Two HD Install, Win 10 & Zorin OS

I have two HD on my system. One is a 320GB drive that came with Win 7 Pro when I bought the machine and the other is a 2TB drive that I cloned the 320GB drive to and "upgraded" to Win 10 last September. This sounds like I know what I'm doing but I really don't. I pulled all of the files I wanted off the 320GB drive and installed Zorin to it by swapping the cables of the two drives and leaving the Win 10 2TB drive disconnected. I put the cables back in their proper order and now I can't get the 320GB drive to boot. I booted from the USB Live stick with Zorin on it and got as far as the Try Something Else screen where I can see the sda 2TB drive and the sdb 320GB drive. It lists the Win 10 drive as the location it will write to the MBR. I am afraid to proceed as I really wanted the Win 10 drive disconnected before installing Zorin.

I also have a 2011 HP Elitebook 2760 that dual boots Win 10 that came preinstalled and Zorin OS that I added soon after I got the machine a few months ago. I bought the laptop so I could teach myself Linux in a hands-on way. I'm thinking of shrinking the Win 10 partition down to 20GB as I always boot into Zorin. I signed up for the fourth time for the edX Linux course starting August 23, maybe this time I'll make it through.

Hi, DON'T install to the mbr/GPT of Windows 10!

1. Make sure the Windows 10 drive is disconnected completely and install GRUB onto the 320 Gb Drive.

2. Next boot into Windows 10 with your Zorin drive connected.

3. Install EasyBCD from Neosmart Technologies (the free one) - it will automatically backup your mbr/GPT of Windows 10 on first run after installation.

4. Edit the mbr/GPT in EasyBCD - add a new entry for Zorin and amend the mbr/GPT accordingly.

5. Cross everything and reboot.

Thanks for the reply. I'm about 350 miles from my Win 10 box so any attempt to try your suggestion will have to wait until Sunday.

[quote="Swarfendor437"]Hi, DON'T install to the mbr/GPT of Windows 10!

1. Make sure the Windows 10 drive is disconnected completely and install GRUB onto the 320 Gb Drive.

With the primary 2TB drive disconnected how do I install GRUB to the secondary 320GB drive when the machine won't boot from the 320GB drive or from a Linux USB stick? I plug in the Zorin USB stick I used to install the OS to my HP Elitebook, start the machine and nothing happens. It will boot from the USB into Zorin if I reconnect the primary Win10 drive. I've been playing with EasyBCD and reading the online documentation. I now get a startup blue Win10 startup screen that lists Windows 10 and Zorin as choices. The Win10 side works fine but if I select the Zorin box the screen goes black and several lines of text talking about GRUB start appearing then stalls. Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions, I'll keep plugging away at this.

I have no idea what your BIOS options are for that machine. On a Dell Latitude 3570 I discovered that you need to enable legacy boot mode - your memory stick (or bootable DVD) will not boot in UEFI mode - it has to be Legacy ROM mode - then you should also see your external 320 Gb Drive to install Zorin to.

I did something dumb. I could not get EasyBCD to boot the 320GB HD so I tried Boot Repair from a Ubuntu USB stick. BAD MOVE. The MBR for Win 10 broke and at would only boot to Grub Rescue. I was stuck so I spent two days scouring the internet looking for fixes until I found this video from ASA Technical on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?=xx2CFufy ... YOzzpMvIUQ
I'm not trying to spam this place. I just happened to have a USB stick with Windows Recovery on it which is very lucky as we're having problems trying to access certain websites like Microsoft dot com, we get Access Denied errors when we try to connect. I only found it by going through a handful of USB sticks by trying to boot them to see what each contained. The recovery stick allowed me to get to a Windows command line. By following the instructions in the video while it was playing on my dual boot HP 2760p notebook my desktop machine nows boots Win 10. I'm back to square one safe and sound. Now I still have to figure out how to get that 320GB drive to boot.

Did EasyBCD install OK? Did it even run?

Swarfendor437 wrote:Did EasyBCD install OK? Did it even run?

Yes, it installed just fine and still works, I just have to figure out how to use it, if I can, to do what I want done.

OK, I know it's Windows 7 and Zorin 9 but the same way as the Matthew Moore way - just bear in mind that you should have the Zorin drive attached when doing this.

https://vimeo.com/110085401 - 1 hour 29 minutes in approx.