How to install Windows 11 on a Work SSD and a Personal SSD?

T

Tanquen

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Feb 15, 2005
Messages
1,226
On this new system last night I installed the first Personal drive. Got everything set up and just for the heck of it, I tried installing Windows on the second drive with the first one still on the motherboard. Unlike the previous system, it went ahead and did it but it set up the windows boot menu. I guess that's okay but then when I removed the Work drive the original install will no longer boot and says there's errors and you can't even use the Windows tool to repair it. You just can't boot into windows anymore until you put the newer second Work drive back in. It seems really odd to break the original Windows install by simply removing the second drive with the second install. So either drive goes bad, you can’t boot into the remaining one. ???

Over the years, setting up a dual boot Window system has gotten more and more complicated. Just installing Windows is now overly complicated. You need to jump through hoops and know some tricks just to install windows without an MS account or internet access. Shift + 10, oobe/ bypassnro

I'm trying to do a clean Windows 11 install for the first time with a Work drive and a Personal drive on a new build. In years past, I would simply unplug the first drive that had been installed and configured while installing and configuring the second. Then I would use the BIOS to boot the drive I wanted. I have tried using the Windows built-in boot menu but it always seems to mess things up.

On my previous build with SSD drives I couldn't even install Windows on the second drive with them both being in the system. It would see the new second drive and it would try to set up a partition and then install files and would fail until I removed the first drive.

This is complicated by the fact that I haven't seen any bios manufacturer give you a simple way to disable a motherboard SSD for troubleshooting. So you have to pull apart the motherboard, heat, sinks and whatnot, possibly remove your video card to take out an SSD so that you can install windows on one without it finding and hosing the other.

Even if I go through the trouble of having one SSD on the motherboard at a time and getting windows installed, are they going to mess with each other?

I had my last windows 10 set up this way and it seemed to be fine. But I went through the trouble of having only one drive on the system until Windows was installed and configured.
 
Depending on the work (or personnal) system requirement in term of direct metal, a Virtual machine instead could be considered you can have a clean separation ? And there some benefit from a VM (backup, easy to have it on different PC in a short amount of time, make the next PC upgrade less of an issue and so on).

Would you physically remove all but the target boot drive, it should be the safest way to go, I have yet to encounter that type of issue but that seem common enough from the Interweb stories, that it could make it good practice to do it like that. VM and the hardware for them got better and better.

Many would prefer to separate has much as possible and not just on the technical level but mentally, so a clean boot choice if you do not have 2 different computer could be preferred for mental reason, even if a VM would do too.
 
is this the dual boot system i replied about in another thread?(maybe not...)
you'l have to start over but you can wipe both, install a separate install on each drive(while the other is disconnected) and then use the bios boot menu to select which to boot from. you might want to hide the drives/os from each other so files dont end up on the wrong one.
 
VMs are nice and I do use them project work as the dev software don't play nice and it's just so much cleaner to have a different VM for each.

The Work SSD is for all the basic office stuff and the run the VMware Workstation host software. I guess I could put it in it's own VM but I like having a desktop and everything just for work and it's way more responsive.

I did end up doing them again. I did have an image of the first SSD before trying the second, so it was not too bad.

This MSI board is not helping. The BIOS option screen goes by too quick, it's on screen for like a second. I need to add a speaker on my new $600+ motherboard so I can better know when to hit F11. Then if you use the RAM profile it trains the RAM every boot and sets on code 15 for like a minute.

The new motherboards really need a way to disable SSDs for testing and OS installs. At least this one lets me disable the Wi-Fi.

Be cool if I could set it so the boot menu just showed up every time.
 
Tanquen said:
VMs are nice and I do use them project work as the dev software don't play nice and it's just so much cleaner to have a different VM for each.

The Work SSD is for all the basic office stuff and the run the VMware Workstation host software. I guess I could put it in it's own VM but I like having a desktop and everything just for work and it's way more responsive.

I did end up doing them again. I did have an image of the first SSD before trying the second, so it was not too bad.

This MSI board is not helping. The BIOS option screen goes by too quick, it's on screen for like a second. I need to add a speaker on my new $600+ motherboard so I can better know when to hit F11. Then if you use the RAM profile it trains the RAM every boot and sets on code 15 for like a minute.

The new motherboards really need a way to disable SSDs for testing and OS installs. At least this one lets me disable the Wi-Fi.

Be cool if I could set it so the boot menu just showed up every time.
Click to expand...
look in the bios and increase the drive/boot delay so you can hit F12(or whatever) in time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top