Mageia 3 beta 2 and GRUB2 fails

[bertaerts]

I have a Dell Inspiron 17R SE 7720 which currently has Mageia 2 x86_64 and Windows 7 64 bit installed using legacy BIOS.
When Mageia 3 comes out, I would like to switch to UEFI. (and to Windows 8)

To prepare for this change, I was trying to install Mageia 3 beta 2 on an external USB harddisk with GPT iso MBR partition table.
I created with gParted following partitions (all primary):
+ sdf1 1 GB UEFI System Partition in FAT32 with boot flag
+ sdf2 50 GB ext4 root /
+ sdf3 8 GB linux-swap
+ sdf4 91 GB ext4 /home

I tried to install Mageia 3 beta 2 LiveDVD KDE4 x86_64 from USB stick.
It all goes well until the bootloader installation.
I choose GRUB2 graphical and sdf as location.
I get the error "This GPT partition label contains no BIOS boot partition. Embedding won't be possible."
Also when I choose sdf2 I get an error on "embedding not possible".
I thought GRUB2 should be on sdf1, the UEFI System Partition, but I don't get this choice...

Who can point me in the correct direction? Or is this a bug?

[filip]

I thought GRUB2 should be on sdf1, the UEFI System Partition, but I don't get this choice...

Did you check errata on this?

[DShelbyD]

For me the problem is that GRUB gets installed on the USB stick. I must be daydreaming when the bootloader installation is configured, but it has happened twice with M3B2 on a network installation and never before M3B2. Or maybe I haven't read the errata. No "maybe" about it -- I have NOT read the errata. Is there something about it there? ... quickly searching for errata ....

Having read the errata now, I'm not sure I'm addressing your issue.

[ozky]

You have too big uefi partition 1gb,it only need 100mb fat32 partition with boot flag.

[ozky]

Your problem is this,bios legacy needs 1mb unformatted partition with bios grub flag to boot it so use gparted to create it .

[bertaerts]

Hi Ozky,

Thanks for your reply but your explanation is so short that I don't understand it...

I started my experiments with a UEFI system partition of 100 MB FAT32 with boot flag.
That did not work. The size is not an issue.
In the installation of GRUB2 boot loader the choice of this FAT32 partition is not available.
Only the drive itself sdf and the ext4 partitions are selectable sdf2 and sdf4.
I tried both sdf and sdf2 and both fail.

[ozky]

You only need to have that partition if you wan't to boot your computer with bios legacy,i don't know if that is working in mageia but in ubuntu grub2 needs it.Did you check that grub2 is try to install it to sda not to partition like sda1 ???,it's so short my answer because i don't have knoledge of uefi because it's so new feature in mageia,maybe you should file bug report to bugzilla they can help you better than me and i'm still using mageia 2 so i can't test it myself yet.

[martinw]

Having just installed Mageia 3 beta 2 on a Windows 8 notebook, I would suggest avoiding Grub2 (which I couldn't get to work). I ended up using rEFInd. The installation procedure (missing out all the false starts ) was:

• Shrink pre-installed Windows 8 partition to make space for Mageia.
• In UEFI BIOS, disable secure boot, enable legacy boot.
• Boot and install from installation media (I used a USB flash drive).
• Use custom partitioning, and make the EFI System Partition mount point "/boot/efi".
• Install Grub1 boot loader in MBR.
• Boot new Mageia installation (using legacy boot mode).
• Install rEFInd using binary rpm from above link.
• In /boot, create a file called "refind_linux.conf" with one or more lines giving boot options, e.g.
  

  Code: Select all

  "Mageia (desktop)"  "root=UUID=aec7b649-8908-49f0-976a-7855d00b0a71 resume=UUID=e6ca0d20-a13a-4732-b37d-0e6ed5256b18"


  
  (you can copy the necessary options from /boot/grub/menu.lst - you need at least a "root=.." option).

After this, rebooting in UEFI mode brought up the rEFInd boot menu, which gave me the option of booting either Windows, or any of the Linux kernels it found in /boot.

[doktor5000]

FWIW, someone tried gummiboot yet? https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Gummiboot
From what i understood, seems to make grub2 partly superfluous for EFI systems, no?

[martinw]

I considered gummiboot in my search for a solution. It offers broadly the same functionality as rEFInd, but rEFInd appeared to have the following advantages:

• can read from ext2/ext3/ext4 filesystems (amongst others), so no need to copy kernel images to the EFI system partition
• can automatically discover bootable Linux kernels (so if you update your kernel, both old and new versions can be made available automatically)
• needs little or no manual configuration (if I'd read the instructions properly , I probably wouldn't have had to create the refind_linux.conf file)
• has a graphical startup screen (not a big deal for me, but others might prefer it)

So I didn't actually try gummiboot. Of course gummiboot is quite new, so may be worth another look in the future.

This certainly does make grub2 superfluous. I'm starting to rather like UEFI! One good feature is that there is no need for chain loading - so if you have multiple Linux installations on your disk, you can make them all available from the initial boot menu.

[edit]
N.B. I found http://www.rodsbooks.com/efi-bootloaders/index.html to be a good resource for explaining the various alternatives.

[ozky]

Is there any plans to make mageia 3 iso files uefi bootable ???.There is big problems still to fix,at least now you need to use other bootloader to turn uefi on and boot mageia in uefi mode.Make live dvd/cd and installer dvd uefi bootable grub2-efi is there but you can't install it because you need to boot it in uefi mode to able to install grub2-efi.

[macxi]

Who can point me in the correct direction? Or is this a bug?

I also have nvidia video card and also unable to access the graphical environment of Mageia 3 beta 2 (see: Mageia 3 b2 - "Error running install command for nvidia"

See the bug 8863, opened about this issue, as pointed by Wilcal.

[macxi]

I installed again Mageia 3 beta 2 DVD, and after setting the usernames and passwords, appeared the option to install the proprietary driver and I opted not to install. Thereafter, the setup was normal. Then at the end, I chose to install the boot menu in the root partition, not in the MBR.

I accessed normally Mageia3b2 I enabled the media and installed updates and rebooted and opened the graphical environment usually already with KDE 4.10 and LibreOffice 4.0.

I think with the release of Mga3b2 liveCD or LiveDVD can not do this because it installs proprietary driver automatically, so in that case (who has Nvidia video card), is best choose to install with Mga3b2 DVD.

This does not solve the problem of the video card nvidia, but allows access to Mga3b2 while the issue is still being resolved.

[ozky]

This topic is not nvidia problems so please macxi read that thread first before you post your problems to here thanks.

[unklar]

It all goes well until the bootloader installation.
I choose GRUB2 graphical and sdf as location.
I get the error "This GPT partition label contains no BIOS boot partition. Embedding won't be possible."
Also when I choose sdf2 I get an error on "embedding not possible".
I thought GRUB2 should be on sdf1, the UEFI System Partition, but I don't get this choice...

Who can point me in the correct direction? Or is this a bug?

Sorry for my english!

With gparted:
100-200 MB FAT32 with the mount point /boot/efi and the boot flag for win8 create.
When installing the Grub2 you can then /boot/efi choose.

[ozky]

I have tested that refind method works out of the box,only thing i needed to change little bit that settings file and booted it in efi mode and installed mageia own grub2-efi to /boot/efi. There is coming uefi support first to live isos and if it's working then it will come later to dvd installer too ,this are from devel mailing list developer thomas backlund alias tmb is working with those live isos.

[martinw]

Just curious, ozky - what benefits do you get from using grub2-efi, rather than using rEFInd to boot Mageia directly?

[ozky]

This because you can't install mageia grub2-efi in bios legacy mode because uefi is turned off,so it cannot see that there is uefi in computer and install of grub2-efi will be fails.Second thing mageia iso files are not yet uefi bootable so you can't boot it install media in uefi mode.

[ozky]

And second thing you need to manualy update refind allways to newer version because it's not in mageia repos ,no any support if there is some problems with it you can't make bug report against it.I don't see why i need to use refind as default bootloader,it cannot be configured with mageia control center like grub and grub2.

[bertaerts]

I can make with gParted a GPT partition in FAT32 format of 200 MB with boot flag.
During installation of Mageia 3 beta 2 I choose to use existing partitions.
But then this FAT32 partition is not listed and /boot/efi is not in the selection list.

What is the procedure to install grub2 on this FAT32 partition during installation?

[ozky]

You can add custom mount point,just clean that mount point with backspace and write that /boot/efi,you can do it manualy before install from control center or manualy from fstab to change that mount point.

[ozky]

I did some test and uefi works even without using refind,just installed from rpmdrake and changed bios legacy to uefi and booting fine.It's in my usb hard drive laptop main disk still have mageia 2 installed so nothing can break badly.