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Old 08-27-2021, 10:19 PM   #1
clepsydrae
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Default Win10 dual-boot -- can I install to a spare SSD?

So I have a relatively old computer and I dual-boot (in legacy BIOS mode) to grub: I run Win 8.1 and Linux.

sda1 is windows 8.1
sda2 is linux

(And there are many other partitions/drives, some of which are also bootable (linux installs).)

I want to install Win10, and ideally I want to do it onto a new SSD (which is in the mail now) and migrate plugins and such over slowly, all the while maintaining the ability to boot to the old Win 8.1 install.

Is this workable nowadays? My specific questions:

- does windows still demand that it live on the first partition of the first disk?

- can I simply install this new SSD, partition to NTFS using Win 8.1, and use the Win 10 image on a USB stick to install Win 10 to the new drive (i.e. even though it isn't sda)? Is this process relatively pain-free?

- should I assume the windows install to the new SSD will overwrite the MBR on sda, and I'll need to run boot-repair from a linux live USB to get back to overall functionality? Or will I be spared the MBR overwrite because I'm installing to a different drive?

- once grub is sorted out, I can boot via grub to either 8.1 or 10 (or previous linux installs), right?

- does Win10 Pro allow significantly better control against surprise software updates out of nowhere? (That's still a thing, right?)

Am I being dumb in some other way?

The basic goal is to try to get Win10 going without losing my old install. If I had to I suppose I could yank all the disks except the new SSD, install Win10, then put everything back and refresh grub from the linux side to pick up the new Win10 install for grub.

I was planning to go the "don't bother with the license upgrade shenanigans from 8.1 and just run Win10 without updating the license and take my chances that it will just work" route (been doing this with a Win10 VM and so far no issues...) But I wasn't sure if that would fly with Win10 Pro?
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Old 08-28-2021, 08:27 AM   #2
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Originally Posted by clepsydrae View Post

I was planning to go the "don't bother with the license upgrade shenanigans from 8.1 and just run Win10 without updating the license and take my chances that it will just work" route (been doing this with a Win10 VM and so far no issues...) But I wasn't sure if that would fly with Win10 Pro?
I can't comment on the multi boot issues, but as just a suggestion, since you have a new hard drive coming, you might want to remove all the drives, install the new one you have coming in, put Windows 10 on that just to make sure it plays nice with your hardware. There are some differences between running Windows live and in a virtual environment.

One thing that might pop up as an issue is availability of Windows 10 drivers for your hardware.
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Old 08-28-2021, 01:43 PM   #3
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The basic goal is to try to get Win10 going without losing my old install.
Since you have a new unused drive on the way, I would:
- connect only the new drive and the drive with the 8.1 installed.
- clone the Win 8.1 drive to the new drive
- remove the original Win 8.1 drive
- run the Win 10 update on the cloned Win 8.1 drive.

If it goes badly, you still have your original Win 8.1 drive available.
You can wipe the new clone drive and try doing a clean Win 10 install instead.
once the clean Win 10 is working, you can put the original 8.1 drive into a USB case to copy the needed files to the new drive.

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Old 08-28-2021, 03:38 PM   #4
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Thanks, toleolu, I'll be on the lookout for that.

Quote:
Originally Posted by lucas_LCS View Post
Since you have a new unused drive on the way, I would:
- connect only the new drive and the drive with the 8.1 installed.
- clone the Win 8.1 drive to the new drive
- remove the original Win 8.1 drive
- run the Win 10 update on the cloned Win 8.1 drive.
Thanks -- so when I clone from 8.1 to 10, how would I partition the new drive in your above-described scenario, keeping in mind that eventually I will be going back to booting bios/non-uefi/legacy (just trying to upset as few apple carts at once as I do this)? I assume I just do an msdos partition table and a couple partitions or whatever, clone 8.1 to the first partition, then try to boot it? Don't I need to run some kind of windows utility to install a windows bootloader on that new partition? Or does that somehow happen when the clone happens?

Thanks in advance.
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Old 08-29-2021, 10:00 AM   #5
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Thanks, toleolu, I'll be on the lookout for that.



Thanks -- so when I clone from 8.1 to 10, how would I partition the new drive in your above-described scenario, keeping in mind that eventually I will be going back to booting bios/non-uefi/legacy (just trying to upset as few apple carts at once as I do this)? I assume I just do an msdos partition table and a couple partitions or whatever, clone 8.1 to the first partition, then try to boot it? Don't I need to run some kind of windows utility to install a windows bootloader on that new partition? Or does that somehow happen when the clone happens?

Thanks in advance.
I don't recall needing to do anything when making a 1:1 clone so I don't think you need to do anything to the new drive.
The clone software will duplicate the source drive on the new drive.

Additionally, it's easier to determine which is the source drive and which is the target drive if the target (new) drive is blank.
This will help keep you from accidentally erasing the source drive.

Once the cloning has finished, the target drive should be ready to go.
Shut down and disconnect the other drive before rebooting.

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Old 08-29-2021, 10:03 AM   #6
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Thanks -- I don't think 1:1 cloning of the whole drive is quite in order, though, because I have other partitions on that drive that shouldn't be cloned... ?

At any rate I'm happy that I can play around without serious consequences given that it will be its own separate drive.
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Old 08-29-2021, 10:35 AM   #7
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Thought I would pass this on to you in case it happens to you if you do a clean Windows 10 install.

Last year I wiped an old laptop and installed Windows 10 on it. During the install, it got to a screen where it was requiring me or either enter or create a Microsoft user account. No option skip or create a local user account. I didn't want to do that but it wouldn't let me proceed without it.

I found a work around online where if that happens, shut down the computer, disconnect any internet connections on the computer, then restart the installation. This time, when it comes that screen to create the Microsoft account, you'll see an option to Skip This Step and you can then go create a local account. Finish the installation, shut the computer down, reconnect to the internet, start back up and start downloading updates.

Just something I ran in to, may not apply in your case.
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Old 08-29-2021, 10:37 AM   #8
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Thanks for the tip!
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Old 08-29-2021, 03:15 PM   #9
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I found a work around online where if that happens, shut down the computer,
You can also just unplug the network cable (at anytime) and go "back" and it will skip the account. Just did it. Annoying? yes.
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Old 08-29-2021, 05:59 PM   #10
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Originally Posted by clepsydrae View Post
Thanks -- I don't think 1:1 cloning of the whole drive is quite in order, though, because I have other partitions on that drive that shouldn't be cloned... ?
You can still do it and see if it works OK.
If you get Win 10 up and running, you can use the drive utility to wipe and reclaim the othe non -Win 10 partitions.

Personally, I would just use the new drive to make a clean Win 10 install.
Once The clean install is working I make a backup image before tweaking or installing any apps.
Once I have it setup the way I want, I make another backup of image for the fully setup drive.

Doing that gives me a relatively quick and easy way to revert to a clean install or fully working install if something goes wrong later or I just want to move to a different drive.

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Old 08-29-2021, 06:26 PM   #11
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Yeah my 8.1. install is kinda crufty... despite the hassle of reinstalling 300 utility programs and plugins, it was tempting to start fresh...

I usually do the same kind of backups when installing new OS's... what's the recommended free utility these days? Macrium Reflect free?
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Old 09-03-2021, 12:23 PM   #12
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Got it done... here's what I needed to do (thanks to all that helped along the way):

- installed new drive
- booted windows, used macrium reflect to image partition to the unpartitioned new drive
- booted linux, ran update-grub2, it found new windows install
- new windows booted fine, used windows drive manager to extend partition
- back to linux; sudo ntfslabel --new-half-serial /dev/sdf1 (where sdf1 was the new windows partition)
- added new UUID to fstab as appropriate
- booted new windows again
- did all windows updates
- installed windows bootloader on new windows drive with: bootsect /nt60 C: /mbr
- shut down, disconnected all drives except new windows partition, booted into new partition
- tried to do win10 upgrade in existing install, but it failed with license product key problems
- deleted everything in C:\Windows\Temp, installed all important and recommended windows updates
- ran DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth (it apparently fixed/restored some stuff)
- ran sfc /scannow (it found no issues), rebooted
- Win10 updater got further this time (no license issues), screen goes blue and it's working away but eventually bails back to desktop
- error is something generic like "Windows 10 upgrade failed"
- used media creation tool to make a USB, same result (couldn't boot to the USB and install that way because it will only do a fresh install, so ran setup.exe from the USB after booting)
- setupdiag.exe showed an error relating to DISM trying to get a package for KB5000983: Error DISM DISM Provider Store: PID=2544 TID=2580 Failed to get the provider DISM Package Manager from the remote provider store. - CProxyProviderStore::GetProvider(hr:0x80004005)
- tried this:
net stop wuauserv
net stop bits
net stop cryptsvc
ren %systemroot%\System32\Catroot2 Catroot2.old
ren %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution SoftwareDistribution.old
net start wuauserv
net start bits
net start cryptsvc
- also manually started a bunch of services that I had set to "manual"
- tried again, still failed
- tried again, running setup.exe off the USB, but yanked the network cable before updating (based on a helpful tip, and also reminiscent of what toleolu said)
- that time it worked; had to let it update a couple drivers once booted, but all seems well now
- boot linux, sudo update-grub2 again

So, all in all, a pretty typical experience with windows administration for me :-), but honestly I was impressed with how smoothly the partition cloning went, and so far win 10 seems to be running great without obvious problems.
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Old 09-04-2021, 12:35 AM   #13
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Glad you got it working, but DAMN!!!!
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Old 09-04-2021, 08:24 AM   #14
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For me that qualifies as an "easy" experience when it comes to windows. :-) I'm actually shocked at how easy the cloning and booting and license stuff worked. Not a glitch. And once the install got going that was also just about flawless. But it wouldn't be a windows install without some kind of inscrutable error code that nobody can figure out and which requires some kind of unorthodox technique to get around. :-)
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