Install to external (I think) SSD

[Xen]

Grizzly schreef op 29-07-2017 13:48:

> Any help please, I will be trying top do this later today

The most important part is that most BIOSes can boot from whatever disk 
you want that has a bootloader installed.

So you do not need to change the original harddisk to boot something 
installed on a separate harddisk.

That said you can simply install on this other disk (SSD) without the 
first disk connected; to be completely safe; and it will install like 
regular system; do you connect them back as usual, then selecting the 
second disk in the boot options of your BIOS will allow you to boot this 
system directly no questions asked.

Often times there is a boot menu with something like F10, F12, or even 
esc, at the boot prompt of your BIOS.

Now this does become tiresome but it is easy to do.

There are two more options.



1) If the secondary disk (SSD) is indeed connected as the first (or 
chosen in the BIOS boot order as the first disk to boot from) then you 
will obtain the GRUB menu from Linux by default when you boot up your 
computer.

This menu can contain the Windows installation on the (now secondary) 
disk as well. But there is a chance it might not work by default without 
a manual fix. I mean to say that Linux will include this Windows 
installation on the (now secondary) disk by default. Sometimes it 
doesn't boot, but there is a fix for that though. What I mean to say is 
that GRUB will swap the primary and secondary disk while selecting 
Windows, so that Windows thinks it is booting from the first BIOS disk. 
Sorry for the confusion here.

In general this just works with perhaps a small fix to apply.

The consequence is that when the person selects the Linux disk as the 
first boot device in the BIOS, then user then will always get a GRUB 
menu to boot with, and can select either Windows or Linux, the order of 
which can be chosen in some way.

So what you get is the boot menu from the Linux disk (SSD) with the 
Windows disk unharmed.


2) It is also possible to install the grub menu on any USB stick or SD 
Card (the bootloader in fact) and use that USB stick or SD card as the 
primary boot device. The bootloader will then read the grub menu from 
the Linux disk and operate in exactly the same manner for the rest of 
it.

However this is an additional option with usually few benefits over the 
previous one except for the fact that it is a recovery mechanism for 
always being able to boot Linux.



So the typical solution would be:

- original HDD containing Windows = BIOS disk 2.
- new SSD containing Linux = BIOS disk 1.
- the installation does not touch the original HDD.
- the boot menu is installed only on the SSD.
- the boot menu is activated only when the SSD is made the boot device.
- this can either be fixed or chosen using the F10/F12/Esc menu.
- if the original HDD is selected, Windows boots as normal with no 
modifications whatsoever.

At that point you can:

- select in the BIOS to always boot Windows
- select in the BIOS to always get GRUB, at which point you can select 
between Windows and Linux

and in all of this the Windows disk is never touched.

Regards.

(Basically it is a very good idea what you propose. Regards).