Windows eats partitions

I really hate that Windows does this. Which is why when I decide to switch a machine to Linux it's the only OS allowed to boot to bare metal. Windows can go in a VM and suck it.
- Not sure why, but your comment made me think about the first machine I switched to Linux. It was a laptop who's fan eventually had a bad bearing and needed to be replaced. Luckily it was still under warranty, so I sent the laptop in to get the fan replaced, and received my laptop back with Windows installed on it... I was so livid.
  
  Never send them the drive.
  They are probably required to boot to the desktop for qa
  
  Had something similar happen to me. Something unrelated to the OS or hard drive and they reformatted my drive and I lost everything. I was ballistic when I found that one out.
  
  That pissed me off
- That's the way to go
- I want to do this so bad but gaming always stops me. Some anticheat refuses to let you play in a vm
  
  Just install windows on a physically separate disk. It doesn't eat other disks, but might take a bite of other partitions on the same disk (if NTFS is corrupted or misaligned).
- Defective by design. I really hate windows but need it for Ableton.
  Can I boat off Linux USB and run an MBR recovery program or something?
- Depending on your configuration, you can pass a gpu to your Windows VM so you don’t even lose any performance if you use Windows for gaming. All you need is an iGPU and a few extra cores/ram to handle the host overhead.
- Get a separate disk for windows and you can set up your windows VM to also optionally dual boot into it

What's actually happening here is Windows is setting its bootloader first in your EFI when it gets updated. Linux isn't gone, you just have to press the "boot another drive" button and boot to it, or go into your EFI setup and switch the bootloader back to the Linux one.
Linuxes do the same thing when updating their bootloader.
Note for the Ackshually crowd: If you're still booting MBR (which comes with the partition eating risk on dual boots) you have a system that is older than Windows 8 - 11+ years old, so eating the MBR is something you'll have to deal with unconventionally, as all modern systems, OS, and hardware expect you to be using EFI.
- Grub does not do the same thing unless something has gone wrong. It detects windows and offers you the choice on boot as to which OS to start.
  
  Grub is still the first bootloader in that case. You would not notice if it was putting itself first after an update unless you have Windows booting first.
  You might notice if you are booting between multiple linuxes, all with their own version of grub.
- Not the case. What's happening here is Windows is removing the ext4 partition completely, expanding the ntfs partition and writing to all of it.
  Windows update did that to my <1 year old laptop. I figured it had just wiped out grub, but when it was booted from a live-usb there was no ext4 partition there at all. This has been reported many times.
  Microsoft should be sued for this shit. Legal protection from destroying people's data that is not part of Windows or in a Windows partition, whether deliberately or by negligence, is not something that can be legitimately covered by a license agreement.
  
  Second that. I can't think of a way that that is not deliberate. The "cover" would be that it is ensuring that the full device is used so that the end user doesn't have to worry about it. In reality, there's no legitimate reason for an update to touch the partition table. Way to easy to brick the system.
- In my experience (W11 + Fedora on UEFI Thinkpad), I've seen it actually get rid of the Fedora entry from the UEFI boot list. Reinstalling GRUB from chroot didn't fix it, so I used EasyUEFI and manually added the Fedora EFI file to the boot list and that worked.
  So it wasn't simply changing the boot order, it actually nuked Fedora from the UEFI boot list.
  
  There are multiple ways it can Ops mess up Linux boot loaders, this is one of several
  I have no patience for this shit, the last 5 years, if a game doesn't work in Linux, I don't need to play it
- It sometimes destroys the Linux boot sector too. But it's simple enough to chroot with a live usb and repair it. I don't even have both OS as an option. Mine boots straight into Linux unless I interrupt it and use the boot another drive option. Linux and Windows have their own separate boot sectors, but Windows will fubar the Linux sector randomly.
- But this is Lemmy Linux memes where they tell lies or use half truths about other OS's and laugh about it rather than making actual clever memes! Get outta here with that sense!!
  
  And where they ridicule Windows users because they're "not good enough at computers to use Linux" yet they keep pointing out all the ways they themselves aren't able to use Windows 🤔

- It’s not a feature, but it’s by design.
- When my dad died he left behind a handful of laptops and computers around the house, all running Linux.
  My mother has to call me for help with setting up her TV, she wasn't about to learn Linux. I managed to get any critical files off and we installed Windows. For all of it's faults, it's certainly a hell of a lot easier to use.
  When I had a computer dual booting Windows and Linux, I maybe booted up Linux three or four times over the years I had it. It honestly just created a headache when that machine crapped out because half the files I wanted were damn near impossible to recover. Those on the Linux side. Now you could say if I had installed Linux and tried to recover them it would have been no problem and you would have been right, but running Linux is a headache in and of itself. I can acknowledge that it's a better operating system, but not from a usability or access to software standpoint. Even if both of those areas are improving, windows still wins in both.
  
  Counterpoint. I used to get constant tech support calls from both of my parents until i switched them both to Linux. Now if i get a call from either of them more than twice a year it's an oddity, and that is usually to install new hardware like a printer which they couldn't install on windows either.
  
  "I don't want to learn something new, therefore Windows is better."
  Wouldn't that have been easier to type than all that filler?
  
  That’s fair though I’m on my second attempt to switch. The first was several years ago and I did the dual boot and never actually use linux thing. This time I only boot up windows for things I wouldn’t have a problem with if I was running a Debian instead of arch based distro
  Windows is still easier but it’s not just that linux is catching up. Windows is getting worse and harder to use. I still use it at work and every update I dislike it more.

Dual booting < having two separate SSD's
- They still need to share an EFI partition
  
  Not really if you have a bootloader like refind it will look for other EFIs and list them. Makes for a really clean set up
  
  If you don't want to bother with the bootloader like the other comment mentioned you can also just use the boot menu from the motherboard instead. You gotta mash f11 (or whatever it is on your motherboard) on boot when you want to go into Windows, but if you only need it every once in a while it is good enough.

Never happened to me. Like ever. And I've been on Linux (with occasional dual-booting whenever I'm in a position where I need windows--) for like 15 years now?
To be honest a lot of stuff people talk about seems to not happen to me and I think I might be exceedingly lucky or smth.
- My guess: the windows update fucked up Grub. Happened to me once or twice in 20 years of dual booting. It is also easily recoverable.
  
  I do remember like, back in the day, having a LiveDVD around that had all sorts of 'recovery tools', among them one that was a one-click "grub is breaked, pls fix" thing.
  Only had to use it once or twice though.
- It tends to happen if you are not using the windows bootloader (GRUB for example) but if you use the windows bootloader it should be fine
  
  Oh it just changes the bootloader? That's not a big deal. Easy to fix from any live usb.
  Also, for any distro hoppers out there... Do yourself a favour and put Ventoy on a USB. You can thank me later
  
  With EFI systems this doesn't matter. It was an issue with the legacy BIOS bootloader systems about a decade ago though.
- Same. Never happened to me either. But I usually make a sperate UEFI partition for Linux instead of relying on grub.
  
  It can still happen. Your UEFI settings are accessible from the system. That's part of the standard. So Windows sometimes rewrites these settings to make itself the default again.
  
  That is true for me now, but for years I used dual boot on old BIOS based systems so idk /shrug
- To be honest a lot of stuff people talk about seems to not happen to me and I think I might be exceedingly lucky or smth.
  Considering the people who seem to have issues are the ones who go out of their way to be all "Linux good/Microsoft bad" I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume most of it is total bullshit.
  I've built half a dozen PC's running windows 10 from scratch and not a single one of them has gotten messed up during the incredibly straightforward install/update process. It's so dumb simple compared to virtually anything else I just don't get how you could even have problems.
  Listening to Windows problems on here from Linux users (I use both btw just to avoid the inevitable pedantry) is like watching a toddler throw a fit because he found out you have to peel a banana before you eat it, but their favorite fruit is an orange.
  
  is like watching a toddler throw a fit because he found out you have to peel a banana before you eat it, but their favorite fruit is an orange.
  Got to admit, that's one hell of a response. Can be used in many situations.
  
  Considering the people who seem to have issues are the ones who go out of their way to be all “Linux good/Microsoft bad” I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume most of it is total bullshit.
  Considering a simple google search of these terms brings up multiple people whose position on Linux and Microsoft is completely unknown to anyone else but themselves, having the exact problem OP is posting about, I'm gonna go out on a limb here and assume you've attached your identity to Microsoft and have to defend them for some reason.
  I've been using Computers for nearly 30 years, and Windows has come a LONG way in that time. But lets not pretend windows doesn't shit the bed sometimes. Hell a simple google search will reveal articles like this one and a large number of results of peoples PC's having issues after windows update. Youtubers have made videos on windows update issues.
  I had one of my PC's straight up boot loop after a routine windows update and had to use a recovery to fix it, only for windows to auto update and re boot loop itself immediately afterwards. Most of the time, windows updates are fine, but sometimes they fuck shit up.
  
  See your argument might hold water if "stuff people talk about" were something applicable only to Windows/Linux fights. (Windows can lick my fuzzy horse ass, btw---)
  But like. People love to meme on how SystemD makes your computer hang up for a long while when shutting down? Never saw it happen. People meme on PulseAudio breaking? Never happened to me. Shit like that.
- Neither happened to me. It only happens if you install windows, not when you're upgrading it...
- Nope. you’re an unsympathetic “how nice for you” asshole talking over people who need to be heard to get the help they need. Don’t be that person.

Windows only updates the bootloader, it doesn't touch Linux partitions. After an update you just have to fix the bootloader again which isn't too hard if you know how it works.
- I'd argue one shouldn't even be messing with dual booting if they don't understand much about the bootloader.
  
  My counterpoint would be how does one best learn about anything if not by messing with it
  
  The best way to learn how it works is to mess with it. I have reinstalled my Surface Go 2 numerous times because I messed something up. After leaving Windows I have used dual boot with Arch and Chrome OS for a while, and now I just use Arch including secureboot enabled.
- I'm sure it varies a lot, but you should be able to enter bios setup and add a boot option. There may be a file browser type popup and you can add the known file as a boot option. Right now it may be looking for the old file location on the current windows boot option you have.

In my case it wasn't the boot entry being removed. It actually ate the partition. When installing Linux Mint, I resized the Windows partition in Linux. Then I noticed that Windows absolutely didn't recognize that change, and thought its partition is still as big as it used to. Then on a restart it hit me with the "Repairing drive C:" which killed the Linux partition leaving just something corrupted.
"Repairing"
- Windows: "Let me repair Linux for you"
  
  Ew, you've got a linux on your windshield, lemme just hit the wipers for you real quick
- Have you tried first resizing the windows partition inside windows? That's what I did and my dual boot has stayed intact
  
  Yep, that's what I did later and it worked.

Protip:
Just don't have a live Windows partition.
- This. I entirely understand that some people don't have that option, but it's worth reiterating that if you have a choice, you're best off not to have partitions at all.
  I run Mint on an 8-year-old Mac desktop machine with no partitions and it's lightning-fast for everything I need it to do.
  It's also worth mentioning that I have said desktop machine because my wife is a pro photographer and Apple and Adobe have colluded for decades to create a kind of "planned obsolescence" whereby professional photographers are ostensibly locked out of the current industry standard unless they run a very recent version of Photoshop that by design isn't compatible with hardware architecture that's more than about 5-years-old.
  
  Partitioning is good even if you're just running Linux. Specifically separating your / from your /home/ -- In case shit goes wrong you can nuke the OS side and keep all your files and shit. (also, mandatory for UEFI systems cuz you also need a /boot/efi partition)

If you still "dual boot", be advised that Windows is a piece of shit and will almost always cause this with a "build" update. Highly, highly recommend having Linux and Windows (shame on you) on separate physical drives.
- Not so easy to do when your laptop only has space for one
  
  Don't most laptops also have at least 1 M.2 slot in addition to SATA bay? I know it's supposed to be for Wifi but you can use a USB wifi dongle (you could even wire it up internally if you wanted to) while still having an NGFF SSD for Linux and having Windows on the SATA bay (or vice versa, whichever you prefer).
- Funny, cause most I hear do not have this problem.
  Sounds like a skill issue.
- Its so much easier too, i didnt even have to configure grub or anything it automatically detected the windows drive.

Just protect bios/uefi with password and windows won't be able to modify any other EFI entry. It worked when i've dual-booted, it should still work.
- How can I do that? I'm dual booting but was not aware of this, makes me a little nervous....
  
  No need to worry, it's in your BIOS under security section. You can check if you set correct one by trying to change boot device: if there's password prompt, you're now safe from windows update "repair".

What about stop making bullshit posts? Windows have never did that to me, and there's no reason why would it touch any partition aside from its own and (if it exists) the Windows boot one.
That said, It MIGHT replace MBR boot record but I don't know if that's very likely these days. I remember upgrading from Windows 8 to 10 and Windows left my MBR alone, and I was able to boot to GRUB just fine.
- If you install Linux first and then Windows on the same drive, it will fuck up your bootloader.
  You can easily make Grub boot Windows, so just overwrite whatever fuckup Windows made, or install Windows first.
  It won't happen with a simple update, though, that's for sure. Maybe if you're upgrading Windows to a new major release.
- Noooo, not the heckin windorinos, s-stop bullying the multibillion dollar company g-guys ;-;
  
  Inventing FUD is a bad look regardless of if you're punching up or punching down. It's not about who the target is. It's that FUD is inherently dishonest, and being dishonest reflects poorly on your character.
  The Linux community should try to be better than that. We shouldn't stoop to Microsoft's old level.
  Admittedly, I haven't set up a dual booted Linux machine in about a decade, so I don't know if it's gotten dramatically worse.
  
  Someone having money isn't an excuse to not call out poor behavior against them. Making nonsensical posts that are not even accurate from an IT perspective helps no one. At best, it's just lies to get fake internet attention, at worst, it exposes a lack of understanding of the technology.
- Calling someone out on their bullshit can do that to a person.

Image Transcription:
White text on a black background reading
'Me: *Dual booting windows and linux.
'Windows: *Updates itself.
'Me: Where is the linux partition?
'Windows:'
Below the text is the Daenerys Targaryen Squint meme showing Daenerys Targaryen from Game of Thrones squint smiling. Over the image is the text '"dunno!"'
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Whoa.. this really happens? If so that's disgusting and doesn't seem legal. I was about to setup a dual boot for my laptop which has proprietary windows only software I need for work but now I guess i need to research a bit.
- Whoa.. this really happens?
  No, the only thing that windows might do, is reset the bootloader so it skips grub. If you're using UEFI (which you should), you can easily restore it from your bios.
  I've only seen it happen on big updates, not the smaller ones.
  
  As an Ubuntu + Win10 dual booter I had a couple of instances where Windows update destroyed things so irreparably that live Ubuntu boot-repair failed to work, and hours of back-and-forthing error messages to Ubuntu IRC and discord support channels yielded nothing. And I'm too stupid to know any other way of fixing it, so I was SOL. Your milage may vary.
  
  Have had Windows remove my Grub entry plenty of times but have also had Windows "repair" partitions after a failed update which will nuke your Linux install.
  
  actually this has happened to me where windows fucked with the file system of both my ext4 Linux OS partition and shared ntfs data partition. A reformat and repartition was the only remedy, so reinstall of the OS and recovery from a backup of the data were required
- I unplug physicals disks when installing windows. Learned the hard way when windows placed the boot partition on a device it could not detect the filsystem of. It destroyed my RAID disks (a little but my fault, because I messed up the recovery).
  This is what Windows installer saw (going by memory, this was 8 years ago)
  SSD 500 GB (either it recognised ext4 file system, or this one was unknown)
  SSD 500 GB (Where I specified to install windows)
  4 x HDD 8TB (unknown disks, unknown file system, Windows unaware that this was a RAID-5 software dm-raid)
  What did it to? It created a new partition table and wrote data to a new boot partition it made on one of the 8TB disks, no questions asked.
  So, to the people who answered you that windows installer cannot do this. Maybe they fixed it. But it certainly could, and it cetianly did. I remember very carefully going through the installer because I was concerned about this happening. I thought about unplugging them, but was lazy. Because "it would be insane for windows to write on a disk it cannot identify the file system of".
  Lessons learned:
  If you plan to install windows on a disk along side Linux, install windows first, if you can. Safest bet is still to:
  If you cannot, unplug all other disks other than the one windows is intended to be on.
  Edit: I found post on this way back when, but leaving what I wrote as is.
  https://superuser.com/questions/758854/mdadm-win7-install-created-a-boot-partition-on-one-of-my-raid6-drives-how-to-r#1243636
  I had remembered some details wrong. I had unplugged the Linux SSD, and it wad raid 6 not 5, and it was 2TB disks.
  
  Windows couldn't even use its own system image to restore my system when a botched Windows update messed everything up. I still don't know what was wrong but I think it did something like try to apply them as GPT instead of MBR on my BIOS system.
  
  Fixed or not this is good to know. I use a separate device for RAID storage and I think I'll keep it that way. Sorry you had to deal with that. I know if my main storage got wiped by windows installer my reaction would probably make national news.
  Will proceed with caution and saved drive images!
- doesn't seem legal
  I wouldn't agree here. Even if Windows does do this (which I doubt), there's no way to prove it isn't a bug. And there's no way anyone's going to sue Microsoft over a bug. Not only is that a gross overreaction, it's financial suicide.
  If you don't trust Windows, don't use it. Or if you have to, use it on a separate system/drive.
  
  Don't need proof that it isn't a bug, it's happened to me multiple times since Windows xp, all the way until the last time I tried dual booting with windows 7...
  At that time, I decided if a game doesn't work in Linux, I don't need it. Luckily dxvk and proton came around that time
  I don't care if it's a bug or if it's intentional. Fuck off windows
- Not with EFI boot. If you deliberately use legacy BIOS emulation to boot, it can. So don't do that.
- How'd you install Windows 11 on BIOS? I thought it "required" features unique to EFI?
- If you find that already illegal... there are vendors signing their own drivers with the pre-installed Microsoft Secure Boot keys. So trying to remove them and replace them with proper ones bricks your system.
  
  That's awful. Not new, but i guess it's becoming more common.
  I was forced to abandon Linux on desktop in 2007. This year on a whim I got back a couple AIOs I had gifted and installed KDE neon and was blown away at how nice it was. And absurdly fast at that.
  My main still has to run win for not just games but also Visio. What really gets me is the tools platform i need for work will only run on win despite it being essentially java based. If allowed to run on native Linux I can't help but think it would be much much faster.
  I'm currently testing out a portable base win10VM for those softwares. Not an ideal solution but it's working.
  I guess while I'm at it I'll go ahead and ask.. is there any OSS alternative to Visio?

to be fair, it actually doesn't know - windows doesn't do ext4...
- But it knows there's a partition there and it's easy to know it's a Linux partition type. Microsoft just prefer to say it doesn't know the partition type and simply say it ignores it. You don't need to have support for a file system in order to check it's partition type. It's just ms bs

For this reason, I put Linux on an NVMe drive and Windows on an old SSD. Seems to prevent it.
- I do it too, but the essence is not to share a drive with Windows. Just use a second drive. It's also better to select the boot drive using BIOS/UEFI.

What? Windows kills other partitions during update?
- Anticompetitive behaviour from microsoft??? gasp
  
  I can confirm. It does this I think if both OS are on the same disk, probably share bootloader. Never happened when I used separate disks.
  
  Is there a grub installer that runs under windows? (no spell checker I refuse to capitalize windows)
- Windows likes to mess with the EFI partition on updates, scrweing up bootloaders. That you can prevent by separate EFI partition on another disk, This way Windows doesn't see the other efi files to boot. But when it feesl really obnoxious, it also edits your EFI table and sets itself as the default. That doesn't actually damage your linux boot files, but you still need to log back with some bootstick and revert the change, to make your bootloader/menu the default again.

Depends on the Distro as some use different boot configs but I had it happen with Pop!OS and did the most logical thing which was wipe my windows partition 🤜🤛
- Was that on a system 76 computer? Because it would be fuckin hilarious if they were doing the same scummy shit Microsoft does.

The good old Microsoft way
- Embrace Extend Extinguish

It senses the competition....

The last time windows tried to update, it froze and when i rebooted my laptop, windows broke
- Lol which Windows? Windows 98? I installed win 10 on the laptop of my gf after replacing the hdd with an ssd some days ago and one update also froze. But it did not break the os. After rebooting it just removed the update.
  
  I was using windows 11

I had this setup 20 years ago. Tried Linux, looked back once because I needed something from the then still unmounted windows partition, dumped the microshit partition 3 months later.
Fuck windows

I had so many issues with my (less than legitimate) windows install kept nuking itself and the drive it was on, I bought a cheap small SSD that has literally nothing but windows on it so whenever it goes fucky I just wipe and reinstall. It's a total time of like an hour going from "shits fucked" to "everything is pretty much how it was before".

Tip, just make a seperate EFI partition for Linux. That way, garbage Windows installer won't be able to fuck up your install. Altough this assumes you're running a non-shit EFI mobo that looks for things to boot in every partition.

Cheryl Blossom? Anyone?

This is what made me jump the gun.
- I think the phrase you want is "pull the trigger". "Jump the gun" means to do something too soon, whereas "pull the trigger" means to do something after a wait.
  
  Nope, I definitely jumped the gun.
  It was Manjaro.

Good meme, I like it. Windows blows. :)

I have the opposite problem. I don’t often boot to windows, but when I do, BitLocker is not happy that I’ve been talking to another operating system.
- I assume secure boot is off and your Windows drive/partition is encrypted.

Happened to me two weeks ago, not necessarily because of an update, but because of the restart
It saw my entire btrfs distro install on a separate drive as "corrupt", and ran a chkdsk while I was away. Now GRUB shows all my installs but can't boot them anymore.
- Boot into Linux using a USB, and fix your boot partition from there.

Very good meme!
- Thank you kind stranger.

And this is why you should install windows to a docker container on your server and not let it touch anything else. Link to GitHub repo.

@cadu@bolha.one

Can anyone smart help me out? I tried to clone my drive and the stupid ass program installed another boot thing. I was able to remove the options in the list, but now I have to wait or hit enter to boot windows 10. Fucking annoying.
- Go into Bios to set the default startup partition.
  
  Thanks. The boot order is already set to windows boot manager> C: system drive. Setting it to just the C: (minus WBM) fails to boot. Uefi is msi.
  The issue is a partition was put on there by Macrium. I deleted it, but the windows boot manager is now borked and now I have to manually select windows 10 or wait for it to time out. This adds a lot of boot time, and it's annoying.

i had to use Microsoft a while ago, so installed a skin of it, ReviOS to be specific, alongside GNU/Linux. It helped in getting the work done without unwanted updates(which are practically downgrades), and was very fast. coupled with a package manager like scoop it was not that bad experience. even better than MacOS, I'd say.

Best to block windows updates, they usually always break things while offering little benefit. Though I never thought dual booting on the same Disk was ever a safe idea with Windows.

The fact that this is something you complain about and that doesn't happen with the majority of other users, probably means something ...
Almost like you guys aren't technologically literate enough to use Windows.
- The reality is that most have used Windows for quite some time. They just don't have a tolerance for making excuses for Windows bugs and bullshit. That's why they changed their OS.
  I can perfectly well fix any of these rare problems, often in seconds. And still I find every single one obnoxious and a valid reason to shit on Windows. Even more so as some are not actually bugs but intentional sabotage of a competing OS.
  The simple fact that I need to think about measures to minimize the possibility of Windows screwing up dual-boot and also need to know how to fix it, if it happens none-the-less is rediculous. That's completely independent from technological literacy.

Never happened to me. Fedora had completely deleted Windows bootloader once though and didn't even recognize the existence of Windows on install in the first place.

- So you like to pretend Windows rewriting your EFI entries and needing to be fixed is normal?
  This has nothing to do with not being able to fix it in seconds. But with Windows indeed being destructive and trying to damage dual boot setup. That's not a feature because you know how to handle it.
  
  They're not worth the effort, if you check their history they're either a troll or someone who is very full of themselves about their knowledge about Windows.
  Everyone should obviously assume that Windows rewrites your EFI entries as that is entirely normal and a thing only dumb people don't know? Other take from their profile is calling someone stupid and OS-illiterate because they didn't know PowerShell, I'm convinced they're a troll lol.