I have a real simple solution that involves not windows
i use a different drive for my windows installation because that happened to often,
and i swear it once managed to wipe the bootloader on the linux drive.
i have no idea how it did that,
but i avoided starting windows using the grub entry since then.
Having two drives is sometimes not enough, either. I have no idea why, but anytime Windows installs for the first time or goes through a major update (not the small security patches, but the periodic feature releases) there’s a random D20 dice throw to determine if it will randomly decide to create the bootloader and recovery partitions in another drive, even though your main installation isn’t there.
I kid you not, Windows 10 once decided that my external SSD enclosure was the best place to put the bootloader.
This happened to me! Did an update, unplugged my eSATA and BAM! Can’t find bootloader. I literally, physically facepalmed when I realized what happened. At least the old one still worked from the primary.
I’ve done a ton of Linux updates and this has never happened to me once (yet).
Pfft, even 2 separate ssds for dual booting doesnt stop this from happening to me -___-
On the plus side, this is the first i recall hearing of someone encountering the same issue, so i guess i dont feel as alone now.
Windows has a lovely “feature” where it installs the bootloader on a secondary drive if there’s one connected. It doesn’t install it on drive 1 and drive 2, just drive 2. I always disconnect all secondary drives before installing windows for this very reason.
That said you can configure the windows bootloader to recognize your Linux (or grub) and just use that to manage booting two OSes and it’s less likely to not destroy things.
Is that actually easily fixable? Was planning to go dual-boot soon on my laptop and haven’t even considered this scenario.
iirc the last time it happened to me, i just needed to fix the uefi entry which wasnt that bad.
(just remember to have a usb stick with a live image ready)
if it were to overwrite your bootloader that would be a way harder fix.
i dont remember if the second ever happend to me
I swear at this point Windows users are collectively victims of Stockholm syndrome.
Yes, someone please come free us! I am being held hostage by Windows and Autodesk Inventor.
It’s the usual problem: if your employer IT refuses to budge, you get locked into a Windows (or Apple) ecosystem. I had the same. My solution was to remove myself from corporate IT, and use my own device.
I use workarounds for the interfaces with corporate:
- MS Teams Linux client (sadly discontinued as of 2022) still works out of a jail, but the browser solution is also tested and ready as backup should I be forced
- Webmail instead of a proper mail proram - that’s a big trade-off, but I can work with it, as much as it sucks
- Webex for conferencing (as it works properly with Firefox, contrary to many other solutions)
- Web portals continue to work - even though sometimes I need a user agent switcher to pretend I am using chrome (fuck you @MS Teams)
I take it webmail is due to Exchange-based mail?
The €10 I pay a year for Exquilla is worth its weight in gold. It’s about the only thing on my system that’s not FOSS, but I’m not even mad because it works. 9.5/10 would recommend.
Or Nvidia GPU owners because Nvidia is fine on Windows but sucks on Linux.
I’m using kde5 on X. To my knowledge, the only issues you might have with Nvidia on Linux is if you want to use Wayland instead of X. Unless you are someone who refuses to use non-free drivers for philosophical reasons, but then you wouldn’t be using Windows.
I’ve been running an Nvidia GPU for over 6 years now on Linux without issues.
I even am using a fairly recent 4070ti and was able to use it with proprietary drivers soon after launch and was running cyberpunk 2077 at 4k with high settings and ray tracing with an average 60fps with dsr.
I also use the cuda cores for running open source llms locally and have no issues there either.
the only issues you might have with Nvidia on Linux is if you want to use Wayland instead of X
So present-day technology instead of legacy crap.
It actually is worse than “that bad”. Windows 2000 wasn’t “that bad” - everything after that has gone downhill.
Objective reasons why Windows is extremely shitty:
- with every new Windows version, the same settings are shuffled around and users have to re-learn the interfaces to find stuff they had been able to easily find before
- bloatware
- tons of software is shoved down your throat with opt-out options either not available, or you have to jump through literal hoops to get there
It’s always funny to me when people defend something by saying that it’s “not that bad”, because that still acknowledges that it is bad.
I mean I can take up issues with Linux as well. The driver support can be iffy at times, especially with Nvidia, gaming can be a challenge, depending on what game you’re playing.
“Not that bad” is a phrase, which acknowledges issues but still contests something to be bad beyond acceptance.
I always say, an OS is a tool, not a religion. I use Linux at home 98% of the time because it fits what I need to do and it’s snappier than Windows on my hardware and gives me more control, or maybe I know better how to do certain things in Linux nowadays that I’ve left Windows mostly behind. I use Windows at work because that’s what dictated, and also because MS Visio is only on Windows (I could use MacOS with Omnigraffle, but Macs are not available at my pay grade. Whatever). They pay me to work and be productive, and this means using Outlook/Teams, AD SSO integration with Edge, all the VPNs/network control/DLP agents. And luckily now I can use Linux subsystem in Windows, so I can work on the cli when I need to do something fancy. They don’t pay me to spend hours trying to find a way to work with their systems other than what’s supported.
On the topic at hand (bootloader issues). Never had a problem personally, but Iast time I did proper dual booting (on the same drive) was with Windows8.1. Now I have different drives, with the bios configured to boot from the drive with Linux. If I want to boot on Windows 10 I actually have to change the boot sequence. And even then there is grub (from an old dual boot setup).
Picture this: you buy a car. You buy a new set of wheels/rims and a new radio system with Android and whatever. You also put some new carpets on the floor of the car. Now you need to take it for a simple routine maintenance and checkup at the car brand official shop. After a few hours you go back there to pick you car up and it has the stock wheels, stock radio, stock carpets and everything and you ask where the hell is your stuff and ALL of them on the shop look at you confused like if they never seen any different accessory on that car before other than the stock ones, or don’t know what you are talking about. All they know is that the car is now “according to spec”.
This is what it feels like after updating Windows with Linux in dual-boot on the same drive.
