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I've looked through many problem solving techniques for similar problems, but with my set-up it appears none of them are quite relevant.

My computer is a HP Envy Phoenix with 3 drives installed: 128GB SSD which my Windows is installed on, 2TB Drive which I generally install programs on and use for storage and a 1TB (Previously completely empty) drive of which I recently installed Ubuntu 14.04 on.

The issue I am now faced with is that the BIOS menu is no longer showing the 128GB drive to boot off at all, meaning my Windows drive has completely vanished. Funny thing is, when I use Gparted or even go to re-install Ubuntu, the 128GB drive appears. (Although in the Ubuntu installer it doesn't show it to be the host to Windows OS).

When I installed Ubuntu, I installed it on the previously stated 1TB COMPLETELY CLEAN drive and did not do anything to any of the other drives. I split it in half, using half for the Ubuntu OS and the other half for the prerequisite "swap" section.

The Windows OS does not show up in the Grub 2 either.

I feel the issue is that Windows is booted on Legacy and Ubuntu boots on UEFI, yet in the BIOS the drive doesn't even appear under the Legacy tree.

Does anyone know how I can boot Windows 7 again (without re-installing/doing the fix with a Windows 7 installation disk)?

Now, on a different thread, it is said that I have "mixed" BIOS installs and are best to re-install one of the OS's so that they are both on the same BIOS. Which begs the question to me (not being able to navigate the Ubuntu installer efficiently) how do I install Ubuntu on the correct BIOS setting? Thank you for your time

EDIT: I have re-installed Ubuntu onto the drive with a 16GB /boot area and a 16GB swap area. The rest of the drive is now for Ubuntu.

Turtle Bum
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  • Just wanted to let you know, I doubt you need 512GB of swap! See this answer for a quick explanation. – TheSchwa Aug 13 '14 at 00:03
  • I noticed that after, as the swap only needs to be slightly bigger than your RAM, but meh. It doesn't worry me, nor should it affect anything! – Turtle Bum Aug 13 '14 at 00:06
  • Also better not to use separate /boot partition for most desktops. Server type installs or encrypted installs may need the separate /boot. Usually /boot is 300 to 500MB. I normally suggest / (root) of 20 or 25GB and then add /home or data partition(s). You can convert a UEFI install of Ubuntu to BIOS install with the advanced mode of Boot-Repair. It really is just uninstalling grub-efi-amd64 and installing grub-pc. But for BIOS boot you must create a 1 or 2MB unformatted partition with the bios_grub flag for grub to correctly install. https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Repair – oldfred Aug 14 '14 at 00:06
  • Thanks for the reply @oldfred Do you think it will fix my Windows not appearing in the menu if I convert to a BIOS version?

    I spent about a total of 9 hours last night re-installing Ubunto, nvidia drivers (to stop crashing etc.), Grub 2 and Boot-Repair. I switched modes to BIOS and tried everything and Windows still isn't available.

    Is it possible that with my computer that part of the BIOS or boot for the windows is, or was, on the 1TB drive and I have overridden it?

    I have just mounted a Windows 7 .iso onto a USB and am going to use it to "fix" Windows. Will this now destroy Ubuntu?

     – Turtle Bum Aug 14 '14 at 00:57
  • It is best to have all installs in same boot mode, either all UEFI or all BIOS. But you do not have to if you want to use UEFI/BIOS or one time boot key to choose, not grub menu. If installs are on different drives and you install boot loaders whether to MBR for BIOS or to efi partition for UEFI onto the same drive as install, you should not have issues. But you want to keep drives totally separate. Some suggest uplugging other drives when fixing one or the other. I also now am a fan of gpt partitioning, but Windows only boots with UEFI with gpt. Ubuntu can boot with BIOS or UEFI with gpt. – oldfred Aug 14 '14 at 04:24
  • After so much struggling etc. I finally resorted to mounting Windows 7 on a USB and completely formatting and re-installing onto the SSD. Windows 7 now boots and Ubuntu can be booted by choosing the drive it was installed on with no hassles at all.

    Thank you for all your help @oldfred

     – Turtle Bum Aug 16 '14 at 01:31

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