Dear wounderful comunity!
I recently decided to try out this new UEFI boot thingy, as I want to encrypt my drive and only found tutorials for UEFI. My laptop does not by default support it (an old Acer Aspire 5750g), but after some digging I found a custom BIOS with UEFI and some other useful goodies!
I have a dual boot instalation (Ubuntu for coding and Windows for gaming and 3D modeling) and works fine in Legacy mode. But here is the problem - I tried converting the drive for GPT and adapt it to UEFI. Windows handled it very well, boots without a problem in UEFI mode. But Ubuntu refuses to work. Like, I am stuck on the point where my laptop does not see GRUB at all.
- I tried reinstalling and completly purging and installing anew EFI specific GRUB
- I tried the boot repair tool. All succeeded, but with no resolve.
- I also tried installing Ubuntu only on an empty drive with UEFI formatted USB drive - still nothing.
- However, for sanity check, I put both drives in a desktop I have and each worked without a problem, the PC saw the ubuntu boot loader, I could select it and it booted just fine into GRUB and then into Ubuntu or Windows. And that is how I am reaching the comclusion, that my laptop out right doesn't see the Linux boot loader, only the windows one.
- I also tried rEFInd, but the laptop doesn't see that one as well.
Is this caused by poor UEFI implementation on my laptop? Probably. But is there a way to fix it through the bootloader? I mean, USB drives with installers on them work, as well as Windows boot manager, there has to be a way. I tried finding if Windows Boot manager can do it, but apperantly Microsoft has limited that to only Windows OS-es.
Or could it be something with security? I read something about secure boot option interfearing, but my laptop doesn't even have such a setting to be turned on or off, only UEFI or not.
I am sorry if it is a duplicate or the solution is very easy. I am frustraited and stuck at the moment, can't think straight. I would really appreciate any help or even leads! Thank you in advance! ^^
EDIT 1: Boot Summary
Here is the Boot summary from boot repair (NOTE: SDA4 and SDA5 are 2 linux installations, I may have broken SDA4 in my fix attempts earlier, as the Desktop doesn't boot it, but that is a different problem for a different day. :D )
EDIT 2: Boot progress
Through the following post's answers: How to get GRUB to be the default bootloader instead of Windows Boot Manager on a UEFI laptop?I found a possible lead - the answer from @Envy allowed me to boot linux by replacing the bootmgfw.efi file under /EFI/Microsoft/Boot with the grubx64.efi under EFI/ubuntu! Great!
However, I get a black screen instead of the Grub menu for around 10 seconds. I may be missing something in the solution.
EDIT 3: Possible shitty work-a-round
After a lot of digging, research and major help from oldfred, who is a GOD at this (kept seeing his name in most topics about boot loaders), didn't achieve much progress. I finally decided to just create a copy of bootmgfw.efi (the windows one, not disguised grub) and rename it to bootmgfw-WIN.efi. Then using "Grub Customizer" I changed the windows entry to boot from bootmgfw-WIN.efi, instead of bootmgfw.efi.
Now I can select either Ubuntu or Windows, albeit, without a screen output (no clue why, the desktop has the same issue) and both work well on the laptop! But not on the desktop.
Thank you again, @oldfred, you are a LEGEND!!! <3
11 Reset to default
