Windows is notorious for fucking with GRUB and other bootloaders. You might be able to go into your BIOS and disable your main drive while doing the install to prevent any issues. But it's been so long since I've tried to do that, maybe verify before taking my advice.
this post was submitted on 09 Mar 2024
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Sadly only SATA ports can be disabled on my board, that doesn't seem to be possible to do to the nvme port, but thanks there!
I'd even suggest unplugging the Linux drive entirely. Let Windows install as if it is on the only drive. When complete, plug everything back in and set up your boot order accordingly. Manually add the Windows drive to your Linux bootloader.
Have done this before, Windows being Windows it will replace grub with the windows boot loader. Use a live disk to reinstall grub and reset your boot options and you're done.
No. Windows will only replace the removable media path at \EFI\boot\bootx64.efi, of the bootloader. If grub is stored somewhere else, windows won't replace it.
https://wiki.debian.org/UEFI#Force_grub-efi_installation_to_the_removable_media_path
However, not every motherboard is compliant with the UEFI spec, and supports booting from other EFI binaries than \EFI\boot\bootx64.efi. My motherboard was one such board, where I had to force grub to install to the removable media path (which isn't the default on debian, although it is the default on a lot of other distros).
@Quills@sh.itjust.works , you should test if your motherboard properly implements the UEFI specification, by going into the UEFI menu, and selecting a different file to boot from, or changing defaults. If you look and there is no such option, or the option is ignored, then you know your motherboard isn't properly implementing the UEFI spec.
You can test if your motherboard supports booting from a different file by downloading an abitrary efi file (like memtest), and then placing it in the EFI system partition, at somewhere other than the removable media path. If you can get the UEFI to boot from somewhere other than that, then the UEFI spec is properly implemented, and Windows updates won't overwrite grub.
Of course, a simpler way to test is to simply install debian and see if it boots. If it does, then windows won't overwrite grub. If not then it will. You can then install a different distro from there.