Acer swift 5 2020 — Dual boot with Windows 10 and Ubuntu 20.04

Anjan
2 min readJul 16, 2020

I recently purchased Acer Swift 5 2020 model SF514–5T. When I tried to install Ubuntu I ran into lot of problems which had no obvious solutions and some still don’t have any fix or workaround.
I am writing this guide to anyone who wants to dual boot his new Acer swift 5 with Ubuntu and Windows.

ISSUES WITH UBUNTU:
1- Switching to AHCI mode from Intel RST or optane in BIOS - Done
2- Sound Speakers don’t work - Done
3- Internal Mic doesn’t work -No fix found, workaround with 3.5mm earphones.
4- Touch Screen doesn’t work - No fix found.
5- Finger print scanner/reader doesn't work - No fix/workaround yet.

NOTE: Every time you will have to go into BIOS when you want to make the switch to windows and vice-versa.

Steps for dual booting.
1- Download and prepare a USB stick with Ubuntu 20.04 image by following the instructions here.

2- Shrink your SSD and make another partition for your Ubuntu installation by following the instructions here.

3- Disable secure boot by following the instructions here.

4- Go to the BIOS disable fast boot by following the step 4 here, also disable the fast-boot in BIOS just to be sure.

5- Go to BIOS and Main tab, press you wont see the SATA controller option so press “ctrl+s” and voila there it is, change it to AHCI. Credits to user atolan’s answer here.

ACER SWIFT 5 BIOS SATA MODE TO AHCI

REMEMBER YOU WILL HAVE TO SWITCH IT BACK TO optane WHEN YOU WANT TO BOOT TO WINDOWS AND TO ahci WHEN YOU WANT TO USE UBUNTU.

6- Plug your Ubuntu Live USB which you prepared in first step and in BIOS switch the default boot priority to USB/Linpus option.

7- You should be able to install Ubuntu without any issue now.
* If you get any error during installation for Intel RST it means you haven't followed step 5 correctly.

8- After installing check if sound and mic is working with laptop speakers and your own earphones/ headsets. If not follow the instructions here.

9- Once you correctly follow above step 8 now sound should work on both laptop speakers and earphones/headset/external speakers. Microphone should work on earphones only. Laptop mic still wont function with Ubuntu.

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