I tend to have a cheap SSD (32GB-120GB) with Haiku OS installed and replace the drive in the laptop.
I have been able to boot most laptops that way. Once you know the computer works with Haiku then you work on duo-booting.
PS. On newer laptops I have to turn off secure-boot as well.
Do you mean you start by partitioning and formatting the disk and installing only Haiku and then install other operating systems to the remaining partition(s)?
Letâs follow the âno black magic involvedâ process, please.
Either your computer boots with a legacy BIOS. In that case, you need a bootloader installed in the MBR. We ship bootman, but you could use GRUB, SmartBootManager, Plop, or whatever you prefer. In this case it does not matter in which order you install the OS, unless one of them decides to overwrite the MBR. The best solution is to install everything in any order and then install the bootloader.
Or, your computer boots with UEFI, in this case, you need the loader executable for each OS to be installed in the EFI boot partition. We ship ours but you have to copy it manually. Then, you need to decide at boot time which one to start. This can be done either directly from the UEFI configuration if it allows it. If it doesnât, you will need a bootloader, such as rEFInd, to provide a menu. Again, it does not matter in which order you install the systems, as long as you end up with all boot executables available.
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On a smaller SSD I only have Haiku installed. On my larger SSDs I do exactly what you suggested.
With Windows however, because it want to wipe other operating systems, I tend to install Windows first, Resize it to a smaller partition with the builtin tools, then install in a second computer as the second drive, install Bootman and format the extra space for Haiku.
This works fine with Windows 7, but I have had mixed results with Windows 10, some machines will not boot Haiku off the same drive even as the Windows 10 works fine. However, in those cases I can boot off a USB stick and still use the BFS formatted partition on the hard-drive. I lately am working on a laptop that takes two drives and I am trying to set it up with Windows 10 on one drive and Haiku on the second drive. But it is a little flaky, it needs more work.
Well, in the latest years, my experience has been more on Mac, so I wonât be the best person to troubleshoot Windows 10 + Haiku issuesâŚ