I've got a laptop here that came with a Windows 8 installation. What I did: Removed the harddisk, put in an SSD, and now I've (unsuccessfully) tried to install Debian. I've used all the default options of the Graphical Installer and chose not to force UEFI. However, it doesn't boot, but hangs in PXE trying to start via IPV4.
Now, I'm revisiting the installer and wondering: If I choose "force UEFI", does that only affect the installation on the SSD?
Can I swap back the harddisk and will my Windows 8 installation automagically work, or will "force UEFI" do other things I don't know about that will make it impossible to swap back my harddisk at a later time?
Best Answer
You're in luck because as part of my own adventures, I had a similar question to you. Forging ahead, I just did the following:
Everything was fine. To boot Debian, I leave my BIOS in UEFI mode. To boot Windows 7, I toggle back into legacy mode.
Thus, I have to assume my option A above was correct: "Force UEFI" seems like a poor way of wording the proposition 'Some firmwares might get horribly confused if you install a UEFI/GPT bootloader on one disk, while having BIOS/MBR bootloaders elsewhere on the system. Would you like to give up, just in case?'
Having said that, for anyone thinking my setup is a tad confusing, you're right - and this experience has shown my firmware might well be one of those poorly programmed ones - to say the least. But I don't believe that specific anecdote is relevant here, so I'll stop myself. The key thing is that it works - for now!