I think I've decided to split my machine by dual booting. I use the same machine for music and audio production as well as for some casual gaming and daily general use. Therefore, I'm looking to keep them as lean as possible with cross-contamination to have optimal performance in both scenarios.

I am therefore looking to install Windows 11 Pro on two separate environments. I have a 2TB C: NVMe drive at the moment, but also have 2 x 4TB NVMe drives in my system.

Should I split the 2TB into 2 x 1TB partitions and retain the two 4TB NVMe drives, or should I put the music production environment on the 3TB and the gaming/daily use envrionment on one of the 4TB drives (or vice versa)?

Also, what is the best current method to dual boot systems? I previously tried it 10-15 years and had horrible experiences, so just want to keep it as simple and vanilla as possible for the dual boot element.

I will likely be installing Windows 11 Pro Ghost Spectre Compact for both OS installs, in case that makes any difference.

 

I used to dual boot Windows around 20 years ago but my boot file was corrupted twice within the couple of years I did it. This may have been due to the instability of Windows 2000 (yes, I did say that) or because of the dual booting. Whatever it was I couldn't recover the boot file in both cases and ever since I've stuck with one installation only and have never lost a boot file since.

DeepSeek says (lots of info, ask it yourself - prompt: is dual booting windows more likely to corrupt the boot file than just having windows as one installation):

'Dual-booting Windows with another operating system (e.g., Linux or another version of Windows) can increase the risk of boot file corruption compared to having a single Windows installation. However, this risk is manageable if you set up and maintain the dual-boot system properly.'

I still wouldn't do it but I'm risk averse.

 

My solution was to buy a mini PC, one of the cheap Chinese ones. I still haven't set it up but the intention was to use it for browsing and media consumption etc., but I'm still undecided as to how I will set it up to use the same keyboard, mouse and monitor for both computers. I may purchase a KVM switch.

 

I use two separate machines now. But for a while I had two physical hard drives. Each completely separate (own boot loader on each). At startup I would swap the boot order in the bios. Not elegant but it worked. I couldn't even tell you most official Microsoft recommended way.

 

Music PC = 4 TB hard drive

I would take the chance and install the music production on the large 4 TB NVMe drive with all plugins and sample libraries and use it only for music, this has 3 big advantages, they have faster loading times, better performance, stability and more security.

I would not go online with it either, so that you don't ruin your stable system again with viruses and doubtless updates. As you know, future Windows updates will probably change your system to the detriment and pose a risk. A permanent update stop for the created music system is worth considering.

Your new CPU will also certainly be bug-free and stable at peak performance in a few weeks or months.

It is really best to have a pure music PC that is permanently disconnected from the Internet when it is running stably. I rely on full backups so that you can restore your system at any time.

Gaming Internet = 3 TB hard drive

I would install gaming and internet for daily use on the 3 TB hard drive. You can quickly reinstall games.

 

Once you have it set up, before any corruption happens, why wouldn't you just extract the .BCD boot file and keep as a backup though using something like EasyBCD (which I believe can do this and you can then simply reinstate if there ever is a corruption)? Wouldn't this mitigate this issue?

 

Last edited: Feb 6, 2025

That's not an option for me though, as music production and VR gaming are both demanding in different ways (CPU+RAM and CPU+GPU, for example), so my base hardware is needed in both scenarios and buying a different entire system powerful enough for either/or of these two use cases wouldn't be cheap!

 

It's important to think about which aspect you're prioritizing when using your PC.
If you're a musician professionally, you should prioritize an environment for music production. If music production is a hobby and you also want to enjoy gaming, then you should split the capacity in half for both.

But maybe it's not that simple in your case?

 

I have 2 separate drives, when starting the computer I enter the boot drive selection menu in BIOS and choose manually.
Maybe it's not super convenient or elegant, but it's safe.

please don’t judge me

 

I used to use GRUB as my boot manager even when I had only Windows installed, because it was trivially easy to add more OSs to it and fix screw ups like Windows updates helpfully resetting the boot manager. Plug in Linux Live USB, re-run GRUB, fixed. But in 2025? No idea what the implications are for EFI secure boot etc.

 

Different system = different drive
Dual boot installed on "main" system is most of the time "destroyed" by windows updates.
For me the best way is to boot on USB memory key and setup a boot choice on it with a multiboot tool like YUMI (UEFI is supported I think).

 

Maybe, I didn't have enough knowledge back then. In fact I still don't! I need to backup my .BCD file!

 

13:40 in this video shows how to back up the BCD bootloader easily, and then goes on later in the vid to show how to reinstate it if it becomes corrupt too.

 

I've given up on Windows and bootloaders. So separate partitions/drives and use BIOS/UEFI boot selector. Ok, any Linux partitions have got GRUB in them that can boot Windows, but that's a bonus, not a necessity. As long as Windows thinks it's the only operating system in existence on a system it's fine.

 

Thanks, I'll watch that video tomorrow.

I tried EasyBCD but it wouldn't work because my system is using EFI. I can still do it manually, I was just hoping for an easy method.

 

This is the exact solution I was going to suggest. While dual boot is possible and does work, in the long run you'll have a much better experience keeping your internet/browsing activities completely separate from your media production machine. Your media prod box being completely sans internet.

 

Out of interest, why is a different machine needed for this? Why can I just disable the ethernet and WiFi adapter on the music prod OS in a dual boot set up to keep it off the internet?

 

I would go for this solution, but I use the Logitech MX Keys keyboard and Logitech MX Master 3 mouse, and for some reason the Logitech USB receiver for these doesn't kick in until the boot logo screen after the BIOS screen, meaning I can't press a key until after the BIOS key prompt screen. I love the keyboard and mouse and used them for years too, and so wouldn't want to change them. I do have a cheapo USB keyboard I use when needing to access BIOS, but don't want it permanently connected on my desk cos it would:

a) take up space; and
b) is ugly af

 

Keyboard does not respond when booting - adjust BIOS settings

1. If the keyboard does not work until the Windows start procedure, call up the BIOS beforehand as described in this practical tip.
2. If available, activate "USB Keyboard Support" in the "Peripherals" area.

 

It's nothing to do with this. This is basic troubleshooting steps. It is because the Logitech USB Unifying Receiver can't fully work pre-boot it seems, despite all USB/peripheral settings in BIOS being enabled. It also happens on other desktops I've tested on, so isn't device (and therefore BIOS) specific. I have my BIOS set to full enabling of all USB ports including legacy support on boot, so anything connected is powered up as much as it can during boot already.