Windows – Dual Booting Windows 10 and Ubuntu 18.04 with Bitlocker Enabled

bitlockerencryptionmulti-bootUbuntuwindows 10

I took the following steps to create a dual boot setup on my SurfaceBook with Windows 10 and Ubuntu 18.04

1) Installed Windows 10

2) Suspended Bitlocker

3) Installed Ubuntu 18.04 from a USB bootable thumbdrive alongside Windows 10. This completed successfully and I restarted.

4) Presented with GRUB screen to choose OS and chose to enter Windows10 (worked this one time) which automatically re-enabled Bitlocker.

5) Restarted which presents the GRUB screen, I selected Windows10 and was presented with the Bitlocker recovery screen

6) Entered my recovery code and clicked the restart button

7) Shown GRUB screen and picked Windows10 again

8) Presented with Bitlocker recovery screen ….

9) This loop continues indefinitely

I am stuck entering the 48-digit Bitlocker recovery code indefinitely, never making it through to Windows. I tried using the Windows command prompt to enter 'manage-bde -unlock <48 digit code>', but when I run 'manage-bde -status', the encrypted windows volume is not even listed as an option. It does not see the Windows partition at all.

I can enter and use Ubuntu with no issue. Had I disabled Bitlocker, there would be no issue. It's the Bitlocker part that's causing me all the headache.

What are the proper steps to get this dual boot working with Bitlocker?

Best Answer

The fix is to suspend Bitlocker then resume Bitlocker. That will reset the flag that keeps asking for the recovery key.

Related Solutions

Windows – BitLocker recovery key required after dual-booting Ubuntu

The optimal solution is to disable BitLocker completely, as you said. However, there is a way to keep Bitlocker on your computer and keep Ubuntu. I have not tried this on my own computer but it has worked well with others.

The way to do this is to uninstall Ubuntu. Remember to disable BitLocker from Windows. Provided that you have files you want to keep, I would suggest you take a backup (I would do this of the /home folder because that is where all your user files are (you would need to reinstall all user-installed programs and dependencies); otherwise you can just take a full backup and reinstall GRUB; more info about this is in this question.

The way to uninstall Ubuntu is easy. Boot from your LiveCD or create a USB with Rufus or some other utility and boot from that. After, open GParted and simply delete the partitions. However, you're not done. Because you deleted the partitions, you also deleted the grub files configuration files (everything in /boot/grub). As a result, if you boot up your computer now, you will get to a grub-rescue screen. So don't reboot just yet.

Open a terminal and run these commands to add a PPA and install boot-repair:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:yannubuntu/boot-repair
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install boot-repair && boot-repair

After that, select "Recommended repair." This will create a new BCD for your Windows system and reinstall bootmgr to the MBR. It will ask you to create a pastebin after and give you a file telling you about what happened. After that, reboot. This should hopefully work. Otherwise, you can clone the drive to another one of the same size and format the whole drive, then move Windows back. Again, the best (and least risky) solution is to disable BitLocker completely.

Windows – Ubuntu Windows 10 Dual boot with TPM & Bitlocker

I chose to install the GRUB bootloader on the SSD as a whole not a specific partition on it so I guess that would make it install GRUB in the EFI partition?

Yes it would. The question whether to install GRUB into a disk vs partition doesn't even make sense on UEFI.

the EFI partition exists (System Reserved Partition)

That's not the same partition.

I want to uninstall grub and return to the Windows Bootloader/boot manager without reinstalling Windows. Then boot by default into it and have the option to chose to go to GRUB or Ubuntu directly as this tutorial https://stomp.colorado.edu/blog/blog/2011/12/05/on-dual-booting-tpm-linux-windows-and-bitlocker/ says.

The tutorial is written for PC BIOS systems. It does not apply to UEFI – the special partitions are different, bootloaders live elsewhere, the whole boot process is nothing like BIOS boot.

For UEFI, the Windows Boot Manager refuses to start any other boot programs except for what comes with Windows itself. You can still add the corresponding entries, but they won't work.

However, for UEFI, your EFI System Partition already has both bootloaders installed and the firmware itself has a boot menu that allows you to choose between them. Hold Esc or F12 or whatever your computer uses; you'll find an entry for "Windows Boot Manager" and an entry for "Ubuntu".

Within Linux you can manage these boot entries using efibootmgr. For example:

# efibootmgr
BootCurrent: 0001
Timeout: 0 seconds
BootOrder: 0000,0001
Boot0000* Windows Boot Manager
Boot0001* Ubuntu

To swap them around (make Windows primary), you can again use the firmware settings screen, or you can change the BootOrder variable:

# efibootmgr --bootorder 0001,0000

To boot into Windows once while keeping Ubuntu as default, you can set BootNext:

# efibootmgr --bootnext 0000

And vice versa, if you're using Windows, to boot into Ubuntu just once:

Use bcdedit /enum firmware to find the Windows BCD GUID for the Ubuntu entry.
Use bcdedit /set {fwbootmgr} bootsequence {UBUNTU_GUID_HERE} to program the BootNext variable.