the external drive. You can read an example of that in this Linux Mint 22 and Windows 11 dual-boot setup article.
On a laptop or desktop computer with 2 internal hard drives, the recommended way to set up a dual-boot system between Linux and Windows 11 is to install each operating system on a separate drive, with the distro installed last. To avoid a situation where the distro’s boot files are also installed on the /boot/efi partition of the Windows 11 drive, you may have to disconnect the Windows drive before installing the distro.
That extra task of opening the computer, disconnecting the Windows 11 drive and reconnecting it is nothing compared to the headache you’ll face if you do otherwise.
