Mint 14 Install broken? Can't access BIOS.

[Znap!]

Okay, I think I figured out what I did wrong. I should probably have left an EFI partition on either disk instead of simply deleting all partitions mercilessly. That's probably the reason it can't boot my Mint install. The only thing I still don't get is why it can't boot from USB to try and undo some of the damage I apparently did. I've read that I can use boot-repair, but I do need to be able to boot to do that.

Any thoughts on this? It just seems very strange that the problem would be with my usb-drive, all of a sudden... I really do appreciate any input, as this frustrating me to no end. Cheers!

[Znap!]

Just in case anyone has any thoughts, here's a summary of what I did when I tried to install Mint 16.

I got my laptop back and decided to get rid of W8 again. So I went ahead and proceeded to install Mint 16 this time, from a live USB. Everything worked fine and dandy, except for one silly thing I forgot to do. As I mentioned before, my laptop has two disks, an HDD and an SSD - although 'BIOS' only recognizes my HDD. I assume this is due to Smart Response Technology, some really annoying feature that sees both devices as one. When installing, I formatted both disks (big mistake - I should've left an EFI partition on either one apparently), and created my root and swap folders on the SSD. I used the whole 500 GB HDD for my /home folder. Everything installed, I rebooted. Then, nothing happened. Several tries later, nothing continued to happen.

Since then, I have tried every single boot order, both in UEFI and in Legacy mode, I have tried both USB ports, I have created a new live USB-drive a few times and with different programs, but nothing works.

When booting in Legacy mode, I get a blinking cursor in the upper left of a black screen, when booting in UEFI mode it tells me there is "no bootable device". I think I do understand what I did wrong in installing Mint (not leaving an EFI partition), but I don't understand why I can't even boot from anything to fix it. Any help is very much appreciated, as I'm truly becoming terribly frustrated with this.

[MtnDewManiac]

I have that same nagging suspicion. Dammit. I really don't want to open my laptop and disconnect any hard drives... since it's only 8 months old, I'd rather send it back under the warranty.

For years, laptop manufacturers have placed simple plastic hatches on the bottom of laptops, held in place with nothing more complicated than one or two Phillips screws. Please notice the distinct lack of a sticker - stating that your warranty will be void - across those hatches. This is because parts such as your hard drive, solid state drive, and RAM card(s) are able to be accessed by the end-user. Doing so will not void your warranty.

Note that doing so badly and wrongly may, however. So it is a good idea to observe simple static electricity precautions, such as not dressing in a wool sweater and then dragging your feet across a carpet immediately prior to placing your bare hands on one of the laptop's components . For those who are worried, electronic component shops and even electronic-themed department stores such as Radio Shack sell anti-static straps that you place around your wrist (IIRC) and then ground. Myself, I have been known to place my hands inside those thin sandwich baggies. Someone I used to live beside snipped the hot and neutral prongs from the cord to a six-outlet power strip but left the ground prong intact. He told me that when he needed to work on something (that had a grounded power cord), he'd plug it into his doctored power strip and that it would not power the device but would provide a correct ground path. I thought at the time that this was overkill - but he never damaged a device or component by working on it. YMMV....

Regards,
MDM

[Znap!]

Just a quick update about the weird things that keep happening, in case anyone cares. I managed to boot Windows 8 from USB, but couldn't complete the install because of a last minute 0x80070570 error. In the mean time, I had formatted both sda and sdb. Weirdly enough, when I rebooted from Legacy, it suddenly recognized my other usb-stick which had Ubuntu installed. So, right now I'm in a live Ubuntu environment and have the possibility to install from here. I'm kinda considering it, but since I want to give Mint another try, I think I'll create a third USB with Mint on it and see if that works.

I still don't really understand what's happening, but well... there's progress at least.