UPDATE: So after I broke grub, I tried reinstalling Fedora. Now windows has disappeared from BIOS
UPDATE: So after I broke grub, I tried reinstalling Fedora. Now windows has disappeared from BIOS
EDIT: So after all that, I was able to reinstall windows and download Macrium reflect + my backup. First time I tried to recover it, it failed for some reason, but the second time around I was able to restore it successfully. I'm now back where I started, thank you everyone!
I'm not done with Linux yet, but I think I'm going to try and run it in a good VM for the time being. When I'm done with classes, or when I get a separate device, I will give it another go.
Post 1: https://lemmy.ca/post/3709382
Post 2: https://lemmy.ca/post/3863438
Yesterday I could at least change the order in the BIOS to boot windows. Now I can't even do that.
I think when reinstalling, I must have overwritten something (the EFI?). I saw some other people that had a very similar experience, and the advice was to reinstall Windows. I'm currently downloading Windows installation media on another computer and I'm going to try and reinstall windows now.
This just keeps getting worse and worse, and thank you for the help while I struggle through this.
If anyone has other tips, I'd appreciate it :)
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Some BIOSes have trouble booting anything other than Windows, so some distros default to clobbering the Windows Boot Manager and trying to manage everything from GRUB. It sounds to me like this is what happened to you except it somehow got borked.
If the Windows install is still present on your drive it should be possible to restore the Windows Boot Manager. Then you won't be able to boot Linux but you'll at least be able to get into Windows.
Try booting off Windows install media and running Startup Repair using the following instructions: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-client/performance/windows-boot-issues-troubleshooting#method-1-startup-repair-tool
If that doesn't work try one of these solutions:
https://superuser.com/questions/460762/how-can-i-repair-the-windows-8-efi-bootloader
https://superuser.com/questions/612830/how-to-reinstall-windows-boot-manager-on-efi-partition
Good luck!
Also relevant xkcd
No joke, I'm trying to fix a family member's laptop's wifi issues while I wait.
So I'm somewhere between 6-10 hours
Also thank you!
what dot20 said was similar to what I had to do in order to get the Windows boot option back after GRUB couldn't find it after a Fedora install. As long as you can still see your Windows drive when you boot up the Windows Install Media, you should be able to rebuild its EFI entry.
As an addendum, here is a link to the Fedora docs for what to do in Fedora after you manage to rebuild Windows' EFI stuff.
Thank you, saving this as well
Between 6-10 hours of what?
edit: oh, you mean the xkcd, LOL. Well let me know if it works out for you haha
Yep, sorry should have specified 😄
Your notes were helpful and I'm saving them for future reference. Unfortunately I already decided to just try for a clean reinstall