Multi-boot

Always install Windows first

Windows does not detect other operating systems and does not feature a boot menu. When you install it, it overwrites your boot sequence and your computer then boots straight into Windows.

Linux Mint (and most Linux distributions) detects other operating systems and builds a menu from which you can choose which system to boot.

For this reason, if you want to dual-boot or multi-boot with Windows, it is easier and recommended to install Windows first, before you install Linux Mint.

Fix the boot sequence

If Windows overwrites your boot sequence:

  1. Boot Linux Mint in live mode (with your USB stick or DVD).

  2. Open a terminal.

  3. To list your partitions, type lsblk -f and press Enter.

_images/lsblkf.png

Find the partition where Linux Mint is installed. On most systems this should be the only ext4 partition.

In the screenshot above:

  • sdb is the USB stick (recognizable by its iso9660 type which corresponds to an ISO image).

  • sda is the hard drive.

  • sda4 is the partition on the sda hard drive, where Linux Mint is installed.

To list partition sizes, type lsblk:

_images/lsblk.png

To list partition labels, type blkid:

_images/blkid.png

  1. Mount the Linux Mint partition and reinstall the grub menu with the following commands:

sudo mount /dev/sda4 /mnt
sudo grub-install --root-directory=/mnt /dev/sda

Warning

In the commands above, replace /dev/sda4 and /dev/sda with the appropriate names for your Linux Mint partition and your hard drive device.