How to Install a Triple Boot Windows, Mac OS X, Unbuntu System – Hackintosh Made Easy
How to Setup a Triple-Boot Hackintosh With Windows, Mac OS X & Ubuntu the Easy Way
Hey all. Lately I have been messing around with a Triple-Boot system running Windows XP, Mac OS X and Ubuntu.
I have seen a lot of guides that make this sound like it is very hard to do. So I am writing this guide for all the lazy or unmotivated techies (like myself) that just want to do it the easy way.
This guide is going to assume you know the basics of installing OS software since you are trying to setup a triple boot installation in the first place.
Installing a Triple Boot System Running Windows, Mac OS X, and Ubuntu
First you need to make sure you have your discs for each OS you plan to install. I’ll assume that you do since you are attempting this in the first place.
01. To start put your Windows disc into the system and start the installation.
02. Use the partition tool to setup “3” partitions since we are creating a triple boot system
(On my system I allotted 100gb for Windows, 25gb for Mac OS X and 25gb for Ubuntu.)
03. Proceed with the Windows installation.
04. Once the Windows installation is complete shut down the PC. (Setup drivers and updates after all your OS have been installed, incase something goes wrong.)
05. Next pop in your Mac OS (Hackintosh) disc and start the installation.
06. Once the setup has started go into “utilities” and select “disk utility”.
07. You should see the partitions you created. Your first partition will be Windows. Select your next free partition and set it to “Mac OS Extended (journaled)”.
08. Once the second partition is setup exit the disk utility and continue the Max OS installation.
(Mac OS “hackintosh” versions are very picky about your hardware. The easiest way to resolve an issue with the installation failing is to just download a different version of the installer. As I said, this is the lazy man’s route. We are not going to troubleshoot all the possible issues with hackintosh installs in this guide)
Recommend hackintosh installations for Intel are:
01. iATKOS
02. Kalyway
03. iPCIf you are using AMD, good luck. Check on the insanelymac forums for assistance.
I originally tried to install iATKOS on my Intel system and had a lot of problems. I then used Kalyway (10.5.2) and it worked like a charm the first time through.
I recommend having both of these installations for a lazy man’s trick to get this all setup.
09. Once your Mac OS installation is complete the system should reboot and go into Mac OS. If you are running Vista or Windows 7 you may need to boot back into your Windows installation disk and select the “startup repair” option, which will note a problem with the boot record and should give you the option to automatically repair it.
- (On Windows XP this step was unneeded.)
10. Now that you have Windows and Mac OS installed on your system, use the iATKOS install CD to install the Bootloader (Regardless of what disc you used to install Mac OS.)
11. Boot into iATKOS and select the “customize” option prior to the standard installation. This will allow you to uncheck components to be installed. Uncheck EVERYTHING except “Bootloader”.
12. Go into Bootloader and make sure it is set to “Chameleon 2.0” only.
13. Double check that nothing else is selected and proceed with the install. The install should take roughly 10 seconds. You will get an error that Mac OS was not installed. Right, it wasn’t, the Bootloader was.
14. Reboot your PC. When you see the Apple logo, hit enter. You will now be taken to a screen with a funky looking lizard. You should also see an option for Windows or Mac OS on this screen.
15. Now reboot the system and insert your Ubuntu installation disc and choose the Ubuntu install option (Not the Live CD option)
16. Fill out the information that is required for the installation. Make a note of any user names or passwords that you setup.
17. Once the Ubuntu partition screen comes up choose the bottom option of “Guided – use the largest continues free space”. This should utilize the last partition you created in Step #3 of this guide..
18. Right before the installation starts you should see an “options” button. This allows you to install the Ubuntu bootloader. You “DO” want to do this, BUT make sure it does not get installed to the MBR of the hard drive, which it is set to by default.
19. The drop down menu will allow you to choose to install it somewhere else on the disk. You should see your Windows partition, Mac partition and then a blank partition. Install the bootloader to this blank partition. (On my system this was sd4)
Ubuntu Install Note:
The first Master IDE hard disk is called hda.
SCSI, SATA and USB are referred to as sd.
Each primary partition is numbered 1 to 4.
Each logical partition is numbered from 5 upwards.
20. Now let the installation finish and once it is complete and the system reboots you should now see Windows, Mac OS X and Ubuntu in the Chameleon bootloader.
Congratulations. You have now setup your triple boot system without the need for any fancy terminal commands, binding patches into your hackintosh installation disk, or using third party partition programs to prepare your disk.
If this didn’t work for you there are plenty of in-depth guides with tedious information on various parts of this type of installation but I found my method to be the most straight forward, with the least amount of hassle.
Contrary to various forums on the internet you shouldn’t need to be an expert to get these OS setup so you can learn them and become an expert. We weren’t born knowing how to run.
Good luck, I will try my best to answer any questions people may have about this.
There are 19 Comments to "How to Install a Triple Boot Windows, Mac OS X, Unbuntu System – Hackintosh Made Easy"
Thanks for this. I’m going to try it as soon as ideneb v1.6 10.5.8 and fedora 11 finish downloading. I downloaded a copy of chameleon though and I hope just installing it should work the same way.
If I have issues I’ll comment again.
do i have to choose which operating system i want to use everytime i boot my computer?
or do they have a timer, so that if i dont choose any, they will proceed with one OS?
Using this method the system will boot in OSX by default. You have about 10 seconds to choose an OS when the system boots otherwise it will automatically load OSX.
I would like to try this! I had a triple-boot GRUB system set up by my cousin, and the Windows partition died. I would like to set up a triple boot system myself. I have a spare hard drive I can use. I want Windows, Hackintosh, and Linux.
My question? I have a hard drive running Windows now, and I was wondering if this method would work if I partition a haard drive, and then copy a bootable backup of my Windows hard disk to one of the partitions, instead of doing a fresh Windows install (which would be a major pain).
Very nice of you to show an easier way to do a multi-boot system. Thank you. Few people are nice enough to do that. With most people, it is, “Oh, it’s easy!” and then 5 pages of command prompts. Ugh.
I stumbled upon your site and glanced at the icon for Windows and saw written “Windows NTFS”
I thought it said “Windows NSFW” and I thought, boy is that right.
hi. I did everything just as you have explained it. and did not work.
when I choose the partition of ubuntu 9.10 I get some strange letters, and will not start. 
believed to be due to grub 2?
thanks
another question .. how do I install the latest version of Chameleon? by that I have is coming in the iATKOS dvd v7 and perhaps this version is the problem.
thanks..
greetings from Spain
This seems pretty easy, I have Kalyway 10.5.2 on DVD and I have a Vista installation CD, then I’m downloading iATKOS right now then after that I’ll install Ubuntu and go for it.
I’ll post resultS!
P.S. I saw in comments that on the boot loader screen you have only like 10 seconds to choose or else it goes into Mac..is it possible where it just stays on the screen without being times so you can choose?
I am interested in doing this on my Lenovo S10e however do not have an external cd drive. It it possible to use the same method with usb installs?
I really, really want to avoid reinstalling OSX yet again. (I’ve done it 5? 6? times.) I have ubuntu on sda1, OSX on sda3, and Chameleon bootloader which only sees the OSX. Is there a command I can use to get Chameleon to see ubuntu *without* reinstalling my whole OS? There has to be, right? Right?
Is there some other solution? It seems like it ought to be a simple matter of editing a config file somewhere
.
A couple of hours after posting my question, I finally found the answer. I’ve been searching for days! It was on the insanelymac forum in a comment by kr4zycld. It works for old grub, not grub2.
after installing both OSes and the chameleon/ darwin bootloader for the OSX partition:
boot with an ubuntu (or other linux?) liveCD
use gparted (also called Partition Editor, found under System > Administration). If your linux partition is flagged “boot”, go to Partition > Manage Flags and uncheck “boot”. If your OSX partition is not marked boot, then go through the same process to mark it “boot.” Close gparted.
Install grub to the linux partition, NOT to the MBR:
while still booted on the liveCD, open a terminal (Accessories > Terminal) and type
$sudo grub [that gives you the grub prompt]
grub>find /boot/grub/stage1 [that returns the boot location, say (hd0,0)]
grub>root (hd0,0) [telling grub where the linux root is located]
grub>setup (hd0,0)
[tells grub to install in the 1st partition of the 1st HD. (hd0) would install to the MBR]
grub>quit
$
and restart to…
Boot back into OSX, and open a terminal
type the command:
sudo fdisk -u -f /usr/standalone/i386/boot0 /dev/rdisk0
[replaces the previous mbr install of grub with the chameleon / darwin loader]
[fdisk will reformat your whole drive if done wrong. don't make any typos!]
-u says rewrite the MBR and preserve the partition table
-f says use the following file
/dev/rdisk0 says write the MBR on the first HD. You can check the correct designation on your system by running “diskutil list” in the terminal.
And then reboot. When the chameleon loader comes up, hit any key when it says you can to make the actual choice for another OS to show up.
hello, thanks for the writeup but i currently have a dual boot setup of windows 7 and ubuntu i was wondering if i could just continue from there by installing a hackintosh version. would it be recognized by grub? if i went this way should i still install chamelion? or would i have to start over first and do it step by step in the order you did? thanks – Steve
Good morning,
I followed the guide (very nice), but after I install MacOSX Kaliway 10.5.2 it gives an error about HFS+ prtition error. I cannot boot either to Win7 nor to MacOSX. Any ideas???
Many thanks in advance
George
@quixote
grub2 works too, actually it’s easier with grub2.
I installed ubuntu 9.10 and it recognised both win and osx and added corresponding boot entries, and that’s it.
in the 11 th point u have not mentioned that where should chameleon bootloader installed, on the mac os x partition or i should give a separate partition for it……..please give me reply………..i really need this……thanks
Hackintosh?
get a proper mac. and why do you need Windows? you have Mac, and Linux. Windoows is un-needed.
Proper macs are not very powerful, and expensive. e.g.
hackintosh can be OC to +4 GHz wheras the Mac Pro is usually <3.4 GHz
windoze is needed to make OSX look better.
@mac some people like to play games on their computers. Or use powerful programs with full use of multiple cores.
OK.. I have been all night up to solve the triple-boot OSX, WIN 7 and Kubuntu and FINALLY I GOT IT RIGHT.
This method worked for me. Still you have to give credit to this forum author…
I had win 7 installed and then OSX (iATKOS 7) and was working fine. I installed kubuntu and then lost chemeleon. Only Grub was loading that didn,t boot me into OSX. Now I was stuck with ugly grub boot that didn’t boot me into OSX.
After reading several forms, this worked for me.
- using iATKOS install DVD, I installed only chemeleon. (thanks to this forum)
- next, got back chemeleon but I lost win 7 login. I was able to boot into kubuntu and OSX. Tried Win 7 install dvd to repair but didn’t work
- luckly, I had ACRONIS BOOT CD (with Disk Director and true image)
- used this cd and boot into Disk Director. Made win 7 partition active
- Using win 7 install DVD, did repair and this time it worked.
- Now I was only booting into win 7
- booted back into ACRONIS DISK DIRECTOR boot cd and now made OSX partition active.
Thats it..now all 3 OS works…Chemeleon looks awesome.
Good Luck..