Hello everyone, I'm in desperate need to help with a problem.
It's quite a complex problem so I'm going to try and describe it as best I can.. here goes.
I got a 256GB SSD for Xmas and am trying to put Windows 7 64bit and Linux Mint 16 KDE 64bit on it.
My computer is custom built with a Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H motherboard (rev 1.0), it has UEFI DualBIOS on it and is updated to the latest non-beta BIOS.
When I try to boot the computer using 'Legacy', it can see all my DVD and Hard Drives. When I try to boot the computer in 'UEFI', It cannot find anything.. no DVD drives, no Hard Drives.
I can press F12 on boot to access a boot menu to choose what device I want to boot from.
I tried to make the new SSD use the GPT partitioning system but my computer, when booting in UEFI, doesn't even find my DVD drive to start installing.
So, after a while in my old Windows installation, I made the disk MBR and proceeded to install Windows absolutely fine on a partition.
I then tried to install Linux Mint 16 KDE and the pain started.
I loaded the install CD and went to install it but Linux Mint can't find my Windows partition. It said the entire drive was empty.
I proceeded to ignore it and make a partition on the other half of the drive and Linux Mint installed fine. I reboot and get greeted with a 'Windows cannot boot' screen.
After digging around, I have discovered that even though I have selected 'Legacy' and not 'UEFI', Linux Mint decided to make the disk GPT and install itself on the latter part of the disk, erasing and unallocating the Windows partition.
So now I am in this position, Window seems to have been wiped from the disk. UEFI mode on my PC makes all my drives on my PC vanish for no reason so I cant boot into anything with it and all I have is a working Linux Mint installation
I am at a loss for ideas now, I've spent hours browsing forums and I'm unable to find any helpful information.
I want to get Windows 7 and Linux Mint 16 working side by side in MBR/Legacy mode only, UEFI/GPT seems to be nothing but problems for this machine.
I hope someone can offer some guidance on the issue.
Thank You in advance.