Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

bobsmith · 2023-12-08 03:15:30

After trying to install about 3 times and some of my own troubleshooting myself (grub-install not found?) I literally cannot understand why Devuan can't configure grub properly itself. I have a 500MB FAT32 EFI partition first on my SSD, then the rest an ext4 partition I choose to install to. Nothing prevents the next boot after installation resulting in a GRUB rescue prompt. What do I do?

isabena · 2023-12-08 07:47:59

bobsmith wrote:

What do I do?

reinstall GRUB and update afterwards

(chroot from live or supergrub2disk)

Last edited by isabena (2023-12-08 07:50:45)

swanson · 2023-12-21 19:54:41

Just encountered this today again when installing on an older machine. Non UEFI. No luck with Daedalus desktop image after three tries to partition the disk with recommended Gparted, GPT, EFI, ESP and FAT32 plus install the bootloader and all. Just no boot.

So, downloaded Chimaera and let that installer to everything and it seems to do exactly what's recommended in the Daedalus installer. GPT, FAT32 and ESP and all. And it boots!

Would be interesting to know the differences between the two install scripts.

However, I've seen some other threads here with the same issues with Daedalus and it's a bit worrying actually. I mean, one argument for switching to linux is to revive older machines. And then there are these issues.

But, a clean install of Chimaera is very easy to immediately upgrade to Daedalus. And there are excellent instructions on devuan.org on how to upgrade.

rolfie · 2023-12-21 20:10:05

You say "Non UEFI", that then means a classical legacy install.

In this case, no EFI, no ESP with FAT32 is required. The ESP is useless in such a case.

But: when you want to use a GPT partitioned disk for the installation, in Daedalus you will need to supply a bios_grub partition with 2 Mib, no file system, flag bios_grub. Refer to https://askubuntu.com/questions/500359/ … -partition When the bios_grub is missing essential parts of grub are not present, the appearance of the rescue screen can be explained by this.

I guess Daedalus now is more picky than Chimaera on this topic.

Last edited by rolfie (2023-12-21 20:11:24)

swanson · 2023-12-22 02:17:10

I guess Daedalus now is more picky than Chimaera on this topic.

That's seems to be true. Or, the instructions aren't very clear here, or they are too directed towards UEFI systems. I've used Linux for years but I'm still not used to UEFI and I do not do dual booting with windows either.

In this case, no EFI, no ESP with FAT32 is required. The ESP is useless in such a case.

Yeah, but it seemed to me that Chimaera used those flags and formats too.

fsmithred · 2023-12-22 16:43:05

@bobsmith
To become root, use su - and you will have root's PATH. Otherwise, you need to use the full path to the command: /usr/sbin/grub-install

If you post or paste or send me refractainstaller.log I might be able to see what the problem is. (If you use the cli installer, please start it as 'refractainstaller -d' to get a more verbose error log. Thanks.)

Nietz · 2023-12-26 00:27:35

Happy holidays @bobsmith.

Are you trying to install to a brand new or a used hard drive? I would check the SMART attributes and look for errors or wear indicators.

Are you able to reach a live desktop or a tty session from external boot media?

aluma · 2024-01-13 18:25:08

Can I ask here?

I'm installing Daedalus on a Lenovo s205 netbook.
I’ll say right away that its BIOS is “strange”, there is no UEFI-legacy switch, while I booted via MBR, there were no problems.

Now I have created an EFI partition, root directories, swap and /home.
I installed openSuse first, everything went fine, the bootloader is installed in UEFI, there are two of its folders in the partition, etc.

Daedalus offers only two options - MBR or the entire disk, or the root partition.
How can I tell him to install it on the EFI partition?

fsmithred · 2024-01-13 20:11:15

@aluma - are you using a live-iso or one of the installer isos? In either case, If you booted in uefi, then you don't tell grub where to put the bootloader. It knows to put it in the esp partition. If you're doing it on command-line, the commands are just

grub-install
update-grub

To be sure whether you booted bios mode or uefi, check to see if /sys/firmware/efi exists. It will be there in uefi mode but not in bios mode.

rolfie · 2024-01-13 20:23:10

Is that netbook one of this very new designs? Then it is possible that its an uefi only bios, no more CSM mode. I own such a laptop manufactured Dec 2020, an Acer Aspire 5.

The installation media has to be booted either in legacy mode or uefi mode, one medium for both installation methods. This mode determines the grub installation method.
One way to do that could be the boot override option. On my X570 boards this is the F8 key, on my laptop F12. I see there a USB stick twice. As example one entry "Toshiba 8G", a second time the same stick as "UEFI Toshiba 8G". Guess what that means.

Another more easy way could be the use of Ventoj. That tells you if its booted in legacy or in (u)efi mode.

To make sure you have booted the stick in efi mode fsmithred's hint can be used for a crosscheck.

Last edited by rolfie (2024-01-13 20:23:39)

aluma · 2024-01-13 21:17:20

@fsmithred
I used devuan_daedalus_5.0.0_amd64_desktop-live.iso, everything is default.
Devuan is installed and updated.
/sys/firmware/efi exists, that's the reason

root@devuan:/# grub-install
Installing for x86_64-efi platform.
grub-install: error: cannot find EFI directory.
root@devuan:/#

In fact, there is such a section and in it there is an opensuse boot record through which the devuan is loaded.
The size of this partition is 1.8GB.

@rolfie
No, this is an old computer, Devuan is already installed on it, with
there are no problems with this.

P.S. It’s even more interesting here, another Linux is installed - PSlinuxOs. The one by default, without asking where the bootloader was installed, it works, but it’s not in the EFI section. It looks like it's written into the MBR and my computer can load any version.

Regards.

Last edited by aluma (2024-01-13 21:23:02)

ralph.ronnquist · 2024-01-14 08:59:53

You'll need to mount the EFI partition on /boot/efi.

aluma · 2024-01-14 09:20:37

Yes you are right.
To do this, I added a line to fstab and created the /boot/efi folder.
This is what I got

root@devuan:/# grub-install
Installing for x86_64-efi platform.
grub-install: warning: Cannot set EFI variable Boot0007.
grub-install: warning: efivarfs_set_variable: writing to fd 6 failed: No space left on device.
grub-install: warning: _efi_set_variable_mode: ops->set_variable() failed: No space left on device.
grub-install: error: failed to register the EFI boot entry: No space left on device.
root@devuan:/#

The partition is 1.8 GB in size, about 10 MB used.

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn · 2024-01-14 09:35:38

the original thread creator @bobsmith is absent/non-responsive
ttps://dev1galaxy.org/profile.php?id=6661

re: @aluma lenovo s205 _questions_
ttps://dev1galaxy.org/viewtopic.php?pid=47256#p47256

the posts are somewhat confusing

there is no UEFI-legacy switch, while I booted via MBR, there were no problems.

so the above quote describes when/where the hdd/ssd was MBR partitioned?(seems likely for a circa 2011 netbook)

Now I have created an EFI partition, root directories, swap and /home.
I installed openSuse first, everything went fine, the bootloader is installed in UEFI, there are two of its folders in the partition, etc.

and then this describes same/different hdd/ssd? MBR/GPT partitioning? dual-boot? triple-boot? re: openSuse re: PSlinuxOs re: Daedalus

this seems confused/confusing to present and future thread visitors.

while i am composing this, more posts are being added but questions remain.

ralph.ronnquist · 2024-01-14 09:44:17

Ah yes, you also need to

mount -t efivarfs none /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn · 2024-01-14 09:46:25

side comment/note:

remember having one of these netbooks years ago(until the magic smoke was released from it by an errant screwdriver blade)

seem to recall in those days that the (u)efi setups were quite buggy and different vendors appeared to purposefully go "off-specification"

edited to change comment

additional edit to add this link
ttps://blog.fpmurphy.com/2012/12/efivars-and-efivarfs.html

Last edited by stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn (2024-01-14 09:59:57)

aluma · 2024-01-14 10:44:09

@ralph.ronnquist
It's already mounted, there are 50 files in this folder.

root@devuan:/# mount -t efivarfs none /sys/firmware/efi/efivars
mount: /sys/firmware/efi/efivars: none already mounted on /sys/firmware/efi/efivars.
       dmesg(1) may have more information after failed mount system call.
root@devuan:/#

@stargate-sg1-cheyenne-m...
Maybe something has changed since 2012.

In fact, as I understand it, it’s a crooked BIOS and that’s what causes all the problems.
On another laptop, everything is installed correctly, regardless of the number of OS, including Win.

ralph.ronnquist · 2024-01-14 11:02:49

Ok. I'm really not sure which efivars files (aka "variables") can be deleted so a to recover space, but at least the most important ones are "immutable" (see with lsattr). Perhaps there are a couple of unused boot options?

You should back them up before experimenting!

rolfie · 2024-01-14 14:41:10

On such an old netbook your best choice is to use legacy install. You possibly never will get happy trying to use such a crappy efi implementation.

aluma · 2024-01-14 15:01:34

This laptop worked for me for several years, loading through the MBR. Now it is generally not needed and I decided to use it as a test machine.

The disk has 6 partitions under “/”, the /home partition, swap and /boot/efi, you can have fun.

From all this experience, one conclusion is that the installers’ algorithm is different. OpenSuse installed efi boot correctly, but the installer itself is more advanced.

GlennW · 2024-01-14 23:26:22

Hi,if you have more than one OS, using Legacy mode may be problematic.

When I choose an .iso image I try to make sure it boots in legacy-mode at least.

When installing, some installers see UEFI or Legacy boot and setup grub for that purpose.

I have used PcLinux for many years (Mandriva before that),and I think it can also do both types (they have a pretty good installer program, imo).

Then I use an "unsigned" linux-image as soon as possible (apt update and upgrade same ver).

The other nag, is the other OS's change the system time... and that screws up all the other OS's updates... timestamps.

I try to keep it simple. (I stayed with lilo boot-loader until it was no longer a viable install choice)

If win7 is non-uefi you're ahead.

It's handy to have fastboot off until you get it sorted... but secureboot=off and CSM=on (Legacy Boot)

I use GPT partitioning and seems to me, independent of Boot-Loader, mbr is old and insecure. And a lot easier to edit.

My 2c. I hope you get it sorted. :-)

aluma · 2024-01-15 10:47:48

@GlennW

My 2c. I hope you get it sorted. :-)

I'll try.
Although, in my case the problems are due to a specific BIOS.
During the OpenSuse installation, the /boot/efi partition was explicitly specified, so it booted. The rest of the distributions that I tried selected MBR, but when I tried to select efi they reported an error

grub-install: warning: Cannot set EFI variable Boot0007.

Regards.

fsmithred · 2024-01-15 14:47:30

There were no changes in the tests for efi partition in refractainstaller between chimaera and daedalus. (see code below)

Were you able to determine which device has no space left? Can you please post the output of df -h and fdisk -l?

If you have a uefi-bootable install, you can install all the others without a bootloader and then run update-grub (with os-prober enabled) in the bootable install to get all the others into the boot menu.

Here's the test for efi partition(s). Maybe someone will look at it and get a good idea.

# Check for UEFI boot and EFI partition
if [[ -d /sys/firmware/efi ]]; then
        uefi_boot="yes"
        esp_count=$(env LC_ALL=C fdisk -l | awk '/EFI System/ { print $0 }' | wc -l)

        if [ -z "$gpt_list" ] ; then
                gpt_message=$"There is no disk with a gpt partition table. 
        You should exit this script and run gdisk to create one for uefi boot."
        fi
        if [ "$esp_count" -eq 1 ] ; then
                esp_dev=$(env LC_ALL=C fdisk -l | awk '/EFI System/ { print $1 }')
                esp_dev_message=$"EFI partition found at ${esp_dev}
        If this is not on the first hard disk, something may be wrong,
        and you should investigate the situation."
                if ! blkid -c /dev/null -s TYPE "$esp_dev" | grep -q "vfat" ; then
                        must_choose_esp="yes"
                        esp_dev_message=$"EFI partition found at ${esp_dev}
        will need to be formatted FAT32"
                fi
        else
                must_choose_esp="yes"
                if [ "$esp_count" -eq 0 ] ; then
                        esp_dev_message=$" There is no EFI partition. You will need to create one."
                elif [ "$esp_count" -gt 1 ] ; then
                        esp_dev_message=$"More than one EFI partition was detected.
        You will need to select one. Normally, it's on the first hard disk."
                fi
        fi

Ignore the missing final "fi". The rest of this code block just checks to see which grub is installed and generates some messages.

aluma · 2024-01-15 20:19:59

@fsmithred
No, no, I have no complaints about refractainstaller. On another laptop, Daedalus is installed in efi without problems.
Unfortunately, I demolished the previous OS. Currently only daedalus is installed. During the installation process, he replaced the grub -...efi package and installed the bootloader in the MBR. Although the /boot/efi partition exists with the boot and ecp flags.

Here is a bios with quirks.
The BIOS reacts to the very presence of /boot/efi and its flags. Without ecp flags, “frozen” appeared in the “disk password” line.
Thanks for your tips, they pushed me in the right direction.

Regards.

Last edited by aluma (2024-01-15 20:21:27)

aluma · 2024-01-24 07:35:14

What a disgusting thing this Windows is!

In an attempt to figure out uefi, I installed Win and it blocked entry into the BIOS (Lenovo s205).
No attempts from Win, nor the

 systemctl reboot --firmware-setup, grub firmware

commands brought success. Even removing the CMOS battery did not change the condition.

At the same time, the boot menu worked and the first entry was Win. I removed it using bcdedit and formatted the disk.
Linux is installed, and the bootloader can be installed in the MBR, or you can install uefi by adding the /boot/efi partition. Both options work without switching in an inaccessible BIOS.

Last edited by aluma (2024-01-24 07:36:46)

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#1 2023-12-08 03:15:30

Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#2 2023-12-08 07:47:59

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#3 2023-12-21 19:54:41

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#4 2023-12-21 20:10:05

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#5 2023-12-22 02:17:10

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#6 2023-12-22 16:43:05

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#7 2023-12-26 00:27:35

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#8 2024-01-13 18:25:08

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#9 2024-01-13 20:11:15

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#10 2024-01-13 20:23:10

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#11 2024-01-13 21:17:20

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#12 2024-01-14 08:59:53

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#13 2024-01-14 09:20:37

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#14 2024-01-14 09:35:38

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#15 2024-01-14 09:44:17

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#16 2024-01-14 09:46:25

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#17 2024-01-14 10:44:09

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#18 2024-01-14 11:02:49

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#19 2024-01-14 14:41:10

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#20 2024-01-14 15:01:34

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#21 2024-01-14 23:26:22

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#22 2024-01-15 10:47:48

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#23 2024-01-15 14:47:30

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#24 2024-01-15 20:19:59

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

#25 2024-01-24 07:35:14

Re: Installation from daedalus desktop-live boots to GRUB Rescue

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