[arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

older
[arch-general] mc - why not alias...

Alan E. Davis

1 May 2014 1 May '14

9:07 p.m.

This is insanity... The first time I have encountered the much maligned Micro$oft UEFI / Secure Boot adventure. On my new Thinkpad Yoga, with a Wacom active digitizer and pen. Ubuntu was a walk in the park. I installed Ubuntu naively, alongside the new Windows 8.1 laptop. It took maybe an hour to break my resolve to take my time. It was a disconcerting experience. I now have a system that boots Ubuntu 2014.04, through a convoluted process of signing into Windoze, then backing out through advanced settings to boot from a Menu. If I were trying to lock in my customer base, I couldn't have designed it any better, or made it any more uncomfortable, myself. Ubuntu picks up the Wacom pen, and almost everything else. But it's not Archlinux. I am a bit fearful, but decided that Archlinux, which I am using on two other machines, would potentially be the better choice. I have two more partitions, one of a /home and another for an Arch /boot, so I went ahead and walked through the most of the install, except for installing the boot manager. I am stuck now. I don't want to compromise what I have already gained. Now I need to learn how to set up the system to boot any of the three OSs. I am puzzled by the variety of approaches I have seen; hence, I am reaching out here on the mailing list. I saw advice to use GRUB but install it in the boot PARTITION. Not sure how to do this, and not sure whether it will work. Does this make sense to anyone? Alan

Show replies by date

Daniel Micay

1 May 1 May

9:27 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 05:07 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

This is insanity... The first time I have encountered the much maligned Micro$oft UEFI / Secure Boot adventure. On my new Thinkpad Yoga, with a Wacom active digitizer and pen.

Ubuntu was a walk in the park. I installed Ubuntu naively, alongside the new Windows 8.1 laptop. It took maybe an hour to break my resolve to take my time. It was a disconcerting experience. I now have a system that boots Ubuntu 2014.04, through a convoluted process of signing into Windoze, then backing out through advanced settings to boot from a Menu. If I were trying to lock in my customer base, I couldn't have designed it any better, or made it any more uncomfortable, myself. Ubuntu picks up the Wacom pen, and almost everything else. But it's not Archlinux.

I am a bit fearful, but decided that Archlinux, which I am using on two other machines, would potentially be the better choice.

I have two more partitions, one of a /home and another for an Arch /boot, so I went ahead and walked through the most of the install, except for installing the boot manager.

I am stuck now. I don't want to compromise what I have already gained. Now I need to learn how to set up the system to boot any of the three OSs.

I am puzzled by the variety of approaches I have seen; hence, I am reaching out here on the mailing list.

I saw advice to use GRUB but install it in the boot PARTITION. Not sure how to do this, and not sure whether it will work.

Does this make sense to anyone?

Alan

You shouldn't have a separate boot partition. Install gummiboot or refind to the existing FAT32 ESP partition and mount that as your /boot. It's *easier* than dealing with MBR/BIOS because you can do it entirely via EFI/Boot/BOOTX64 rather than messing with EFI entries.

Alan E. Davis

10:02 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

This looks interesting, and I am tempted to walk into the deep water. It raises some questions. Will gummiboot or refind also find the Ubuntu partition? The original partition structure of the machine there were four or five partitions, and another one popped up in the higher end of the disk. I stumbled into the install, with the Ubuntu installer, and ended up with four linux partitions in addition to the Windoze partitions. At some point I used gparted to resize, and this might have been the step that botched the structure. But in any event, I have three Linux partitions of 50G each, and a swap partition. Ubuntu is sitting in one of those partitions. I have no idea what is an EFI partition. I have seen instructions, presumably for those who are wiping the Windows and starting from scratch, to make an EFI partition. I finally realized why there are so many partitions, and learned to use gdisk when walking through the Archlinux install. Here is a some information from the gdisk listing: Nbr Size Code Name -----+------------+------+------------------------- 1 1000.0 MiB 2700 2 260.0 MiB EF00 EFI system partition 3 128.0 MiB 0C01 Microsoft reserved part 4 49.6 GiB 0700 Basic data partition 5 9.7 GiB 2700 Lenovo (?recovery?) 6 10.0 GiB 8200 Linux SWAP 7 49.4 GiB 8300 Archlinux / 8 58.8 GiB 8300 /home 9 1024.0 KiB EF02 "bios_grub" (Ubuntu?) 10 59.8 GiB 8300 UBUNTU / Alan On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 2:27 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...

On 01/05/14 05:07 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
This is insanity... The first time I have encountered the much maligned Micro$oft UEFI / Secure Boot adventure. On my new Thinkpad Yoga, with a Wacom active digitizer and pen.

Ubuntu was a walk in the park. I installed Ubuntu naively, alongside the new Windows 8.1 laptop. It took maybe an hour to break my resolve to take my time. It was a disconcerting experience. I now have a system that boots Ubuntu 2014.04, through a convoluted process of signing into Windoze, then backing out through advanced settings to boot from a Menu. If I were trying to lock in my customer base, I couldn't have designed it any better, or made it any more uncomfortable, myself. Ubuntu picks up the Wacom pen, and almost everything else. But it's not Archlinux.

I am a bit fearful, but decided that Archlinux, which I am using on two other machines, would potentially be the better choice.

I have two more partitions, one of a /home and another for an Arch /boot, so I went ahead and walked through the most of the install, except for installing the boot manager.

I am stuck now. I don't want to compromise what I have already gained. Now I need to learn how to set up the system to boot any of the three OSs.

I am puzzled by the variety of approaches I have seen; hence, I am reaching out here on the mailing list.

I saw advice to use GRUB but install it in the boot PARTITION. Not sure how to do this, and not sure whether it will work.

Does this make sense to anyone?

Alan

You shouldn't have a separate boot partition. Install gummiboot or refind to the existing FAT32 ESP partition and mount that as your /boot. It's *easier* than dealing with MBR/BIOS because you can do it entirely via EFI/Boot/BOOTX64 rather than messing with EFI entries.

Daniel Micay

10:06 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 06:02 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

This looks interesting, and I am tempted to walk into the deep water. It raises some questions.

Will gummiboot or refind also find the Ubuntu partition?

You should use the ESP (EFI system partition) to store all of the kernels. The loader (gummiboot) will find the Windows loader along with any kernels on that partition. You really aren't going to want separate boot partitions.

...

The original partition structure of the machine there were four or five partitions, and another one popped up in the higher end of the disk. I stumbled into the install, with the Ubuntu installer, and ended up with four linux partitions in addition to the Windoze partitions. At some point I used gparted to resize, and this might have been the step that botched the structure. But in any event, I have three Linux partitions of 50G each, and a swap partition. Ubuntu is sitting in one of those partitions.

I have no idea what is an EFI partition. I have seen instructions, presumably for those who are wiping the Windows and starting from scratch, to make an EFI partition.

I finally realized why there are so many partitions, and learned to use gdisk when walking through the Archlinux install.

Here is a some information from the gdisk listing:

Nbr Size Code Name -----+------------+------+------------------------- 1 1000.0 MiB 2700 2 260.0 MiB EF00 EFI system partition 3 128.0 MiB 0C01 Microsoft reserved part 4 49.6 GiB 0700 Basic data partition 5 9.7 GiB 2700 Lenovo (?recovery?) 6 10.0 GiB 8200 Linux SWAP 7 49.4 GiB 8300 Archlinux / 8 58.8 GiB 8300 /home 9 1024.0 KiB EF02 "bios_grub" (Ubuntu?) 10 59.8 GiB 8300 UBUNTU /

It's the one marked EFI system partition (ESP).

Alan E. Davis

10:15 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

Ubuntu's kernel is on the / partition. Would I move it to the ESP partition, in that case? And I will mount that partition on /mnt/boot ? I have never used gummiboot. Since the Arch system is already to go, but not yet with a boot management setup, I should manually move that kernel to the ESP partition as well? Alan Davis On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:06 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...

On 01/05/14 06:02 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
This looks interesting, and I am tempted to walk into the deep water. It raises some questions.

Will gummiboot or refind also find the Ubuntu partition?

You should use the ESP (EFI system partition) to store all of the kernels. The loader (gummiboot) will find the Windows loader along with any kernels on that partition. You really aren't going to want separate boot partitions.

...
The original partition structure of the machine there were four or five partitions, and another one popped up in the higher end of the disk. I stumbled into the install, with the Ubuntu installer, and ended up with four linux partitions in addition to the Windoze partitions. At some point I used gparted to resize, and this might have been the step that botched the structure. But in any event, I have three Linux partitions of 50G each, and a swap partition. Ubuntu is sitting in one of those partitions.

I have no idea what is an EFI partition. I have seen instructions, presumably for those who are wiping the Windows and starting from scratch, to make an EFI partition.

I finally realized why there are so many partitions, and learned to use gdisk when walking through the Archlinux install.

Here is a some information from the gdisk listing:

Nbr Size Code Name -----+------------+------+------------------------- 1 1000.0 MiB 2700 2 260.0 MiB EF00 EFI system partition 3 128.0 MiB 0C01 Microsoft reserved part 4 49.6 GiB 0700 Basic data partition 5 9.7 GiB 2700 Lenovo (?recovery?) 6 10.0 GiB 8200 Linux SWAP 7 49.4 GiB 8300 Archlinux / 8 58.8 GiB 8300 /home 9 1024.0 KiB EF02 "bios_grub" (Ubuntu?) 10 59.8 GiB 8300 UBUNTU /

It's the one marked EFI system partition (ESP).

Daniel Micay

10:18 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 06:15 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

Ubuntu's kernel is on the / partition. Would I move it to the ESP partition, in that case?

And I will mount that partition on /mnt/boot ?

I have never used gummiboot. Since the Arch system is already to go, but not yet with a boot management setup, I should manually move that kernel to the ESP partition as well?

Alan Davis

Yes, you should mount the ESP partition as /boot so the kernels get installed there. Then install gummiboot and set up entries for Arch and Ubuntu.

Mike Cloaked

2 May 2 May

8:56 a.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 11:18 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...

On 01/05/14 06:15 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
Ubuntu's kernel is on the / partition. Would I move it to the ESP partition, in that case?

And I will mount that partition on /mnt/boot ?

I have never used gummiboot. Since the Arch system is already to go, but not yet with a boot management setup, I should manually move that kernel to the ESP partition as well?

Alan Davis

Yes, you should mount the ESP partition as /boot so the kernels get installed there. Then install gummiboot and set up entries for Arch and Ubuntu.

The approach mentioned above should work. An alternative is to have the ESP mounted as, say /boot/efi (which is a vfat partition) and then the (vfat) ESP becomes /boot/efi/EFI/ which then contains the windows efi boot files, and you can then if you wish install refind in a directory such as /boot/efi/EFI/refind/ - and it is in principle also possible to have more than one boot manager in that directory so that you can choose which boot manager to use, and each can then boot all of your installed operating systems via UEFI. If so then it is also possible to have /boot as either a separate ext4 partition, or a subdirectory of the root partition, also as ext4 (thereby getting the advantage of a journaled filesystem). Then the kernel(s) can be in /boot/ and using refind the refind efi binary can still read the ext4 /boot/* files for the kernel(s) and initrd(s) since refind has drivers that can read ext4 files. The details are in the author's refind web pages ( http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/ ). It is possible to either let refind automatically discover all the available operating systems that you have set up or you can configure the config files with specific stanzas to boot individual OSes - and each becomes a nice icon on the graphical boot screen. You can select which is the default system to boot, but can also intercept the boot to choose a non-default system. Of course you have the choice to use different boot managers, and gummiboot and grub will in principle be able to boot all three OSes once set up. -- mike c

Alan E. Davis

1 May 1 May

10:20 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

I see another level of complexity here, in a statement on a page about Gummiboot on the wiki: * Warning: *Gummiboot simply provides a boot menu for EFISTUB kernels. In case you have issues booting EFISTUB kernels like in FS#33745https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/33745, you should use a boot loader which does not use EFISTUB, like GRUBhttps://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/GRUB, Syslinux https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Syslinux or ELILOhttps://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Bootloaders#ELILO . Would grub work, using this, or a similar, approach? On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:15 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

Ubuntu's kernel is on the / partition. Would I move it to the ESP partition, in that case?

And I will mount that partition on /mnt/boot ?

I have never used gummiboot. Since the Arch system is already to go, but not yet with a boot management setup, I should manually move that kernel to the ESP partition as well?

Alan Davis

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:06 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:02 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
This looks interesting, and I am tempted to walk into the deep water. It raises some questions.

Will gummiboot or refind also find the Ubuntu partition?

You should use the ESP (EFI system partition) to store all of the kernels. The loader (gummiboot) will find the Windows loader along with any kernels on that partition. You really aren't going to want separate boot partitions.

...
The original partition structure of the machine there were four or five partitions, and another one popped up in the higher end of the disk. I stumbled into the install, with the Ubuntu installer, and ended up with four linux partitions in addition to the Windoze partitions. At some point I used gparted to resize, and this might have been the step that botched the structure. But in any event, I have three Linux partitions of 50G each, and a swap partition. Ubuntu is sitting in one of those partitions.

I have no idea what is an EFI partition. I have seen instructions, presumably for those who are wiping the Windows and starting from scratch, to make an EFI partition.

I finally realized why there are so many partitions, and learned to use gdisk when walking through the Archlinux install.

Here is a some information from the gdisk listing:

Nbr Size Code Name -----+------------+------+------------------------- 1 1000.0 MiB 2700 2 260.0 MiB EF00 EFI system partition 3 128.0 MiB 0C01 Microsoft reserved part 4 49.6 GiB 0700 Basic data partition 5 9.7 GiB 2700 Lenovo (?recovery?) 6 10.0 GiB 8200 Linux SWAP 7 49.4 GiB 8300 Archlinux / 8 58.8 GiB 8300 /home 9 1024.0 KiB EF02 "bios_grub" (Ubuntu?) 10 59.8 GiB 8300 UBUNTU /

It's the one marked EFI system partition (ESP).

Alan E. Davis

10:28 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows: mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars It was ineffective, so after noticing a note that it should be done inside and outside of the chroot environment, I tried it outside too. No error issued, however, nothing interesting happened. That's when I backed out. I can walk back through it to that point. This is so massively complicated. It must have been the intention of the originators of this system, to complicate the lives of the innocents. It makes me even more angry than I have been for the last 25 years. To make it more complicated, there is no single such structure, but various shades and variations. Thank you. I will try to get to that point again. I am using May 1, 2014 installation iso. Wow. Alan On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:20 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

I see another level of complexity here, in a statement on a page about Gummiboot on the wiki:

* Warning: *Gummiboot simply provides a boot menu for EFISTUB kernels. In case you have issues booting EFISTUB kernels like in FS#33745https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/33745, you should use a boot loader which does not use EFISTUB, like GRUBhttps://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/GRUB, Syslinux https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Syslinux or ELILOhttps://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Bootloaders#ELILO .

Would grub work, using this, or a similar, approach?

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:15 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
Ubuntu's kernel is on the / partition. Would I move it to the ESP partition, in that case?

And I will mount that partition on /mnt/boot ?

I have never used gummiboot. Since the Arch system is already to go, but not yet with a boot management setup, I should manually move that kernel to the ESP partition as well?

Alan Davis

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:06 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:02 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
This looks interesting, and I am tempted to walk into the deep water. It raises some questions.

Will gummiboot or refind also find the Ubuntu partition?

You should use the ESP (EFI system partition) to store all of the kernels. The loader (gummiboot) will find the Windows loader along with any kernels on that partition. You really aren't going to want separate boot partitions.

...
The original partition structure of the machine there were four or five partitions, and another one popped up in the higher end of the disk. I stumbled into the install, with the Ubuntu installer, and ended up with four linux partitions in addition to the Windoze partitions. At some point I used gparted to resize, and this might have been the step that botched the structure. But in any event, I have three Linux partitions of 50G each, and a swap partition. Ubuntu is sitting in one of those partitions.

I have no idea what is an EFI partition. I have seen instructions, presumably for those who are wiping the Windows and starting from scratch, to make an EFI partition.

I finally realized why there are so many partitions, and learned to use gdisk when walking through the Archlinux install.

Here is a some information from the gdisk listing:

Nbr Size Code Name -----+------------+------+------------------------- 1 1000.0 MiB 2700 2 260.0 MiB EF00 EFI system partition 3 128.0 MiB 0C01 Microsoft reserved part 4 49.6 GiB 0700 Basic data partition 5 9.7 GiB 2700 Lenovo (?recovery?) 6 10.0 GiB 8200 Linux SWAP 7 49.4 GiB 8300 Archlinux / 8 58.8 GiB 8300 /home 9 1024.0 KiB EF02 "bios_grub" (Ubuntu?) 10 59.8 GiB 8300 UBUNTU /

It's the one marked EFI system partition (ESP).

Daniel Micay

10:35 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows:

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

...

It was ineffective, so after noticing a note that it should be done inside and outside of the chroot environment, I tried it outside too. No error issued, however, nothing interesting happened. That's when I backed out.

I can walk back through it to that point.

You don't need to do this. Just do exactly what I said (install gummiboot, tell gummiboot to install itself as the loader) and it will work fine...

...

This is so massively complicated. It must have been the intention of the originators of this system, to complicate the lives of the innocents. It makes me even more angry than I have been for the last 25 years.

To make it more complicated, there is no single such structure, but various shades and variations.

It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out of your way to ignore the instructions.

Delcypher

10:41 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote:

...

On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows:

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

...

It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out of your way to ignore the instructions.

It is unless you're one of the people effected by the EFISTUB bug like myself. So I'm currently using GRUB2.

Alan E. Davis

10:42 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

I'm staying tuned. Alan On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:41 PM, Delcypher wrote:

...

On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows:

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

...
It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out of your way to ignore the instructions.

It is unless you're one of the people effected by the EFISTUB bug like myself. So I'm currently using GRUB2.

Alan E. Davis

10:45 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

What is the "EFISTUB bug"? Alan On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:42 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

I'm staying tuned.

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:41 PM, Delcypher wrote:

...
On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows:

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

...
It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out of your way to ignore the instructions.

It is unless you're one of the people effected by the EFISTUB bug like myself. So I'm currently using GRUB2.

Daniel Micay

10:48 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 06:45 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

What is the "EFISTUB bug"?

Alan

The kernel's EFISTUB booting support is broken on some hardware, possibly due to buggy firmware requiring workarounds or perhaps because of remaining bugs in the kernel. It does work on most hardware though, especially now that several bugs have been fixed.

Alan E. Davis

10:54 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

I am now walking through the install step by step. Initially, it is suggested (in the Beginner's Guide) to test whether efivars is mounted. I ran mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars And got this message: mount: mount point /sys.....efivars does not exist. I don't knolw whether this is good or bad news. I tested for UEFI in Windows. The result was positive. This is kind of what I mean, that there are so many shades and variations. On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:45 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

What is the "EFISTUB bug"?

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:42 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
I'm staying tuned.

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:41 PM, Delcypher wrote:

...
On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows:

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

...
It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out of your way to ignore the instructions.

It is unless you're one of the people effected by the EFISTUB bug like myself. So I'm currently using GRUB2.

Alan E. Davis

10:55 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

I wonder what Ubuntu is doing, then. Whether it will be incompatible. A On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:54 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

I am now walking through the install step by step. Initially, it is suggested (in the Beginner's Guide) to test whether efivars is mounted. I ran

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

And got this message:

mount: mount point /sys.....efivars does not exist.

I don't knolw whether this is good or bad news. I tested for UEFI in Windows. The result was positive.

This is kind of what I mean, that there are so many shades and variations.

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:45 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
What is the "EFISTUB bug"?

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:42 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
I'm staying tuned.

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:41 PM, Delcypher wrote:

...
On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows:

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

...
It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out of your way to ignore the instructions.

It is unless you're one of the people effected by the EFISTUB bug like myself. So I'm currently using GRUB2.

Mark Lee

10:56 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA256 On 05/01/2014 06:54 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

I am now walking through the install step by step. Initially, it is suggested (in the Beginner's Guide) to test whether efivars is mounted. I ran

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

And got this message:

mount: mount point /sys.....efivars does not exist.

I don't knolw whether this is good or bad news. I tested for UEFI in Windows. The result was positive.

This is kind of what I mean, that there are so many shades and variations.

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:45 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
What is the "EFISTUB bug"?

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:42 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
I'm staying tuned.

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:41 PM, Delcypher wrote:

...
On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows:

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

...
It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out of your way to ignore the instructions.

It is unless you're one of the people effected by the EFISTUB bug like myself. So I'm currently using GRUB2.

Salutations,

You need to boot into UEFI mode. So when you're loading the Arch Linux ISO, make sure you select to boot into UEFI mode (usually an option in the boot menu) Regards, Mark -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux) iF4EAREIAAYFAlNi0ScACgkQZ/Z80n6+J/aG2QD+J3nw8NrglCi3vuS4jOAk9may o9b0rmb9YTTO7/cmXqUA/18m9G+7kx585OgR5t+Nr+NZue+IYy3qtPWn8J2t7eIk =YCQj -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Alan E. Davis

11:06 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

I saw no options. The iso image on the USB drive booted without any problem or selection. DOes it matter that this is a May 1 2014 installation iso? Alan On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:56 PM, Mark Lee wrote:

...

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA256

On 05/01/2014 06:54 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
I am now walking through the install step by step. Initially, it is suggested (in the Beginner's Guide) to test whether efivars is mounted. I ran

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

And got this message:

mount: mount point /sys.....efivars does not exist.

I don't knolw whether this is good or bad news. I tested for UEFI in Windows. The result was positive.

This is kind of what I mean, that there are so many shades and variations.

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:45 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
What is the "EFISTUB bug"?

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:42 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
I'm staying tuned.

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:41 PM, Delcypher wrote:

...
On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote: > After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some > information that suggested to use a command, as follows: > > mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

...
It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out of your way to ignore the instructions.

It is unless you're one of the people effected by the EFISTUB bug like myself. So I'm currently using GRUB2.

Salutations,

You need to boot into UEFI mode. So when you're loading the Arch Linux ISO, make sure you select to boot into UEFI mode (usually an option in the boot menu)

Regards, Mark -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)

iF4EAREIAAYFAlNi0ScACgkQZ/Z80n6+J/aG2QD+J3nw8NrglCi3vuS4jOAk9may o9b0rmb9YTTO7/cmXqUA/18m9G+7kx585OgR5t+Nr+NZue+IYy3qtPWn8J2t7eIk =YCQj -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Alan E. Davis

11:07 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

Running gdisk, this message: Found valid GPT with protective MBR: using GPT. On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 4:06 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

I saw no options. The iso image on the USB drive booted without any problem or selection. DOes it matter that this is a May 1 2014 installation iso?

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:56 PM, Mark Lee wrote:

...
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA256

...
I am now walking through the install step by step. Initially, it is suggested (in the Beginner's Guide) to test whether efivars is mounted. I ran

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

And got this message:

mount: mount point /sys.....efivars does not exist.

I don't knolw whether this is good or bad news. I tested for UEFI in Windows. The result was positive.

This is kind of what I mean, that there are so many shades and variations.

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:45 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
What is the "EFISTUB bug"?

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:42 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
I'm staying tuned.

Alan

On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:41 PM, Delcypher wrote:

...
On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote: > On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote: >> After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some >> information that suggested to use a command, as follows: >> >> mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars > > You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this > information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs > itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without > being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

> It's certainly a lot simpler than using grub... you don't seem to want > it to work so obviously it's not going to work, since you're going out > of your way to ignore the instructions.

It is unless you're one of the people effected by the EFISTUB bug

On 05/01/2014 06:54 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote: like

...
...
...
...
myself. So I'm currently using GRUB2.

Salutations,

You need to boot into UEFI mode. So when you're loading the Arch Linux ISO, make sure you select to boot into UEFI mode (usually an option in the boot menu)

Regards, Mark -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)

iF4EAREIAAYFAlNi0ScACgkQZ/Z80n6+J/aG2QD+J3nw8NrglCi3vuS4jOAk9may o9b0rmb9YTTO7/cmXqUA/18m9G+7kx585OgR5t+Nr+NZue+IYy3qtPWn8J2t7eIk =YCQj -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Daniel Micay

11:07 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 06:56 PM, Mark Lee wrote:

...

Salutations,

You need to boot into UEFI mode. So when you're loading the Arch Linux ISO, make sure you select to boot into UEFI mode (usually an option in the boot menu)

Regards, Mark

You can do this without being booted into EFI mode, since gummiboot will install itself as /boot/EFI/Boot/BOOTX64.EFI and then you can set it up properly after the first boot. I had to do it this way because my hardware (T530) ran into the EFISTUB bug on old kernel versions, including the latest Arch ISO. It's completely fixed now at least on this hardware... no issues with dozens of 3.14.1/3.14.2 builds or the latest LTS kernel.

Alan E. Davis

11:40 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

I took a chance, and nothing happened. I installed gummiboot on /boot, where the kernel was. But I didn't move the ubuntu kernel over. In the end, Windows still booted, and I was able to get back to a boot menu from there, and boot ubuntu. Not Arch. Yet. Thank you for now. Alan On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 4:07 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...

On 01/05/14 06:56 PM, Mark Lee wrote:

...
Salutations,

You need to boot into UEFI mode. So when you're loading the Arch Linux ISO, make sure you select to boot into UEFI mode (usually an option in the boot menu)

Regards, Mark

You can do this without being booted into EFI mode, since gummiboot will install itself as /boot/EFI/Boot/BOOTX64.EFI and then you can set it up properly after the first boot.

I had to do it this way because my hardware (T530) ran into the EFISTUB bug on old kernel versions, including the latest Arch ISO. It's completely fixed now at least on this hardware... no issues with dozens of 3.14.1/3.14.2 builds or the latest LTS kernel.

Daniel Micay

11:59 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 07:40 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

I took a chance, and nothing happened. I installed gummiboot on /boot, where the kernel was. But I didn't move the ubuntu kernel over.

In the end, Windows still booted, and I was able to get back to a boot menu from there, and boot ubuntu. Not Arch. Yet.

Thank you for now.

Alan

You need to explicitly run the entry (if you had the EFI stuff mounted) or the fallback entry (if you didn't).

Alan E. Davis

2 May 2 May

12:06 a.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

I don't understand what is the entry, or fallback entry, or "run the entry." I'm sorry. I'm going to try again later. In fact, I may take the undesireable step of installing from Manjaro or whatever is the shortcut way to install Arch Linux these days. On the one hand, I don't care to learn about what's Micro$oft's latest tortuous trick it has played on the users; and on the other hand, I do value to learn the nuts and bolts of GNU/Linux. Thank you very much. I am willing to give it one more try. I might even try to install grub in a partition, as apparently is what Ubuntu has done. Thank you again, Alan Davis On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 4:59 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...

...
I took a chance, and nothing happened. I installed gummiboot on /boot, where the kernel was. But I didn't move the ubuntu kernel over.

In the end, Windows still booted, and I was able to get back to a boot

On 01/05/14 07:40 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote: menu

...
from there, and boot ubuntu. Not Arch. Yet.

Thank you for now.

Alan

You need to explicitly run the entry (if you had the EFI stuff mounted) or the fallback entry (if you didn't).

Daniel Micay

12:19 a.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 08:06 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

I don't understand what is the entry, or fallback entry, or "run the entry." I'm sorry.

I'm going to try again later. In fact, I may take the undesireable step of installing from Manjaro or whatever is the shortcut way to install Arch Linux these days.

On the one hand, I don't care to learn about what's Micro$oft's latest tortuous trick it has played on the users; and on the other hand, I do value to learn the nuts and bolts of GNU/Linux.

Thank you very much. I am willing to give it one more try. I might even try to install grub in a partition, as apparently is what Ubuntu has done.

(U)EFI was created by Intel replace legacy BIOS, it had nothing to do with Microsoft. AFAIK, OS X adopted it long before Windows. I'm not sure why you keep mentioning Microsoft over and over. Arch has great UEFI support and it results in a significant improvement in boot time compared to legacy BIOS booting. The gummiboot loader is a huge simplication over grub, so there's not much to complain about there either.

Alan E. Davis

12:23 a.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

Then I stand corrected. Thank you for pointing this out. FOr me, the simpler the better. I'll try to deal with it, though. Alan On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 5:19 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...

On 01/05/14 08:06 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
I don't understand what is the entry, or fallback entry, or "run the entry." I'm sorry.

I'm going to try again later. In fact, I may take the undesireable step of installing from Manjaro or whatever is the shortcut way to install Arch Linux these days.

On the one hand, I don't care to learn about what's Micro$oft's latest tortuous trick it has played on the users; and on the other hand, I do value to learn the nuts and bolts of GNU/Linux.

Thank you very much. I am willing to give it one more try. I might even try to install grub in a partition, as apparently is what Ubuntu has done.

(U)EFI was created by Intel replace legacy BIOS, it had nothing to do with Microsoft. AFAIK, OS X adopted it long before Windows. I'm not sure why you keep mentioning Microsoft over and over.

Arch has great UEFI support and it results in a significant improvement in boot time compared to legacy BIOS booting. The gummiboot loader is a huge simplication over grub, so there's not much to complain about there either.

Daniel Micay

1 May 1 May

10:47 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 06:41 PM, Delcypher wrote:

...

On 1 May 2014 23:35, Daniel Micay wrote:

...
On 01/05/14 06:28 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
After already chrooting, during the Arch installation process, I saw some information that suggested to use a command, as follows:

mount -t efivarfs efivarfs /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

You don't need to do this, so I'm not sure where you're getting this information. Adding an EFI entry is optional since it already installs itself as the fallback loader too. You can install an EFI loader without being booted via EFI.

It's at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI#Mount_efivarfs

Nothing there says it's necessary to install gummiboot. You can install gummiboot with pacman -S gummiboot && gummiboot install without being in EFI mode at all. You *do not* need the efivars partition mounted, since it will install itself as the fallback loader. It will take care of installing itself as an entry automatically too if it's mounted, but you can let it do that later or just not do it at all.

Daniel Micay

10:30 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

On 01/05/14 06:20 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...

I see another level of complexity here, in a statement on a page about Gummiboot on the wiki:

* Warning: *Gummiboot simply provides a boot menu for EFISTUB kernels. In case you have issues booting EFISTUB kernels like in FS#33745https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/33745, you should use a boot loader which does not use EFISTUB, like GRUBhttps://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/GRUB, Syslinux https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Syslinux or ELILOhttps://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Bootloaders#ELILO .

Would grub work, using this, or a similar, approach?

gummiboot is far less complex than grub, so I'm not sure where you're getting that from. The kernel's EFISTUB handling doesn't work on all hardware, but it will most likely work fine for you. The whole point of EFISTUB is that it's simpler/faster than the legacy way of doing it.

Alan E. Davis

10:31 p.m.

New subject: [arch-general] Installing Archlinux alongside Ubuntu on a Windows 8 UEFI laptop

Do I need to install a special kernel? Thank you for the advice. Alan On Thu, May 1, 2014 at 3:30 PM, Daniel Micay wrote:

...

On 01/05/14 06:20 PM, Alan E. Davis wrote:

...
I see another level of complexity here, in a statement on a page about Gummiboot on the wiki:

* Warning: *Gummiboot simply provides a boot menu for EFISTUB kernels. In case you have issues booting EFISTUB kernels like in FS#33745https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/33745, you should use a boot loader which does not use EFISTUB, like GRUBhttps://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/GRUB, Syslinux https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Syslinux or ELILOhttps://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Bootloaders#ELILO .

Would grub work, using this, or a similar, approach?

gummiboot is far less complex than grub, so I'm not sure where you're getting that from. The kernel's EFISTUB handling doesn't work on all hardware, but it will most likely work fine for you. The whole point of EFISTUB is that it's simpler/faster than the legacy way of doing it.