I've set up a dual boot with Linux Mint and Windows, and then decided to add Fedora. Unfortunately, when I installed Fedora, its GRUB bootloader overwrote the original one and now I can't see the option to boot into Windows. I tried to fix it but ended up messing things up even more. Now, neither Linux Mint nor Windows will boot properly. When I try to boot from a USB installation media to get into Windows, I get an error saying, "Windows failed to start due to a recent hardware or software change." I'm feeling pretty lost and would really appreciate any help! Also, I'm open to talking through the issue via voice chat if someone is willing.
1 Answer
I had a similar issue before! You’ll need to rebuild the bootloaders for both Mint and Windows. First, ensure that Secure Boot is disabled. If you have a USB with the Windows recovery, boot from that. In the Command Prompt, run DISKPART to see your drives. You want to check for your Windows installation disk and the EFI partition. If the EFI partition doesn’t have a letter, assign one before running the `bcdboot` command to rebuild Windows boot files. For Mint, just boot into the live environment and use Boot-Repair to sort things out. It’s pretty user-friendly! Afterward, you should see the GRUB menu again, and everything should work fine!
I’m having trouble with the Windows recovery too; it keeps failing to start for me. I did manage to boot into Fedora, but my other distros don’t show up in GRUB correctly. Can we chat via Discord for some quicker help?