Attempting to reinstall Manjaro on an existing dual boot setup (Manjaro/Windows). Please help to clarify my doubts

[moonjamoon]

Hello everyone. I needed some advice before I go on to install Manjaro 21.0.7 (Gnome). I am currently running a dual boot (Manjaro 20 + Windows 10) on my laptop.

I followed the step-by-step guide titled “[HowTo] Dual-boot Manjaro - Windows 10 - Step by Step]” (present on Manjaro forums, unfortunately my account is too young to add links in posts) for dual booting Manjaro/Windows earlier & will do the same again. It’s just that I have always performed dual boot installations from scratch & never overwritten an existing Linux partition in a properly working dual boot setup.

A little bit about my laptop configuration & the dual boot setup:

Model: Acer Predator PH315-52
Processor: i7-9750H
Discrete Gfx: GeForce RTX™ 2060
RAM: 16 GB
SSD 0: 256 GB (Windows 10) (/dev/nvme0n1)
SSD 1: 512 GB (Manjaro 20) (/dev/nvme1n1)
HDD 0: 1 TB

With the above configuration, I will be following the above mentioned guide again. The core steps boil down to these:

1. Boot into live USB media
2. Launch the graphical installer
3. Select Manual Partitioning
4. Completely Erase old Manjaro Partition (/dev/nvme1n1)
5. Create new partitions (EFI, Swap, root, home)
6. Complete installation
7. Update grub
8. Done.

Is there anything I am missing? Is there any basic mistake I am committing that might cause the dual boot to not work as expected (like losing one of the entries in grub or directly booting to Windows etc.)

Please advice. Thank You.

[Olli]

i would remove the existing manjaro first and after installing the new manjaro the way you are used.

(SOLVED) Removing Manjaro from Dual Boot (CORRECT Way)

How to delete Manjaro xfce and install windows 10?

[maycne.sonahoz]

Haven’t you kept your Manjaro up-to-date?

[HowTo] Upgrade Manjaro to the latest version

Difficulty: ★☆☆☆☆ How can i upgrade Manjaro to the latest version? Simply update as usual. Being a rolling release distribution, keeping Manjaro up-to-date is enough to always be at the latest version. How can i upgrade the kernel? Actually, kernels are an “exception” to the above rule, in the sense that they will only update to the latest patch version. This is because Manjaro allows users to have multiple kernels installed. As such, updating your system will also update your installed ke…

---

[HowTo] post screenshots and links

Difficulty: ★☆☆☆☆ You’ve probably been sent here by a more experienced user because you cannot post links nor screenshots so please follow the simple instructions of this tutorial below to allow you to post both screenshots and links in any post and have a short explanation of why you can’t do this easily… If you’re reading this in response to a question, please click the green link above this text to bring you to the full unabridged text of the tutorial itself. If you …

[stephane]

@moonjamoon

Manjaro 21.0.7 (Gnome).

1. you should better use lastest iso manjaro , not old one ,
   you will break on first upgrade even with pacman

2. check that all UEFI version motherboard is up to date ,
   if not prefers before update

3. see theses for boot in UEFI

before installing
ALWAYS recheck options in UEFI

secure boot off
fast boot off
csm off
legacy off
all drivers on AHCI ( not raid )
no optane RST

it easy to check before installing from USB live manjaro
open a terminal

inxi  -Fxza
test -d /sys/firmware/efi && echo efi || echo bios
sudo efibootmgr -v
sudo parted -l 

in some case Nvme can require vmd in mkinitcpio.conf (this a micro$oft package )

4. gparted can be use to create before partitions

5. in case part EFI ( /boot/efi ) , dont forget to add flags boot& esp on MOUNTPOINT declaration

6. if possible create 2 profiles in your UEFI settings , one for Windows , other for Linux ( no secure boot)

be careful on any update microsoft that they change always any options
( AHCI disks , fast boot , secure boot on , etc … )

7. if you only lost entry UEFi boot for manjaro ( it do not appears with efibootmgr )

for adding entry in UEFI

change disk letter sdX ( X=a, b,c ,etc) and -p N (N= 1 , 2 , 3 )
if nmve , it will be nvmeX -pN

sudo manjaro-chroot -a 
cat /etc/fstab ( check that UUID /boot/efi is ok )
efibootmgr -c -d /dev/sdX -p N -L "manjaro" -l "\EFI\Manjaro\grubx64.efi"
efibootmgr -v
exit ( quit chroot )

[moonjamoon]

Haven’t you kept your Manjaro up-to-date?

No. I had set it up for some dev work while in university. But got a job in the following months & the employer decided to send over a laptop for work related activities. So this setup got a little bit ignored.

The original install was Manjaro with KDE. Now, I want to explore its Gnome variant. So rather than updating the OS & then changing the desktop environment, I thought better to go for a clean install. Will experience Manjaro Gnome from scratch.

[moonjamoon]

secure boot off
fast boot off
csm off
legacy off
all drivers on AHCI ( not raid )
no optane RST

All these settings are in place.

be careful on any update microsoft that they change always any options
( AHCI disks , fast boot , secure boot on , etc … )

Noted. Will keep this in mind

Moving forward with clean installation.

[Olli]

i would recommend to do a whole clone of the disk (including win+manjaro) with something like clonezilla. you’ll be always on the safe side

[moonjamoon]

Well, I followed the instructions to the dot. Upon reboot, the system is booting into Windows 10. There is no GRUB menu. Pressing F2 on boot (to access BIOS), leads to a black screen with a white cursor on it.

This has happened with me before. I think I overcame this by removing & reapplying the CMOS battery & then rebooting. I was able to access the BIOS then & I changed the boot order to make things work.

So, I feel this is a boot order problem. Any suggestions? @stephane / @Olli / @maycne.sonahoz

[moonjamoon]

Solved it by removing the CMOS connection as well as the battery connection, turning on the PC & then then reapplying the connection.

I think that caused the BIOS to reset to factory state & I was able to access the boot menu once again.