[SOLVED] Dual-Boot: Windows overwrites bootloader?

wilberfan · 2015-11-03 21:16:28

UEFI system. Windows 7 installed on sda3, Arch installed on sdb4. I modify my firmware/BIOS settings to boot from grub first, DVD 2nd, USB 3rd.

If I boot into Arch, everything is fine. The next boot will give me the grub menu again.

If I boot into Windows via grub, the next time I reboot, "Windows Loader" has replaced my firmware choices and I boot directly into Windows.

I've done some Googling, but most of what I found is several years old and referring to grub-legacy.

I've tried setting the boot sequence with efibootmgr, but things still got overwritten at the next Windows boot.

Thanks in advance.

Last edited by wilberfan (2015-11-03 21:59:02)

ewaller · 2015-11-03 21:29:55

If it hurts, just don't boot Windows

How are you setting your EFI variables? I was having a similar issue and was blaming it on Windows. I had been using efibootmgr to set my variables, and all would be fine until I booted Windows, and it would change. I later configured it using the firmware setup tools for my HP Envy (often mistakenly called BIOS set up) and I have not had any problems with it reverting. I am wondering if there is something about how the variables are configured by efibootmgr that Windows does not like causing Windows to take initiative and "fix" it. Conversely, perhaps the firmware tools intrinsic to the laptop set the variables to Windows liking. As I almost never boot to Windows, I really don't care much. Also, I do not use a boot loader -- I just use the efistub capability of the kernel. Windows will exist on my laptop until the day after the laptop warranty expires.

wilberfan · 2015-11-03 21:41:32

On this particular machine, I boot into Windows probably 2/3rds of the time. (I have another tower and a lappie that are almost exclusively Arch.) It's the Adobe Syndrome (ie, PS, InD, Ill) that keeps me booting into Win7 (Oh, Quicken, too.). I had a perfectly working dual-boot system--until a couple of weeks ago when something got seriously borked. It had been a couple of years, anyway--overdue for a Win re-install.

I can't remember if this was an issue two years ago--nor how I fixed it if it was!

Head_on_a_Stick · 2015-11-03 21:43:48

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Un … boot_order

wilberfan · 2015-11-03 21:58:43

Head_on_a_Stick wrote:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Un … boot_order

As someone, somewhere, said in a different context,

"You, Sir, are a steely-eyed missile man!"

(How did you know I had an ASRock P67 Extreme4 mobo?)

That command seems to have done the trick!

Last edited by wilberfan (2015-11-03 21:59:53)

ewaller · 2015-11-03 22:20:18

wilberfan wrote:

"You, Sir, are a steely-eyed missile man!"

Flight, EECOM. Try SCE to AUX

Arch Linux

#1 2015-11-03 21:16:28

[SOLVED] Dual-Boot: Windows overwrites bootloader?

#2 2015-11-03 21:29:55

Re: [SOLVED] Dual-Boot: Windows overwrites bootloader?

#3 2015-11-03 21:41:32

Re: [SOLVED] Dual-Boot: Windows overwrites bootloader?

#4 2015-11-03 21:43:48

Re: [SOLVED] Dual-Boot: Windows overwrites bootloader?

#5 2015-11-03 21:58:43

Re: [SOLVED] Dual-Boot: Windows overwrites bootloader?

#6 2015-11-03 22:20:18

Re: [SOLVED] Dual-Boot: Windows overwrites bootloader?

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