installation
How to triple boot install redhat enterpirse linux 7.2 with Ubuntu 16.04 and windows 10?
Responses
My hope is that people will chime in here... but my previous experience with dual but is to initially load windows first. I've never done triple-boot of an OS. When I did do dual-boot operating system loads, it was a while ago, namely not with grub2. I've seen some issues with "secure boot" where the windows OS demands a secure boot, not allowing other operating systems to boot, but that was a while ago. There is a chance you may face contention with a secure boot bit, and you may have to play with the hardware settings to make it work. You might need to check other forums for anyone who has done this before on your specific hardware.
The other amusing bit will be the grub2 directives with (not dual boot, but) triple boot. That will be "entertaining".
Yet another option is to use RHEL "KVM" (kernel virtualization machine) and load the system first with Linux, then make virtual editions of windows and Ubuntu.. Another (shudder) alternative is to load it with the Other operating system (windoze) and then use something like Oracle Virtualbox (free) to virtualize the other two Linux distros.
Triple boot maybe possible, but it will be "entertaining" and you'll be going down a path that will have some uniqueness to the hardware you have and the grub2 directives between RedHat & Ubuntu. Not saying it is impossible, but you'll just have to do some "Louis & Clark work" (early explorers in the pioneer days).
Perhaps some others with experience with triple boot of 3 operating systems will chime in here. we shall see...
Wish you well with this, let us know how it goes. Recommend taking notes along the way to leave a path for yourself for later as you go through this process.
Hiya, you call out a very good point here, thank you.
Vinayak, please do consider the advice to use KVM and install Ubuntu and Windows as Virtual Machines. If you have specific hardware that needs to be passed to the OS and not abstracted through the hypervisor, then we have some guidance in https://access.redhat.com/solutions/22205 that can help.
vbr mark
Hi Vinayak,
I'm sorry, but Red Hat don't support multi OS booting, so it is not something we provide documentation for.
Most guides on the Internet recommend installing the Windows OS first, followed by your Linux distributions.
Once all three are installed and visible to one of the Linux installations, updating the grub partition should populate the Grub boot menu with the installed systems.
You should note there are some specific problem if you are using UEFI boot that can complicate the installation, so using BIOS boot is preferred.
There are a number of documents on the internet that can help, but none of them match your exact requirements, so I am hesitant to provide a link. We do have https://access.redhat.com/solutions/45409 but it does not discuss adding Windows into the mix.
Apologies for the lack of good news. Mark
Hi Christian,
We don't support multi OS booting, that doesn't mean it won't work!
In terms of support, it would mean that if your problem was to do with grub2 or another part of the boot sequence, we may want to see the problem reproduced with a vanilla boot configuration. Because we cannot support another Vendor's OS, we put quite strong warnings into the text, as you will see from the link in my previous reply.
It is not a dictate that you cannot do this, but a strong caution that it is not something we support and could cause delays for tickets logged on a production system.
But, in my experience, if a machine is dual booting, it is almost always a developer's system and not doing front line processing.
Hope that is a bit clearer, please feel free to follow up if I can explain further, vbr mark
Hi Vinayak,
First prepare the disks and their partition layout, you can use GParted to do this, a bootable (live) ISO image is available from gparted.org. Alternatively you can use the ubuntu installation media, GParted is included there. Assuming you have an EFI based machine, create a new GPT partition table and then create the partitions.
Partition 1 -> EFI partition (format : fat32 | size : 2 GB | flag : boot, esp | label : System)
Partition 2 -> MSR (format : unformatted | size : 16 MB | flag : msftres)
Partition 3 -> Windows (format : ntfs | size : minimum 20 GB | flag : msftdata | label : Windows)
Partition 4 -> MRT (format : ntfs | size : 2 GB | flag : msftdata | label : Recovery)
Partition 5 -> Data (format : ntfs | size : your choice | flag : msftdata | label : your choice)
Partition 6 -> Swap (format : swap | size : matching the RAM of your computer)
Partition 7 -> RHEL (format : ext4 | size : minimum 20 GB | label : redhat)
Partition 8 -> ubuntu (format : ext4 | size : minimum 20 GB | label : ubuntu)
Partition ... -> whatever you need and how many you want (up to 128 max.)
Now first Install Windows on partition 3 and once it is finished - disable Hibernation and Fast startup. Boot into Windows, open Command prompt as administrator and execute : powercfg /h off. Open Windows Control Panel -> Power Settings and uncheck Fast startup. In case this option is not visible, enable Show hidden settings. Shutdown the computer completely - do NOT reboot your machine !
Install RHEL (/) on partition 7 (I recommend to install the latest stable edition RHEL 7.3) and then install ubuntu (/) on partition 8.
Every operating system has its own boot loader and all of them are getting (and have to be) installed on partition 1 (EFI partition).
Boot into BIOS and select either redhat or ubuntu to be the default system to boot, because the Windows boot loader gives you no option to boot RHEL or ubuntu, unless you add them manually to the Windows BCDstore. The only downside is, that you have to update GRUB in your default system every time after a new kernel was installed, otherwise you still boot into the older kernel. From now on you can choose which operating system you want to boot from the GRUB menu.
Hope I could explain this complex topic good enough for you to understand everything correctly ... and now enjoy your triple boot setup ! :)
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