Windows 8 forum: Clean install of Windows 8 on a multi-boot computer

I am not interested in using VirtualBox.

Try out installing in various orders and find which methods work for you. It's a shame Microsoft didn't work out this area better. There is no best solution so let's hope you have good backup systems as it blows up a few times.
Bob

The problem for me is that almost nobody is installing Windows 8 from scratch rather than doing an upgrade. Also there seems to be no information on what the install from scratch of Windows 8 does from Microsoft.

Unfortunately as much as I like Windows, Microsoft's installation of new versions acts too often as if nothing else should exist on an end-user's system but the version of Windows being installed, or perhaps another version of Windows. This is not good for those who multi-boot into non-Windows OSs also.

Why? Because what I'm reading is not encouraging. That is I see folk boot and install but 7 and now 8 don't install to one partition. That idea is dead and gone. Folk that used to do this are pretty cranky about that.

It's also another reason I have to think you need to go do this. It's no loss as it blows up since it's a fresh setup. We know it blows up even in the days of pre-8. And those that do this a lot seem to learn how to backup and restore drives after a while.

In other words, while I've written about this a few too many times, you still have folk that will not believe how twitchy MSFT's installers are and how they'll wipe out a setup without much warning.

-> Before you think this is a bug. It's not. It's just something they don't support well. This OS is for the masses so they can neglect folk that want to boot this many versions. I've shared how we deal with it.
Bob

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817153071

Connected with eSATA this lets you swap drives and viola. You are able to install many OSes without any issue on many drives.
Bob

I totally agree with Bob in this matter, it is possible but not one for the faint of heart. And remember with Windows 8 this can not be done with the promotional Upgrade version and Microsoft in it's wisdom did not release a Full Retail version of Windows 8. This requires The OEM version of Windows 8 bought from someone like New Egg or Amazon. This sells in the neighborhood of $130 US. and Does NOT include support.

I was asking for support here, not from Microsoft, and what I get is that Microsoft can do whatever it wants and it is up to me to protect myself since no one knows what Microsoft actually does when you install Windows 8 Pro directly and not by upgrading.

That is not very helpful, although I understand that you and others are trying to help.

Maybe my OP should have asked if anyone has installed Windows 8 Pro as an orginal install and, if they had, can they tell me the answer to my questions.

Was the clean install. By observing what it did, I agree with what I've read others reporting with multi-boot. That is, twitchy, does not install to one partition and can blow away other OSes without notice (well I can't agree with that last one totally as I wasn't there.)

It's very early in the product cycle to expect more than a few to have done this so post widely.
Bob

I did that today with a full version (not an update version) of Windows 8 (downloaded from Technet as an evaluation copy). I installed onto a disk that had a bootable Linux, a non-bootable NTFS partition and some 100 GB unallocated space (freed by shrinking the Linux partition).

It installed fine, but blew up the BCD, so although the Linux partition was still there, it couldn't be reached. Then (because there was nothing to keep on the Linux partition) I deleted that (with a GPARTED) disk and installed Ubuntu 12.04 LTS "next to Windows 8". It nicely installed itself in the newly unallocated space, and in the BCD, so the next boot let me choose between Windows 8 and Linux, as expected.
To install Ubuntu I had to disconnect another disk (the disk I boot from regularly) temporarily, but that wasn't a real issue.

There was no Windows 7 on that disk, so I don't know what the Windows 8 install would have done with that. The two options:
(a) it would have removed it from the BCD. Then use a program like EasyBCD to add it again. Should work.
(b) it would have added itself to the BCD, so you would get multiboot between Windows 7 and 8. Then the above reinstall of Linux would have worked the same.

It's common to install Linux after Windows for this reason. Of course, if you have an image of the Linux partition, you can restore that later, so effectively you only use the install of Linux to update the BCD. For fixing the BCD of you install Windows after Linux, see https://help.ubuntu.com/community/DualBoot/WindowsLast (and noet it says it's option b above!).

Since you write you already have a 'multi-boot manager' I expect you can solve the issues with the BCD you run into. Of course, having a backup of the BCD makes sense.

Summary:
If you install Windows 8 on a non-allocated part of a disk, it won't touch other partitions (neither NTFS nor Linux), but it erases the existing BCD on that disk (or adds one if it doesn't yet have it). But I didn't try with a bootable partition on that disk.

It might make sense to disconnect other disks, and use your tools to add the new Windows partition to the BCD on the disk you usually boot from. Or uset he BIOS boot device selection (F11 on my MSI motherbord) to boot from the disk you installed Windows 8 on if it's the only OS on it.

And it might make sense to make a full image of that disk, just in case the Windows 8 install decides to harm an existing bootable Windows 7 partition (I didn't try that, my NTFS partition was storage only). But maybe just using GPARTED to clean the 'this is a bootable partition' indication during the Windows 8 install (and setting it later again to 'bootable') is fine also.


Hope this helps.


Kees

Thanks for all the details but it appears not much has changed. Same issues, fixes and if someone decides to try it their choice to backup or not.
Bob

Installing Windows 8 deletes Windows 7 from the BCD. But note that a Linux help site isn't the most authorative source for that statement.

Kees