Windows 8 is gone

[treener]

You're probably saying..so what? It's supposed to be there in a dual boot scenerio. I followed a step by step tutorial for installing Mint 13 with Win 8 by NoErrors. Mint will boot..with some issues. Not serious I hope, but Windows seems to have disappeared. That's the gist of it.
Being a relative novice with linux my idea is to format the hard drive, reinstall windows, and start over with linux or vice versa. It's a new machine so nothing but a little time would be lost. How would I do that?
But, that's my idea. Please someone tell me there is a less drastic solution. Please Thanks in advance.
PS, during the install, there was a note that there was a partition missing, but that it could be added later. Any ideas on that? Could that be the dual boot information? I know this is not a technicaly rich post. Forgive me.

[srs5694]

Given your description, it's impossible to say what's happened or how to recover. Please run the Boot Info Script and post the RESULTS.txt file that it creates, either between code tags or as a link. That will give us the information we need to offer better advice.

[treener]

Thanks for the reply. If I'm a little slow getting back, it's because I'm feeling my way along. I'll try this..
[url]file:///home/george/Documents/bootinfoscript-061/RESULTS.txt[/url] If this isn't what you need (I don't think it is) I don't know how to include the attachment. I'llwork on it.

[treener]

Ok, I'll try to get the results from bootinfoscript uploaded again.

[srs5694]

The problem is that you've got an existing EFI-mode installation of Windows, but you installed Mint in BIOS mode. The result is that each OS is bootable via its own method (EFI vs. BIOS), but switching that boot mode tends to be awkward on most motherboards. There are several possible solutions:

• Re-install Linux, but be sure that the installer is running in EFI mode. You can check this from a Linux shell by looking for a directory called /sys/firmware/efi -- if it's present, you've booted in EFI mode; if it's absent, you've probably booted in BIOS mode. Unfortunately, getting the installer to boot in a particular mode can be tricky, and the details vary from one computer to another. You may need to adjust your firmware options or use the firmware's built-in boot manager (usually accessed via a function key at boot time).
• Install an EFI boot loader for Linux. Unfortunately, this creates a chicken-and-egg problem, since part of the installation process is to use the "efibootmgr" utility to register the boot loader with the firmware, but this utility works only in an EFI-mode boot, and your Mint is currently booting in BIOS mode. You can do the job from an emergency disc booted in EFI mode, though.
• Switch boot modes, boot to Windows, and install my rEFInd boot manager. You can then edit its refind.conf file: Uncomment the "scanfor" line and add "hdbios" to the list of options. When you reboot in EFI mode, rEFInd should then give you an option of booting Windows (in EFI mode) or a generic boot loader (which should launch GRUB in BIOS mode). This won't work on all computers, though; some lack the necessary support.
• Run Ubuntu's Boot Repair tool. (I think you may need to do it in EFI mode, but I'm not 100% positive of that.) This will implement a hackish fix that should install an EFI-mode version of Mint, which should let you select Mint or Windows. Unfortunately, this sometimes creates a setup that fails in launching Windows.
• Completely wipe the partition table data and re-install both Windows and Mint in BIOS mode. This is the most radical solution, and it's probably not worth doing. An exception is if you're using a Samsung laptop, since they've got a firmware bug that can result in bricking the laptop if it's booted in EFI mode. It used to be believed that this bug was triggered by a Samsung-specific kernel module, but it's now known to be more general than that, and it's even possible to brick the computer from Windows.

Sorry I don't have anything easier for you. IMHO, the Mint installer is broken; it should detect the mode of the Windows installation and issue big warnings if it's about to install Linux in the other mode. It doesn't do that.

[treener]

Thank you for your work. And it's good news..I think. Bricking sounds bad. I never in a million years would have come up with with these ideas, except the "clear everything and start over" option. The flip side of the coin..I'm chewing on this, digesting. I get the general idea of the problem. Are your suggestions in some kind of order, ie, best to least. So I would have a good place to start. This will turn into a project for me, I know it..days. It took me three hours to get that "results" file into my previous post. I know now why they call them "read me" files.
Any how, thanks again

[kc1di]

Hello treener and welcome to Mint,

here are a couple of pages that may lead to a solution for you.
One thing I noticed is you need to make sure quick boot is disabled in your bios setup.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UEFI
after reading though that page you may want to download and run boot-repair found here:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Repair
hope it helps , good luck

[kc1di]

Sorry for the double post

[srs5694]

Are your suggestions in some kind of order, ie, best to least.

Not really. They've all got their advantages and disadvantages, which I've tried to summarize in my earlier post so that you can decide for yourself what to do.

One thing I noticed is you need to make sure quick boot is disabled in your bios setup.

I disagree with that assessment. It can help on some computers, particularly if you need to boot in BIOS mode for some reason; but on a properly-functioning computer, the quick boot feature should be fine. Overall, I'd say to disable quick boot if you have problems at any point in the boot process, or if some hardware doesn't work correctly once you've booted.

One caveat, though: If you're dual-booting with Windows, it has its own "fast start" feature, which essentially turns a power-off operation into a suspend-to-disk operation. This is dangerous on a dual-boot computer, since shared partitions (including the ESP) will be in an inconsistent state when booted back into Linux. Thus, this Windows feature should be disabled. See here for instructions.

[kc1di]

point well taken srs5694 however here's the offical unbutu take on that:

In your BIOS, disable QuickBoot/FastBoot and Intel Smart Response Technology (SRT).

It seems on some intel machines quickboot will prevent uefi from working in ubuntu , which of coarse is the base upon which Mint is built.

That's why I suggest he check it out on his machine since he is having trouble.

[treener]

Hi guys, thanks much for this discussion. I'm reading, reading. Both of you seem to agree the quick boot should be disabled if I want to dual boot Win8 and Mint, right? But I have to get Windows to boot first. "Boot Repair" seems like a magic bullet. Gets Windows back if gone (my case), or gets Linux back if it's gone. I'm not crazy about Win 8, but it is a filler till I would get Mint up and running..wireless, email, etc. But I can do that..first things first.
I'm on my old XP system right now, which BTW I had in a dual boot with Ubuntu about 4 years ago. Ironically (sp) I lost Ubuntu on this machine. "Boot Repair" may have helped then. I digress, sorry.
Right now, I have to go back through these past posts. Give me a day and I'll get back

[kc1di]

Right now, I have to go back through these past posts. Give me a day and I'll get back

Good luck we'll be here when you back

[treener]

Hi fellows, I had to install Mint in CSM boot mode to bypass "Secure Boot". What would happen if I now switched boot back to UEFI mode? Will it automatically reinsert "Secure boot"? I don't want to just start pushing buttons. Do you think bricking has me worried? Thanks
PS to srs5692, the directory /sys/firmware/efi is not present. O

[Pierre]

if you have wiped win8, successfully, then neither secure_boot nor UEFI is needed - so leave them off - keep as is.

[treener]

Thanks Pierre, My problem is Windows is still there, I'm pretty sure. I want to dual boot, windows being a backup till I get Mint where I want it. But, Windows won't boot..no menu at boot to choose between the two. I read, been doing a lot of reading, Windows 8 needs uefi to boot. My question is What would happen if I reenable uefi in the boot settings? I need one of these OS to run to do anything.

[srs5694]

AFAIK, every x86-64 computer that supports Secure Boot provides a way to disable it while still booting in EFI mode. That said, there are no standards about where such options exist in the firmware's user interface; they could be buried, or the option to do it might be hidden until another option is set (or unset). Therefore, I recommend you re-examine your firmware options to locate the one that disables Secure Boot.

Once you've found that, you can review the list of options I presented earlier and try one to get dual-boot working.

Alternatively, you could add Secure Boot support to a Linux EFI boot loader. This will be trickier, though, since Mint doesn't yet support this option. See my general page on the topic or the page in rEFInd's documentation on the topic for details. This takes some know-how, but once you've got the know-how it's not really all that hard. The trick is you'll need to spend some time reading and digesting what little documentation actually exists on the topic.