Arch & Windows Wiping UEFI On Install

PinguiniLinguini · 2025-05-26 03:20:52

Hello, I'm somewhat new to Arch and have only been daily driving it for a short period. I currently have a Framework 16 (which I love, would highly recommend) and I dual-boot Arch and Windows off two separate drives, just using the built-in BIOS boot selection when I need to boot into Windows, (Arch is default, so no need to touch anything for it to boot directly into it). However, today I reinstalled Arch, as I wanted to test my backup/restore system. I used the

archinstall

script to install, however, it completely wiped my UEFI options and made Windows unbootable. I attempted to fix this by reinstalling Windows (which I thought would work because originally, when I first set up my dual boot, I installed Windows after Arch,) however, it just wiped the boot options as well, meaning Arch was unbootable. I've attempted to search for any sort of solution and have tried using the Windows repair utility, efibootmgr, ect. to no luck. I would appreciate any advice on how to fix this. (Explanations of commands are also very much appreciated, as I'd like to learn more about the inner-workings of UEFI and boot management.) As of now, I reinstalled Arch to be able to use bash (I hate PowerShell and command prompt, they are evil and a foreign land to me.)

In case it is of any use, here are the outputs of fdisk -l and efibootmgr:

Disk /dev/nvme0n1: 931.51 GiB, 1000204886016 bytes, 1953525168 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt

Device             Start        End    Sectors   Size Type
/dev/nvme0n1p1      2048    2099199    2097152     1G EFI System
/dev/nvme0n1p2   2099200  106956799  104857600    50G Linux root (x86-64)
/dev/nvme0n1p3 106956800 1953523711 1846566912 880.5G Linux home


Disk /dev/nvme1n1: 931.51 GiB, 1000204886016 bytes, 1953525168 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt

Device              Start        End    Sectors   Size Type
/dev/nvme1n1p1       2048      34815      32768    16M Microsoft reserved
/dev/nvme1n1p2      34816 1952206847 1952172032 930.9G Microsoft basic data
/dev/nvme1n1p3 1952206848 1953521663    1314816   642M Windows recovery environment


Disk /dev/zram0: 4 GiB, 4294967296 bytes, 1048576 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 4096 = 4096 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes

BootCurrent: 0001
Timeout: 0 seconds
BootOrder: 0001,2001,2002,2003
Boot0001* EFI Hard Drive (25064E0179F3-CT1000P310SSD2)  PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x1,0x2)/Pci(0x0,0x0)/NVMe(0x1,00-A0-75-01-4E-01-79-F3)/HD(1,GPT,4bbc798d-5ffe-4570-8b73-af4624a03207,0x800,0x200000)RC
Boot0002* EFI PXE 0 for IPv4 (60-6D-3C-BF-1A-49)        PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x8,0x1)/Pci(0x0,0x3)/USB(6,0)/USB(2,0)/MAC(606d3cbf1a49,0)/IPv4(0.0.0.0,0,DHCP,0.0.0.0,0.0.0.0,0.0.0.0)RC
Boot2001* EFI USB Device        RC
Boot2002* EFI DVD/CDROM RC
Boot2003* EFI Network   RC

Thanks in advance for any help!

Last edited by PinguiniLinguini (2025-05-26 03:21:36)

seth · 2025-05-26 06:38:56

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Dual_b … FI_systems
But just re-install the bootloader or UKI?
Don't use archinstall…

Edit: though actually you're now at https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Dual_b … re_Windows ?

I hate PowerShell and command prompt, they are evil and a foreign land to me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_S … _for_Linux
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygwin

Last edited by seth (2025-05-26 06:40:07)

PinguiniLinguini · 2025-05-26 18:37:05

seth wrote:

But just re-install the bootloader or UKI?

I'm slightly confused. I have Grub on Arch, but I'm not using it to boot into Windows, as they're on separate drives and I previously just used the BIOS boot switcher.

I tried to regenerate the Grub configuration with os-prober, but I'm not sure if I mounted the Windows partitions properly and Grub did not detect/add a Windows boot option.

seth wrote:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_S … _for_Linux
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygwin

I've used WSL, but I just wish PowerShell had a more Unix-like feel, that way I could use bash commands and do Windows-specific things eg. regedit.

Last edited by PinguiniLinguini (2025-05-26 18:40:50)

seth · 2025-05-26 20:21:44

Did you click the second link?

The wiki wrote:

Reboot the system into a Windows 10 installation media. When prompted to install select the custom install option and install Windows on the Microsoft basic data partition created earlier. This should also install Microsoft EFI files in the EFI system partition.

PinguiniLinguini · 2025-05-26 20:56:05

seth wrote:

Did you click the second link?

Yes, I've read the entire guide, yet I'm still heavily confused. The guide seems to be focused on a single drive dual-boot setup, but I'd prefer to keep them on separate drives to avoid having to deal with partitions.

seth wrote:

The wiki wrote:
Reboot the system into a Windows 10 installation media. When prompted to install select the custom install option and install Windows on the Microsoft basic data partition created earlier. This should also install Microsoft EFI files in the EFI system partition.

I didn't manually create the partitions, as I just selected the second drive and allowed Windows to automatically create them. Once they were created and Windows was installed, it overwrote my ability to boot into Arch. I reinstalled Arch, but that overwrote my ability to boot into Windows. I'm confused how best to proceed to have both Windows and Arch not in Grub, but in the native BIOS boot switcher.

seth · 2025-05-26 21:07:54

There's going to be one ESP in the system which is also why the installations wipe each other if you allow them to.
It doesn't matter across how many physical disks you then spread the various OS afterwards.

It also doesn't matter how exactly the partitions were created, the point is that they're already there and you've linux installed but windows doesn't work, so you can pretend that you've a bunch of empty partitions and now want to install windows.
Technically https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Dual_b … oot_record might suffice as well (since likely only the windows bootloader is gone but archinstall lft the ntfs partitions alone?)

Arch Linux

#1 2025-05-26 03:20:52

Arch & Windows Wiping UEFI On Install

#2 2025-05-26 06:38:56

Re: Arch & Windows Wiping UEFI On Install

#3 2025-05-26 18:37:05

Re: Arch & Windows Wiping UEFI On Install

#4 2025-05-26 20:21:44

Re: Arch & Windows Wiping UEFI On Install

#5 2025-05-26 20:56:05

Re: Arch & Windows Wiping UEFI On Install

#6 2025-05-26 21:07:54

Re: Arch & Windows Wiping UEFI On Install

Board footer