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Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board

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On 4/12/25 20:40, Paul wrote:
> On Sat, 4/12/2025 7:50 PM, bad sector wrote:
>>
>> Recovering data from my suddenly departed son's computer was a job and a half, but it's mostly done. He had a huge server tower and I think he was amusing himself with RAID (which he didn't need) and encryption (which he didn't need) and so on!
>>
>> Drives:
>>
>> #1
>> 500gb ssd with strange partitions for Linux and I think some created for future Linux OSes, could't figure out his /home partition setup, possibly raid.
>>
>> #2
>> 1tb ssd hosting fat and ext4 data PLUS a w7 and a w10 partition
>>
>> #3
>> 4tb data
>>
>>
>> #4,5,6 in a Linux-Raid array, all data
>>
>> I copied out the #4 data set, cleared those drives, and released the tower to the executors for liquidation. Then I also backed up what ever other data I could find to other drives on hand.
>>
>> Plugged the # 1,2,3 drives into my own very similar computer; couldn't believe it when everything just booted right up, even the two window installs! This gave me the idea that I can relax and take my time doing the rest of the recovey, filtering and disposal as time permits because I can now just boot my son's systems on my own computer. But it's my OLD computer.
>>
>> _____And that's how shit hit the fan
>>
>> I'm moving to a new and inevitably UEFI box, just plugging those 3 drives in doesn't work any more, so...
>>
>> I copied the #1 drive to a 1tb ssd to have more space, then did a fresh Linux (Tumbleweed) install to get EFI bootabilty. With that new #1 drive and his other drives including the #2 with windows on it also plugged-in I ran Yast to set up the EFI boot. I can now boot either my temporary facilitating Linux install OR my son's Linux (Leap-15.4) on the new EFI-BIOS board.
>>
>> But I cannot boot his windows, for that I'd have to keep my old Legacy-BIOS box which I don't want to do (I can unload it for a few hundered bills).
>>
>> Not knowing windows much I think I could do a w7 and a w10 fresh install after having done two 'windows backups' on the legacy box and then try a recovery from those windows-backup files on the new w7 and w10 installs on the EFI box. There's GOTTA be a simpler way   ..I hope.
>>
> 
> With my Macrium CD, I can boot from the CD and back up any machine.
> 
> You would not use the "Windows 7 Backup" that comes with Windows, because
> of the rough edges. Commercial backup materials have the rough edges filed off.
> 
> *******
> 
> Similar to your Tumbleweed facilitator install, you can install a Windows side-by-side
> in a sense. Use Macrium to clone over or backup-restore over, the partition
> from the other box. Then do a Macrium CD boot repair, and the boot repair (similar to
> OSprober), it sees the orphan Windows partitions you added, and includes
> them in the boot menu.
> 
> Similar to third-party "EasyBCD" on Windows, you can use this command
> 
>     bcdboot C:\Windows /s C:
> 
> to add an item to the boot menu (stored in the BCD file, BCD file
> format is actually a registry file).
> 
> But, there is "much to and fro" involved. For example, somewhere along the
> way, you will be holding an MSDOS Primary partition in your hand,
> some other disk is GPT with GUID partition type declarations.
> 
> What commercial tools will agree to bodge those items together
> to make a whole part ?
> 
> It's going to take trickery at some point.
> 
> Perhaps you make a "shell" of a partition (exact sizing important)
> on the GPT disk, then "dd" copy the MSDOS partition into the
> space set aside for the GPT partition. I have no idea whether
> that works. I can tell you, that the equivalent of an rsync
> between Windows C: type partitions, would never work, due to
> all the fiddly details involved in such things. Microsoft have
> gone out of their way, to ensure you can't Robocopy the entire
> C: drive into another partition. I *used* to do that in WinXP era,
> but those were simpler times and the file systems were a bit more
> bend-able back then.
> 
> Windows has an MBR2GPT.exe utility, written by some hapless developer.
> Any program carrying out composite file system operations (partition,
> merge, shrink, done) is basically doomed to fail and fall on its face.
> Developers normally stick to "primitive" "one step" commands, for safety.
> Yet, somebody wrote that code... and it has enough smarts to reject
> disk configurations it does not like. Leaving only one configuration
> it does like. I think you can see coercing such a utility to do more
> than it intended to do, is a tall ask. It will not accept any old
> arbitrary configuration, and convert it.
> 
> So yes, your mission looks like, technically do-able, but just about
> all the tools will tell you "I don't like broccoli", "I will sit
> here in this corner with this cold broccoli until hell freezes over",
> and so on :-) You've seen this before somewhere.
> 
> MBR2GTP.exe can help you cross that river, but it won't allow
> you to carry a duck and a potato in the boat with you (a reference
> to this problem, where the problem was modified for an AI to solve).
> How the problem can involve a duck and a potato, I will never know.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf,_goat_and_cabbage_problem
> 
> Summary: Do-able, but mostly a bar bet, like a steam powered rocket launch :-)
> 
>     Paul
> 

So far it's been one huge exercise in futility beginning with my own 
impatiance. I had gone to great lengths to recover what bare data I 
could onto even duplicate data disks, I even made duplicates of the 3 
ssd's that continued to perform *flawlessly* on my own older Crosshair 
legacy board. BEFORE I first tried the windows DOS disk I should have 
seen the red flag 'WHY did my son keep that one disk DOS when ALL the 
othes were GPT'?  But in my haste I didn't. I should also have dd'd 
mirror image FILES of the win-10 partition!

So when I first tried the windows (10) disk in my EFI box maybe I didn't 
even have it in compatibility mode (or maybe I did, can't remember), it 
failed to boot and THAT's when I lost the plot completely thinking 'well 
maybe something's wrong with my clone of the disk' and OTHERWISE 
unsuspectingly I just swapped it for the (only) original one. In those 
few seconds win-10 on both got trashed (I suspect by the w10 installer 
but don't really know).

If I knew what got changed I could maybe try to fix it before beginning 
all over but as it is I don't even have a working legacy BIOS departure 
point any more :-(

BTW, having made several w10 freshies, I found the USB installers made 
with the WoeUSB linux utility fairly good AND persistent. The one made 
by the MS uti (on my laptop 'for another computer' which is my only 
windows also box) never worked at all, and the ones made with Ventoy got 
invariably destroyed for each 2nd attempt (see prompt blowup in image).

https://imgur.com/59mcvHC

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Thread

migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-12 19:50 -0400
  Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> - 2025-04-12 20:40 -0400
    Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-13 22:42 -0400
    Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-22 16:40 -0400
      Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> - 2025-04-23 09:38 -0400
        Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-24 00:23 -0400
        Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> - 2025-04-24 03:52 -0400
        Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-25 08:33 -0400
          Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> - 2025-04-25 12:42 -0400
            Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-25 23:01 -0400
            Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-27 08:43 -0400
              Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> - 2025-04-27 11:20 -0400
  Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-04-14 04:27 +0000
    Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> - 2025-04-14 03:29 -0400
    Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-14 06:03 -0400
      Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> - 2025-04-14 08:16 -0400
        Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-04-14 23:38 +0000
        Re: migrate triple-booting legacy-BIOS Linux-w7-w10 to EFI board bad sector <forgetski@_INVALID.net> - 2025-04-14 20:44 -0400

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