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I've installed Ubuntu 14.04.3 LTS from a USB drive, on a PC running Windows 8.1. But when I turn on my PC, I'm not presented with an option to choose to boot either Windows or Ubuntu. Instead, I'm taken straight to Windows. I've reinstalled Ubuntu (from the same USB drive), and nothing's changed. Moreover, Ubuntu doesn't appear in my list of programs in the Windows control panel. How can I boot into Ubuntu?

Someone suggested I boot the USB drive and type the commands: sudo fdisk -l sudo grub-install /dev/

Here's the output of these commands: Output of sudo commands

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  • Hi, welcome! Are you sure you installed it, as opposed to just using (booting into) the Live USB?
    – pradeepcep
    Feb 4, 2016 at 1:56
  • So, I changed the booting settings of my machine to put "boot from usb drive" (in my own words) first. So to install Ubuntu, I turned off my computer, plugged in the USB, turned on the computer, and was then presented with 4 choices: "Try Ubuntu without installing", "Install Ubuntu", "OEM" and "check disc for defects". I choose the first. The Ubuntu standard desktop opened. I clicked on the button to install Ubuntu, and I followed the instructions. I then turned my computer off, unplugged the USB, and turned it on. It is then that I have no option to boot into Ubuntu when I should have one.
    – MasterChief117
    Feb 4, 2016 at 1:58
  • Did you check (tick) "replace boot manager with GRUB" or similar option during the install?
    – pradeepcep
    Feb 4, 2016 at 2:07
  • No, I didn't do that.
    – MasterChief117
    Feb 4, 2016 at 2:08
  • I think you just have to go to your BIOS settings and choose Ubuntu from the list. If you look up how to install ubuntu on a UEFI or EFI system, there are a lot of posts and Google will yield many results as well. askubuntu.com/questions/tagged/uefi
    – mchid
    Feb 4, 2016 at 2:27

3 Answers 3

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I have something similar. I never see grub. However, if I get the BIOS boot menu, I can choose either Windows or Linux.

You may also need to disable safeboot in the BIOS.

When your machine first comes on it should tell you which key to press to get BIOS settings. F10, F12, del or something.

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  • AFAIK, there's no such feature as "safeboot." I think you mean Secure Boot. Disabling it should not be necessary, since Ubuntu supports Secure Boot. That said, there are rare cases of broken Secure Boot implementations when disabling it is required, and there are other situations in which disabling it may be desirable. As a general rule, though, leaving Secure Boot enabled is desirable, since it provides security benefits you shouldn't throw away casually.
    – Rod Smith
    Feb 4, 2016 at 14:16
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I strongly suspect, but do not know for certain, that you've installed Ubuntu in BIOS/CSM/legacy mode, and that you've got an EFI/UEFI-mode Windows installation. Such dual-mode installations always complicate matters, and should be avoided. Unfortunately, avoiding them takes some general EFI know-how that is, as yet, not as common as it needs to be.

Another possibility is that your firmware is broken and it's either "forgetting" your boot settings or it's ignoring them. In this case, the best solution is to replace the broken computer with one that works; however, most people end up using an ugly workaround, like renaming their boot loaders. The Boot Repair utility has an option to do this on its Advanced menu.

To know which of these is the case, you should run the Boot Info Script. This will generate a file called RESULTS.txt. Post it to a pastebin site and post the URL to your document here.

I strongly recommend that you read as many of the following as you can manage; they'll give you the information on EFI-mode booting and dual-booting that you need to handle the situation intelligently:

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There is a section of your HHD that is the boot area. The information in there will dictate the boot steps. If you installed Ubuntu along with Windows then you need to install GRUB from ubuntu to the boot manager. That will handle our chioce of win or ubuntu.

You will need to boot the live disk and either fully reinstall or install grub from there. Open a terminal, and type sudo fdisk -l Now, type sudo grub-install /dev/

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  • How could I do it? Please be specific. Edit: When you say "boot the live disk", do you mean booting from the USB drive?
    – MasterChief117
    Feb 4, 2016 at 2:12
  • yes boot the usb drive, either select try without installing and run these commands OR just click Install Ubuntu. Are you trying to keep windows or replace it?
    – wlraider70
    Feb 4, 2016 at 2:23
  • I definitely want to keep Windows :) I'm gonna try these commands now. Edit: After entering "sudo grub-install /dev/", I got the following message:
    – MasterChief117
    Feb 4, 2016 at 2:24
  • After entering "sudo grub-install /dev/", I got the following message: Installing for i386-pc platform. grub-install: error: failed to get canonical path of '/cow'.
    – MasterChief117
    Feb 4, 2016 at 2:30
  • This answer is built on BIOS-mode boot assumptions. If the computer shipped with Windows 8.1, Windows is almost certainly booting in EFI mode, so BIOS-mode boot repairs will be ineffective at best and detrimental at worst. Also, grub-install /dev/ is useless on any Ubuntu system; on an EFI-based system, you'd normally omit the device specifier, and on a BIOS-based system, you need to specify a device filename, such as /dev/sda, not the /dev/ directory itself.
    – Rod Smith
    Feb 4, 2016 at 14:18

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