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This may sound stupid, but I am wanting to install ubuntu but I do not want to put it on my ssd. I have 1 hdd that is partitioned and set up with my windows os, and I want to get a second that has only Ubuntu on it. I was thinking that if I took out my ssd and hdd put in my "2" hdd and installed ubuntu from a usb it would then be able to be booted from once I put all the drives back in my machine. Would this work? is there an easier way that does not partition my ssd but allows for boot request on start up? I feel like if I do it my way I will always have to go into the bios to request the Ubuntu boot. also I fear Ubuntu will try to change things on my ssd or my windows configured hdd.

Pinkllamajr
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  • You can disconnect drives, but must run sudo update-grub after booting Ubuntu to have it add Windows to its boot menu. And you need to set BIOS to boot Ubuntu drive. You can use Something Else to install without disconnecting drive. But be sure to install grub to that same drive, it defaults to sda, which with several drives is sure to be wrong. http://askubuntu.com/questions/343268/how-to-use-manual-partitioning-during-installation – oldfred Apr 04 '15 at 03:33

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Instead of swapping out your drives back and forth, you can install all three hard drives right away and then make sure to configure the correct drive/partition(s) for Ubuntu installation.

  1. If your 2nd drive is empty, note its size and then run ls /dev/sd*. This will give you a listing of available hard drives, as in sda, sdb, sdc (and possibly more).

  2. To find out which one is your 2nd drive, do sudo fdisk -l /dev/sdX, where X is the last letter of the drive (a, b, or c). This will list the drive size and its partition table, if any. The drive size should be close to the size of your 2nd drive. If it doesn't, check another drive. If the drives are equal in size, look at the partition table (if one shows up). The Windows drive will have multiple HPFS/NTFS/exFAT entries - that's the drive you do not want to touch!

  3. Once you found your target drive, launch Ubuntu installer and point it at that drive, i.e. /dev/sdb (or whichever one is your 2nd drive). Unless you know what you're doing, let it auto-partition the drive. It will not touch your Windows drive or the SSD. As a part of the installation, it will add the GRUB bootloader which will auto-detect Windows and will let you choose the OS to boot when the computer starts.

Hope this helps.

muru
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linuxgringo
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