Before I go any further, just a reminder that Linux 4 Everyone just did a video on stopping the hating on us dual-booters. I have a couple of must have pieces of software that I have not found a Linux solution for yet.
I spend 99% of my pc time in Linux, but the dark side of my machine still has Windows 7. My question is, if I try doing the free update to Windows 10 (so I don’t have to unplug my ethernet cable when I do boot up Windows), will that mess up the dual boot setup? Do I need to take any steps first, like having a Grub repair on live usb install? (Which I’m sure wouldn’t hurt to have regardless). Is it a simple process to repair that if something does happen?
Any other helpful advice? (not “don’t install Windows”).
If you wouldn’t mind a lateral answer while waiting for a direct one.
I’d recommend duckduckgoing “windows update grub” and reading people’s experiences with destructive Windows updates. Even if your upgrade succeeds the Linux partition is still at the mercy of future Win10 updates. The best answer may be simply using a 2nd hard drive though if this is a laptop that may mean a USB-C or USB 3.0 to m.2 adapter or a way to hot swap drives.
I don’t have any experience with Windows upgrades, but you should always be prepared for the worst. Assume the same with all OS upgrades, that you will loose everything, have good backups of all important data.
My best recommendation would be to copy your drive with clonezilla or dd your drive to another drive. Make sure it boots and works properly. Remove the drive then go ahead with the update. Make it a learning experience without any worries. Hope to hear your feedback of how it went.
Yes, we can’t offer you any assurance that Microsoft won’t take a convenient pot-shot at any neighbouring linux install that it detects, without informing you. It’s possible, however unlikely, that they truly don’t know they are innocently hurting a Linux install, when they aggressively update their bootloader with no warning.
Thanks for the replies. I will try “duckduckgoing” for this and see what comes up (that does not roll off the tongue nearly as smoothly as “googling”.
It may still be some time before I attempt the upgrade as I still need to go through my Win apps to see what may need to be reinstalled after upgrading and considering any other ramifications.
I do have multiple internal HDDs in my desktop but unfortunately my Manjaro install is on the same drive as my Windows install. Maybe I could do some shuffling around and change that.
I do have my /home folder on a separate HDD, and regularly rsync that to yet another internal HDD, so the backups are there. (Yes, I still intend to do an external backup for offsite storage). And I have a portion of my docs in an offsite Nextcloud server, so there is a pseudo backup there (I know, not a real backup).
I also run Timeshift, so the main install is also backed up.
I’ve now created a MulitbootUSB drive with gparted live, rescatux and a couple of full distros on it. Any other tools I should put on that?