Ubuntu does not load after installing it alongside Windows

Question

I installed Ubuntu 12.04 and I chose to install 'alongside windows 7'.

After installation and restart, Windows 7 loaded but there is no sign that Ubuntu is actually installed.

Windows 7 is installed in hdd0, boots in legacy mode (only 1 HD in machine), UEFI secure boot is disabled.

I don't see anything on UEFI boot.

Partitions on my 1TB HDD:

100MB ntfs (win 7 installation made it automatically)
200GB NTFS (Win 7 partition)
4 GB Partition (I don't know what fs type)
rest all unallocated

Edit: Yesterday I deleted the unused 4 gb partition current OS is running on live usb fat 32

The result of fdisk -l

Result of sudo parted -l

Is it possible you started the live CD but did not install Ubuntu? Since... 'unallocated' means non-formatted and without formatting something to ext3 or ext4 you can not install Linux. — Rinzwind, Jan 08 '13 at 09:16
I did installed it. It gave me 3 options
(1)alongside win7
(2)replace win7
(3)something else( for repartitioning ,formatting, swap, ext drive etc.) i chosed alongside win 7. — Gaurav Sharma, Jan 08 '13 at 09:19
Can you boot from the Live CD, and start Disk Utility to see if the rest of the data is really unallocated? — Gerhard Burger, Jan 08 '13 at 09:32
Are you sure you didn't install it via WUBI? Because if that's the case, your whole Ubuntu install will be inside your NTFS partition, in a file. — ThiagoPonte, Jan 09 '13 at 11:09
I booted my pc to usb 4gb drive in uefi mode, then selected install alongside windows. This isnt wubi I guess — Gaurav Sharma, Jan 10 '13 at 06:33

score 1 · Answer 1 · edited Jun 12 '20 at 14:37

Solution

Reinstall GRUB2 to the MBR, either:

with the instructions here^*, or
(if you prefer) using any of these methods.

^{* This should fix the problem even though in this case it was not caused by a recent installation of Windows, see below.}

Explanation

You're installing alongside Windows 7 (not Windows 8 or later) and there's no reason to believe this is a UEFI system (no "Secure Boot"). Therefore, we should expect that the cause of this problem is the usual cause of Ubuntu failing to boot after being installed as a fully-fledged (i.e., non-Wubi) system.

Sometimes Ubuntu's installer will not successfully install the GRUB2 boot loader to the Master Boot Record. As I answered in this related (but somewhat different) question:

While most installations go without anything going wrong, this is actually one of the more common installation problems. It can occur if you manually tell the installer not to install GRUB to the master boot record of the first hard drive, if it identifies the first hard drive incorrectly (its idea of first isn't necessarily what the BIOS tries to boot first), if it thinks a suitable boot loader is already in place (and is wrong), and possibly for other reasons.

Reinstalling the GRUB2 boot loader to the master boot record of the drive that the BIOS is trying to boot almost always solves this problem. When someone with a working Ubuntu system installs a Windows system alongside Ubuntu, the Windows installer will overwrite the master boot record with its own boot loader, which does not detect and provide an option to boot Ubuntu. That's what your situation has in common with that of users who've just installed Windows beside Ubuntu.

I have posted the screenshot of fdisk -l using live ubuntu 12.04 — Gaurav Sharma, Jan 09 '13 at 09:04

Ubuntu does not load after installing it alongside Windows

1 Answers1

Solution

Explanation

Linked