Dual boot HP 2000-2d49WM Ubuntu & Windows 8

[bilkay]

Wow! I just stumbled on the solution. The screen was black because the brightness came on set all the way down! How dumb is that?

[bilkay]

So I have it installed and so far everything looks fine except for one tiny thing (other than that it starts black): It only boots into windows. Then, to get to ubuntu, I have to go to shutdown, hold down the shift key while clicking on restart, and then selecting ubuntu. There's gotta be a better way.

p.s. Same result with secure boot enabled and disabled.

[oldfred]

If you installed in legacy/CSM/BIOS mode you cannot dual boot from grub, only from UEFI menu or one time boot key if your system auto switches from UEFI to BIOS mode. Some require you to turn on/off CSM or UEFI modes to change.
UEFI and BIOS are not really compatible, once you start booting in one mode you cannot change. So if different modes you cannot dual boot from grub.
Also even if Ubuntu is in UEFI mode, there is a bug on booting Windows in UEFI mode if secure boot is on.

[bilkay]

So you're basically saying I'm screwed? Could I create a usb stick that directly boots to the installed ubuntu on HD?

[oldfred]

No, you just will not be able to use new 3TB drive to boot Windows unless you have UEFI.

Install Windows on a smaller drive with MBR and boot in BIOS mode. You can then install Ubuntu on 3TB drive with gpt partitioning to boot in BIOS mode. To get grub to install correctly on gpt drive, you do need the tiny 1 or 2 MB unformatted partition with the bios_grub flag. If you think drive may get transfered to a new system with UEFI, I would also suggest a 200 to 500MB fat32 partition at the beginning of the drive for future use as efi partition. It could be difficult to add later when drive is full and efi partition should be near or at front of drive.
And since drive is huge, I would keep / (root) as a 25GB partition and then use rest of drive as /home and/or NTFS shared data partition(s).

I used to dual boot Ubuntu on gpt drive and XP on MBR drive without issue.

For the Total space you want for Ubuntu:
Ubuntu's standard install is just / (root) & swap, but it is better to add another partition for /home if allocating over 30GB.:
Only if gpt - all partitions in gpt are primary:
gpt: 300 MB efi FAT32 w/boot flag (for UEFI boot or future use for UEFI, you only can have one per drive, so if already existing do not attempt another)
gpt: 1 MB No Format w/bios_grub flag (for BIOS boot not required for UEFI)
for gpt(GUID) or MBR(msdos) partitioning
Ubuntu partitions - smaller root only where hard drive space is limited.
If total space less than about 30GB just use / not separate /home or standard install.
1. 10-25 GB Mountpoint / primary or logical beginning ext4(or ext3)
2. all but 2 GB Mountpoint /home logical beginning ext4(or ext3)
3. 2 GB Mountpoint swap logical

Depending on how much memory you have you may not absolutely need swap but having some is still recommended. I do not hibernate (boots fast enough for me) but if hibernating then you need swap equal to RAM in GiB not GB. And if dual booting with windows a shared NTFS partition is also recommended. But you usually cannot create that as part of the install, just leave some space. Or partition in advance (recommended).
One advantage of partitioning in advance is that the installer will use the swap space to speed up the install. Thanks Herman for the tip.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/DiskSpace
suggested partitions for just Ubuntu on 3TB drive.
http://askubuntu.com/questions/33643...rtition-scheme
Another advanced suggestion from TheFu with Multiple / (root) - Post #5 similar to what I actually do
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2170308
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2021534

[bilkay]

That's an awful lot to understand and digest (and do). I'd be happy if I could install grub on a usb stick and use that when I wanted to boot into ubuntu, and leave it out the very infrequent times I'd want to boot into windows. Everything I've found so far on that subject seems to assume I'd be loading linux from the USB.

[oldfred]

If you do not want to update system and only add a few applications you can run the install with persistence. You cannot change the installer or default boot, but persistence lets you save some info.
Or you can do a full install to one USB flash drive to another flash drive.

Pros & cons of persistence install over direct install to flashdrives - C.S.Cameron
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2133067
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1655412

[bilkay]

What about using elilo "Bootloader for systems using EFI-based firmware"?

[oldfred]

As I understand elilo is just another boot loader like grub. I think it was an earlier boot loader that worked with UEFI before grub worked with UEFI.

I have tried installing DUET which is a UEFI boot loader for Windows even though I do not have Windows. I just wanted to try it. I did get it to install to my flash drive and start to load, but version from rodsbook script is not the newest and did not work with Ubuntu, and it looks like it has not been updated since so many new systems now have UEFI. So not much need anymore.

Duet - UEFI for BIOS:
http://www.rodsbooks.com/bios2uefi/

[bilkay]

Thanks for your replies and have a Happy New Year!