[SOLVED] Possible install windows 7 on Legacy ?

[legno-legnuzzo]

Hello,

Basically i ve Windows 10 which is UEFI (boot manager), but i want also to have Windows 7 not UEFI but Legacy.

is it possible? how?

i tried delete folder 'efi' from w7 installer in my USB, tried put bios on Legacy mode only, but usb doesn't boot without it.

any thought?

 

[Colif]

Do you have 2 hdd or one?

If you only have one, you can't do what you want to do. You cannot have UEFI boot and Legacy on same hdd.
But you can have both win 7/10 on same hdd but you need to install win 7 first and then install win 10, as the other way around doesn't work. Just an example: If you install win 7 over top of 10, and 10 is formatted as legacy and has an MBR partition, win 7 will overwrite all the boot information as win 10 is a completely alien operating system as far as Win 7 concerned, since it didn't exist when Win 7 was produced.
The above also applies if you have them both on different drives, win 7 needs to be installed first and then 10, as 10 knows what 7 is and can add itself to the boot order and include the Win 7 drive in its boot manager

is this is a custom build or brand name PC?
If custom, what motherboard?
If brand name, what make/model?

if you have win 10 installed now, its likely the motherboard has secure boot set and it won't let you boot off USB

I don't think deleting the efi partition will help at all as now bios may not have anything to boot off on the USB. I would make a new installer. That wouldn't have had anything to do with why the PC wouldn't boot legacy.

What USB slots did you use? USB 2 or 3? Win 7 doesn't know what USB 3 is so might not install using those slots.

Does PC have win 7 drivers as that is going to be a hurdle later as well. Lots of errors and bad times ahead if you try to run on default software.

 

[legno-legnuzzo]

I got 1 ssd for w10, and the 2nd where should be installed W7.

it's a custom build PC, motherboard asus rog strix Z270H.

Actually USB 3.0 works good when i installed W7 in UEFI time ago.

 

[Colif]

You would need to put 7 on 1 hdd and then 10 on the next, so its a matter of starting again and backing up all the data you want to save on the win 10 hdd

This is the more straight forward way... not sure if you could install win 7 on new hdd and then try to add it to the win 10 boot order via rebuilding the bcd. I don't know if that would work or just be a waste of time

Motherboard at least has win 7 drivers

 

[howtobeironic]

A heads-up. New Win7 installs contain both UEFI and Legacy installs-deleting "efi" folder won't work, you'll get thrown an error-you have to specify which mode do you want to use. You choose which mode to install from boot order, "uefi" prefix will mean that it will install in uefi and no prix means that it will install legacy.

You can't install an GPT and a MBR partition on the same drive, unless you have some sophisticated system that will handle, sort and convert each signal that reaches the HDD and sends them to correct partitions, which would be hard (and not so useful)

You can install them to different drives, but many resources say this:
A Legacy Windows will only boot a Legacy Windows
An UEFI Windows will only boot an UEFI Windows

However, there are some workarounds:
You can try your luck, if it works well(and your mobo supports switching legacy modes on the fly) you'll have both Legacy and UEFI options.

You will have to boot order all the time (and switch the modes manually)

You'll install a Linux based bootloader such as Grub but if you screw up you'll need to restore a backup or wipe all the stuff (you'll want a Linux partition/OS for it. You can do without any but it'll take you some dear time.)