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fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 2,501  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

1) Chipset == PIIX3
2) USB TABLET
3) x ENABLE I/O APIC

Those are the same settings I've used in virtualbox.

Q: Are you saying rEFInd should be able to boot kernel on beowulf netinst iso?
. . . then reinstalling eEFInd from CLI is all that needs to be done to boot both netinst & minimal-live kernel's
englee

No, that's not what I was saying, but I'm pretty sure that would work. What I meant was if rEFInd was already installed to the hard drive and you did a netinstall without adding a bootloader, refind would see that installed system and be able to boot it.

rEFInd sees all the bootloaders in the efi partition, whether they work or not, plus it sees linux kernels that could be booted. If there's a live-CD in the optical drive, it sees that and will boot it. I just tested that with rEFInd that I have on a 256mb usb stick that's probably older than a fair number of devuan users. I keep it around in case I need it to boot something.

englee

Member

Registered: 2021-03-24

Posts: 32  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

If the minimal-live CD booted on the macbook, then the mac is capable of booting in legacy bios (CSM) mode. There is no uefi bootloader in that iso.

Hi,
Partitions on VM V-Disk for the fully functional beowulf netinst:

Partition ___ File System ___ Mount Point ___ Label ___ Size ___ Used __ Unused __ Flags

/dev/sdal     fat16                /EFI                             94.00 MiB 206.00 KiB 93.80 MiB
/dev/sda2     ext4                /                       beowulf  7.68 GiB   6.67 GiB  1.01 GiB boot
/dev/sda3     linux-swap                                        228.00 MiB   0.00B   228.00 MiB

Q1: Does the /EFI, fat16 partition mean that this ISO requires a uefi bootloader, that's bundled in the ISO (GRUB)?

Q2: If minimal-live CD ISO has no uefi bootloader bundled in its ISO, how would the above partition's differ in legacy bios (CSM) mode, when refracta installer script defaults to gdisk/gpt?
englee

fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 2,501  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

If the minimal-live CD booted on the macbook, then the mac is capable of booting in legacy bios (CSM) mode. There is no uefi bootloader in that iso.

The above quote was in reference to booting the CD on hardware.

Hi,
Partitions on VM V-Disk for the fully functional beowulf netinst:

Partition ___ File System ___ Mount Point ___ Label ___ Size ___ Used __ Unused __ Flags

/dev/sdal     fat16                /EFI                             94.00 MiB 206.00 KiB 93.80 MiB
/dev/sda2     ext4                /                       beowulf  7.68 GiB   6.67 GiB  1.01 GiB boot
/dev/sda3     linux-swap                                        228.00 MiB   0.00B   228.00 MiB

Q1: Does the /EFI, fat16 partition mean that this ISO requires a uefi bootloader, that's bundled in the ISO (GRUB)?

Q2: If minimal-live CD ISO has no uefi bootloader bundled in its ISO, how would the above partition's differ in legacy bios (CSM) mode, when refracta installer script defaults to gdisk/gpt?
englee

A1: It means you created a FAT16 partition on that virtual disk. If it happened automatically, it had to be the netinstall iso, not the live iso.  Why is it mounted at /EFI? It's not going to do anything there. If it is a real efi partition, it does not need to be mounted to boot, only to install or update a bootloader. Is vbox set to boot uefi or bios? Does /sys/firmware/efi exit? (You've seen these questions before. Since we're talking about two different isos installed in two different places, please try to be clear about where we are.)

A2: You have to choose msdos or gpt when you partition a disk. Refractainstaller will let you use gdisk if you boot in uefi mode and cfdisk if you boot in legacy bios mode. As I said, the minimal-live iso will only boot in bios mode, so it should not have shown you gdisk. If you managed to boot that iso in uefi mode, please explain to me how you did it.

For a legacy bios boot, you don't need the efi partition. You just need a root partition for the operating system and grub-pc will put the bootloader in the mbr of the disk of your choice. If you use gpt with a bios boot, you need to have a special partition for the bootloader to put some additional code. The live installer will complain about this if you don't have it.

englee

Member

Registered: 2021-03-24

Posts: 32  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

If the minimal-live CD booted on the macbook, then the mac is capable of booting in legacy bios (CSM) mode. There is no uefi bootloader in that iso.

The above quote was in reference to booting the CD on hardware.

Hi,
Q2: If minimal-live CD ISO has no uefi bootloader bundled in its ISO, how would the above partition's differ in legacy bios (CSM) mode, when refracta installer script defaults to gdisk/gpt?
englee

A2:
For a legacy bios boot, you don't need the efi partition. You just need a root partition for the operating system and grub-pc will put the bootloader in the mbr of the disk of your choice. If you use gpt with a bios boot, you need to have a special partition for the bootloader to put some additional code. The live installer will complain about this if you don't have it.

Hi,
Your 'A2' surfaced the hidden glitch in the bootloader matrix!  The beowulf minimal-liveCD defaults to 'gpt', and minimal-liveCD is limited to BIOS boot, which requires a special partition for the bootloader to put micro-code in, besides linux file system & swap partition's.
Q: What label/name, format, size and code (ef??) is required for this _special_ bootloader partition, inorder for minimal-liveCD installation to boot kernel?
Cheers!
englee

Head_on_a_Stick

Member

From: London

Registered: 2019-03-24

Posts: 3,125  

Website

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

What label/name, format, size and code (ef??) is required for this _special_ bootloader partition, inorder for minimal-liveCD installation to boot kernel?

For gparted (or parted) the bios_grub flag should be applied. For gdisk use the ef02 code. Do not apply a filesystem to the BIOS boot partition.

---

Brianna Ghey — Rest In Power

englee

Member

Registered: 2021-03-24

Posts: 32  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

Thread solved:

Devuan GNU/Linux 3 beolive tty1
beolive login: root
Password:
Linux beolive 4.19.0-14-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 4.19.171-2 (2021-01-30) x86_64
Devuan Beowulf 3.0 -- Minimal Live
Devuan GNU/Linux comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY, to the extent
permitted by applicable law.
root@beolive:~#

Thanks for your time!
*

fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 2,501  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

Your 'A2' surfaced the hidden glitch in the bootloader matrix!  The beowulf minimal-liveCD defaults to 'gpt', and minimal-liveCD is limited to BIOS boot

Yeah, I see the problem. The installer selects gdisk if /sys/firmware/efi exists or if there are gpt disks found. If you don't know to pre-partition with cfdisk, you are understandably lost in the installer. I'll change it so both are available under any circumstances, and the user can decide which one to use.

englee

Member

Registered: 2021-03-24

Posts: 32  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

Your 'A2' surfaced the hidden glitch in the bootloader matrix!  The beowulf minimal-liveCD defaults to 'gpt', and minimal-liveCD is limited to BIOS boot

Yeah, I see the problem. The installer selects gdisk if /sys/firmware/efi exists or if there are gpt disks found. If you don't know to pre-partition with cfdisk, you are understandably lost in the installer. I'll change it so both are available under any circumstances, and the user can decide which one to use.

Hi,
While you are adding the fix, make sure cfdisk can see more than sda and that it uses msdos-mbr, not gpt.
Q: When can we see an updated minimal-liveCD installer?
. . . the problem w/VM, after installing minimal-live is that 'setnet.sh' fails to connect via ethernet

englee

fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 2,501  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

While you are adding the fix, make sure cfdisk can see more than sda and that it uses msdos-mbr, not gpt.
Q: When can we see an updated minimal-liveCD installer?
. . . the problem w/VM, after installing minimal-live is that 'setnet.sh' fails to connect via ethernet

englee

cfdisk lists all the internal disks if you run it without any argument. gdisk will ask you to type in the disk you want. cfdisk is for msdos partitioned disks, gdisk is for gpt disks. You can use both in the same session if you want.

For setnet.sh: Setup interfaces, select eth0, Conf, DHCP, done. I usually forget about that and run 'dhclient eth0'.

The new version of refractainstaller will be packaged as soon as one of our local git wizards shows up. It's all set to build. It'll be in ceres within a few days and in chimaera next week. It probably won't make it into beowulf, but I'll post the deb packages on my sourceforge site.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/refracta/files/tools/

englee

Member

Registered: 2021-03-24

Posts: 32  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

cfdisk lists all the internal disks if you run it without any argument. gdisk will ask you to type in the disk you want. cfdisk is for msdos partitioned disks, gdisk is for gpt disks. You can use both in the same session if you want.

For setnet.sh: Setup interfaces, select eth0, Conf, DHCP, done. I usually forget about that and run 'dhclient eth0'.

The new version of refractainstaller will be packaged as soon as one of our local git wizards shows up. It's all set to build. It'll be in ceres within a few days and in chimaera next week. It probably won't make it into beowulf, but I'll post the deb packages on my sourceforge site.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/refracta/files/tools/

Hi,
Please note both netinst & minimal-liveCD still fail to boot kernel onto external USB HDD, sdb, trapping:

No bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key

Also, cfdisk defaults to 'gpt', where refracta complains that the 'BIOS BOOT' partition is missing, aborting install.

Therefore, VM is the only environment where beowulf can boot kernel, both netinst & minimal-liveCD.
englee

fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 2,501  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

I wouldn't expect the minimal-live to boot on any uefi system. It's not uefi-compatible. Please try the amd64 desktop-live iso. It has both 32 and 64-bit uefi bootloaders. It should boot on your system.

If you choose to install it, I think you'll need to install the grub-efi-ia32 package first, then run the installer and let it install the bootloader.

I don't understand why you think cfdisk defaults to gpt. I also don't see where you can change the partition label on a partitioned disk. It just reports what is there. On an unparitioned disk, the first thing cfdisk does is give you a choice of partition table types. I had to zero the first few MB of a disk before running cfdisk to see that.

englee

Member

Registered: 2021-03-24

Posts: 32  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

I wouldn't expect the minimal-live to boot on any uefi system. It's not uefi-compatible. Please try the amd64 desktop-live iso. It has both 32 and 64-bit uefi bootloaders. It should boot on your system.

If you choose to install it, I think you'll need to install the grub-efi-ia32 package first, then run the installer and let it install the bootloader.

I don't understand why you think cfdisk defaults to gpt. I also don't see where you can change the partition label on a partitioned disk. It just reports what is there. On an unparitioned disk, the first thing cfdisk does is give you a choice of partition table types. I had to zero the first few MB of a disk before running cfdisk to see that.

Hey fsmithred!
Finally got minimal-live to boot kernel from USB external HDD, sdb, on MBP.
All cfdisk has to do is create a linux partition and refracta takes care of swap:

sent 1,652,039,705 bytes received 877,530 bytes 1,639,731.49 bytes/sec
total size is 1,648,868,116 speedup is 1.00
changed ownership of ‘/target/dev/console' from root:root to root:tty
changed ounership of ‘/target/dev/ptmx’ from root:root to root:tty
changed ounership of ‘/target/dev/tty' from root:root to root:tty
‘/target/dev/fd' -> ‘/proc/self/fd'
‘/target/dev/stdin' -> ‘/proc/self/fd/0’
‘/target/dev/stdout’ -> ‘/proc/self/fd/1’
‘/target/dev/stderr’ -> ‘/proc/self/fd/2’
‘/target/dev/core’ -> ‘/proc/kcore’
‘/target/dev/shm’ -> ‘/run/shm’
mkdir: created directory ‘/target/dev/pts'

Making a swap file...

Setting up swapspace version 1, size = 256 MiB (268431360 bytes)
no label, UUID=0f99e69e-51ef-4caa-994a-c8c75a970409

Q1: Does minimal-live come with software to drive speaker, for sound?

Q2: 'dhclient eth0' does enable network, but what command disables connection?
englee

fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 2,501  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

Q1: Does minimal-live come with software to drive speaker, for sound?

Q2: 'dhclient eth0' does enable network, but what command disables connection?
englee

A1: alsa is installed, mocp can play audio files, and if you choose one of the access options to boot, the computer will talk to you the entire time it's on. I don't recommend using that unless you have vision problems.

A2: ifconfig eth0 down There's also a way to do it with the 'ip' command, but I haven't gotten around to learning that one yet.

englee

Member

Registered: 2021-03-24

Posts: 32  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

Q1: Does minimal-live come with software to drive speaker, for sound?

Q2: 'dhclient eth0' does enable network, but what command disables connection?
englee

A1: alsa is installed, mocp can play audio files, and if you choose one of the access options to boot, the computer will talk to you the entire time it's on. I don't recommend using that unless you have vision problems.

A2: ifconfig eth0 down There's also a way to do it with the 'ip' command, but I haven't gotten around to learning that one yet.

Hi,
'mocp' complain's:

No valid sound driver!

using MBP!
Q: Do you know the trick to have minimal-live decipher some valid sound driver?

Also, minimal-live fonts, on the MBP display, are extremely small and can they be enlarged in some way?
englee

fsmithred

Administrator

Registered: 2016-11-25

Posts: 2,501  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

I have no idea about the audio problem. Does aplay -l show anything?

Console font can be changed with dpkg-reconfigure console-setup as root.

englee

Member

Registered: 2021-03-24

Posts: 32  

Re: Non Booting GRUB on Beowulf

I have no idea about the audio problem. Does aplay -l show anything?

Console font can be changed with dpkg-reconfigure console-setup as root.

FYI

The minimal installCD bootloader get's wiped out, in some way, and now fails to boot kernel.  Also, netinstal has never been able to boot kernel from external USB HDD on MBP, using gpt/uefi.
Therefore, tried another gpt/uefi based distro, which had its installer do _all_ required HDD formatting, transparently!
Needless to say, this distro has _no_ problem booting kernel OOTB.
englee