Dual boot Win8 & Mint15

[nobugs]

Hello, please help!

I have an Acer E1-571 Computer with I3 processor, 500GiB HDD, 4Gib Ram & Win8 pre-installed.
Request to install Mint15, either as a full dual boot or with Mint4Win within Windows 8.
Frustration: EXTREME!

Tried most suggestions found on the web, but each ends in failure and confusing complications.

Have discovered that W8 will only boot with UEFI and secure boot enabled. Mint15 only boots with Legacy BIOS and secure boot disabled. Immediate problem!

To change these BIOS settings, a supervisor password needs to be set. Done that!

I have created a partition for Mint15 and a swap file (see below), but I'm now not sure how they should be formatted or the flags set. Have tried different settings, but just going in circles.

Booted up in Legacy mode, secure boot off and installed Mint15 to a 35GiB partition. Also created a swap file of 4Gib, but am unsure if this should be formatted and if so, what type. In Gparted, there are options for a linux swap file and all the other types. Do I also format it as well as selecting it as a swap file?

In desperation, I also downloaded and installed easyBCD, but that just confused me further. Some posts say easyBCD does not work with UEFI and others say it does. Similarly with Mint4Win and Mint15. So all the messages I get are confusing to me. I don't know if I'm dealing with just installation errors or compatibility problems.

Has anyone managed to solve this situation. I would really appreciate any help and guidance on installation, preferable with some steps, as I completely out of my depth now and feel a start again from the beginning is required.

This is my HDD breakdown:
Sda1, NTFS, Recovery, Unused 171.73 MiB, hidden,diag
Sda2, Fat32, ESP, Unused 275.01MiB, boot
Sda3, Unknown, ---------, ---------, msftres
Sda5, NTFS, Acer, Unused 371.55Gib, ---------
Sda9, Linux-swap, ---------, ----------, ---------
unallocated
Sda7, Ext4, Mint15, Unused 30.94Gib, bios_grub
Sda4, NTFS, Push Button Reset, 2.39GiB, hidden, diag
Sda6, unknown, --------, ---------, msftres
unallocated

Also, the machine came with this boot order:
1.Windows boot manager
2.HDD
3.ATAPI cdrom
4.USB FDD
5.Network Boot-IPV4
6.USB HDD
7.USB cdrom
8.Network Boot-ipv6

Cheers!

[Fornhamfred]

This link may help.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UEFI

[nobugs]

Thanks for that. I tried to follow the directions, but they are for Ubuntu and only more confusing to me. Also I'm trying to install Mint15 and the installer is different to that of Ubuntu. For instance there is no "Try Ubuntu". So am I required to reinstall Mint or go with the one I have already installed in my 35GiB partition. I elected to go with the original installation, as it seemed to install fine. It's the booting part that's got me bamboozled and I've spent days trying to figure this out!

The instructions however did not assist me at all, just providing me with more unanswered questions. Anyway, I gave it a shot and now I have a machine that will only boot Linux from a liveDVD or a USB stick. Windows won't boot at all and I think I have completely stuffed up my computer.

At the end of boot-repair, there was a message "Please do not forget to make your BIOS boot on sda2/EFI/linuxmint/Grubx64.efi". I have no idea what that means and what to do about it.

If I switch the BIOS back to UEFI, secure boot is automatically enabled. Then I get a message "Windows Boot Manager has been blocked by the current security policy. No bootable device. Hit any key."

If I alter BIOS back to legacy, message is "insert a bootable device", which of course does not work. I need to turn computer off, insert a bootable USB or DVD and restart. Thus I now only have Linux running from an external device.

What a fiasco! Is there any way I can resurrect my machine or is it now a case of hurling it out the window.

[srs5694]

Try this:

1. Download the USB flash drive or CD-R version of my [url=http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/getting.html]rEFInd boot manager.[/url]
2. Prepare a USB flash drive or CD-R with rEFInd. Note that the USB flash drive version is best prepared with "dd" under Linux, as described in the README-flashdrive.txt file in the .zip file.
3. Disable Secure Boot in your firmware.
4. Boot to the rEFInd USB flash drive or CD-R. You should get a rEFInd menu. If you don't, post back with details.
5. Test rEFInd's ability to boot both Windows and Linux. Both should work. If either one doesn't, post back with details.
6. If rEFInd can boot both Windows and Linux, boot to Linux, ensure that /dev/sda2 is mounted at /boot/efi, and install the Debian package version of rEFInd. Thereafter, you should be able to boot either Linux or Windows via rEFInd.

Note that Windows 8 can boot with Secure Boot disabled. Chances are you're under the impression that it doesn't work because of some other problem. For instance, if you disabled Secure Boot and then installed Linux, GRUB would be in the boot path, and Mint's GRUB doesn't do a good job of chainloading to Windows, so you might mistakenly blame the deactivation of Secure Boot for the problem. It's also possible that you did more than disable Secure Boot in the firmware. Unfortunately, there's no standardization of firmware options, so it's often hard to figure out what's what, and it's impossible to give concise and accurate instructions except for specific EFIs.

[nobugs]

Thanks for the quick reply. You can probably tell I'm tired, peeved and a bit over it at the moment. I'll give your suggestions a go after I have some sleep. My brain is befuddled at the moment. I've read so much stuff on this, I'm grasping at straws. So a rest is in order. I'll post back tomorrow when I have some news, hopefully positive.
Cheers!

[nobugs]

Hi again srs5694,
Just before I finish for tonight as I'm half asleep now, this is the state of play.
Successfully burnt a CD of fEFind.
Can boot up Windows8 and Mint15.
Have installed rEFind debian package.

A couple of notes;
When I switch UEFI on, secure boot is automatically enabled. This was catching me out, as I had to go back in to the BIOS each time to check and disable it. rEFind would not run with Legacy BIOS and SBoot disabled.

Now that I am able to boot both systems and have installed rEFind, will it now act as a boot manager when I reboot. I'll check this tomorrow. Also, I have some questions on what is showing up in the rEFind menu. Some duplicates!

To add to the problems, Mint15 has no sound now, even though there was sound when running from the liveDVD. And there is no Gparted installed and I have been unable to install from the repositories as there are errors when updating and it is not there.

As I can't check the partitions without gparted, I can't verify the /dev/sda2, /boot/efi you mention and I don't understand what you mean. I think it would be prudent to go back to Mint13, as it seems a more stable version. I just have to figure out how to do this after these problems are put to bed.

Thank you for your guidance and I would respectfully ask if you can help me further to get my system organised. Right now, I've made myself sick with all this worry and for now I'm off to bed.

Kind regards,

[srs5694]

When I switch UEFI on, secure boot is automatically enabled. This was catching me out, as I had to go back in to the BIOS each time to check and disable it. rEFind would not run with Legacy BIOS and SBoot disabled.

I assume you've resolved this problem. If not, there should be some way to achieve the desired effect in the firmware's setup. If that fails, though, it is possible to use rEFInd with Secure Boot. In brief, you need to install the version 0.2 or later of the shim program and rename the rEFInd binary to grubx64.efi. (This is confusing, I know, but it's the way shim is written.) Details are on the [url=http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/secureboot.html]rEFInd Secure Boot documentation page.[/url] It's long, but only about 1/3 of that page applies to your situation, so don't get freaked out by it.

Now that I am able to boot both systems and have installed rEFind, will it now act as a boot manager when I reboot. I'll check this tomorrow.

It should; however, some EFIs have bugs that complicate installation. To the best of my knowledge, these can always be worked around, but the details depend on the nature of the bugs.

Also, I have some questions on what is showing up in the rEFind menu. Some duplicates!

Those can be resolved by removing unwanted boot loaders from the ESP or by editing the refind.conf file and uncommenting and adjusting the dont_scan_dirs and/or dont_scan_files items in that file. Note that duplicate entries for Mint may be desirable, because rEFInd shows each kernel as a separate boot option. When you upgrade your kernel, you're likely to get a new entry, at least up to a point. This is desirable because kernel updates occasionally go badly, so being able to drop back to an earlier but known-working kernel is a good thing.

To add to the problems, Mint15 has no sound now, even though there was sound when running from the liveDVD. And there is no Gparted installed and I have been unable to install from the repositories as there are errors when updating and it is not there.

The sound issue could be a driver problem. I recommend you start a new thread on it. Sometimes the repository data gets a bit wacky, but such problems usually correct themselves fairly quickly. Thus, you may be able to install GParted the next time you try. If you still have problems, try typing "sudo apt-get update" in a Terminal window. That should refresh your repository data.

As I can't check the partitions without gparted, I can't verify the /dev/sda2, /boot/efi you mention and I don't understand what you mean.

I specified /dev/sda2 because that's what you said was the ESP in your first post. Normally, if you install Mint in EFI mode, it sets the ESP to mount at /boot/efi. You can check this with "df", as in:

Code: Select all

df /boot/efi
Filesystem     1K-blocks  Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda1         191284 10315    180970   6% /boot/efi

If the "Mounted on" column shows "/" or "/boot" rather than "/boot/efi", then nothing is mounted at /boot/efi. In this example, it's /dev/sda1 that's mounted there. This is because the ESP isn't always /dev/sda2; it can be /dev/sda1, /dev/sda3, or any other partition. The critical thing is that the ESP actually be mounted there. If it's not, rEFInd can't install itself to the ESP. If this had been the case, you should have seen an error when you installed the rEFInd Debian package -- at least, if you did the installation in a way that shows standard output, such as by using apt-get in a Terminal. (Some GUI tools don't, by default.)

I think it would be prudent to go back to Mint13, as it seems a more stable version. I just have to figure out how to do this after these problems are put to bed.

I advise against this. Mint 13 is over a year old, which means that its EFI support and its support for modern hardware is less mature than is the equivalent support in Mint 15. You'll likely find it easier to work through the problems with Mint 15 than to get Mint 13 working on a new computer.

[nobugs]

Hello srs5694,

I've just spent the last two hours formulating a reply to you and detailing where I'm at, but my login has timed out and I've lost everything I've typed. Arrrrrrrrrrrgh!

Mightily confused again, so I'm just going to do something else for now, before I hurl this machine. Suffice to say, I don't get the rEFind menu at all. Everyway I try, seems to bring a whole new set of different menu instructions, most of which I don't understand and don't know what to do.

I think I should just use the Acer recovery partition and reinstall Windows and start again. The computer did not come with any backup disks, just an Acer BU partition. There is a video on the NET showing the method. Change D2D in the BIOS and boot with Alt F10. I'm hoping that this will restore the boot sectors back to default. Can you see anything dangerous with this approach.

I think I'll just change the BIOS every time I need to use each OS and run my favourite Linux from a USB stick and I'll never buy another Win machine again. My head hurts, lol.

Cheers!

[nobugs]

After days of frustration and a good sleep, I'm back still trying to get a dual boot going with Mint15 and Win8.

Deleted my Mint15 partition as the original installation appeared corrupted. Missing programs, no sound etc.
Have reinstalled Mint15 onto the same partition sda7 and it all appears intact. Gparted is back and sound is fine too.

But, something is wrong with grub. For the life of me, I can't get dual boot going. Keeps booting into Win8.
No grub menu at all, despite following as many tutorials as I can find.

The only way I can boot the installed Mint15 is from rEFInd started in the CD Drive. It lists both OS's as well as some other entries and I can use it to boot either. Have tried to install it using ./install.sh and the notes say it installed fine, but no. When I remove the CD and reboot, only Win8 boots. There is no grub menu. Tried following advice from the how to's, but no luck. Tried boot-repair and supergrub2 as well, but they really just add another level of confusion.

As both OS's appear to be working correctly, it is only a boot menu that is missing. I like rEFInd as a boot manager, but will settle for anything at this stage, like a bare bones boot menu.

I think the whole episode went pear shaped, when I initially tripped over the EFI/secure boot and boot order and may have installed grub in the first instance to the wrong partition.

In my resolve to get this dual boot working, I even stuffed up so much, Win8 would not even boot and had to use the recovery back up, to get running again. I'm clutching at straws!

Can anyone please help me resolve this. I think I'm more confused than ever, having read all the advice which, whilst helpful and enlightening, is in general, beyond my expertise and ability to absorb.
Please!

[nobugs]

Update! Finally after considerable time, success!

When the computer is turned on (Acer E1-571), if you do nothing, it boots into Win8. But, if after the Acer logo displays and you press F12, the grub boot menu appears. In my case I get Mint, rEFInd (because I installed it during my tests) and Windows8. All the selections work!

In case anyone else is having similar troubles, then perhaps the F12 key is the solution. Without hitting this key on boot, it looks like any solutions have failed. It would be ironic to discover that after going through all the confusing and convoluted suggestions, it is just this simple. Maybe it only applies to Acer machines. Don't forget that the F12 function needs to be activated in the bios.

So just to recap:
UEFI can be left enabled.
Secure boot can be left disabled.
F12 s/be enabled.
Change the boot order to, CD, USB stick, HDD.
Boot up with a burned CD/USB with Mint.
Click Install and follow the prompts.

Hope this simple explanation helps and thank you all who assisted me in overcoming this problem.

[piovrauz]

Funny how I just bought the same lappy, and even if I didn't install mint15 yet, I can give you a tip you'll like for sure.

1. while in the bios go in the security tab, the one where you set the admin password.
2. there's an option to select .efi loader and setting it as secure. (in the middle of delete all settings and restore factory default)
3. just do that with the grub64x.efi that comes with mint, browsing for its location on the hdd.
[YES, Acer allows you to sign any .efi as secure, ence enabling you to let the secureboot option enabled; for ppls needing dualboot it's good]
4. now exit and save, reboot.
5. go in the bios again, boot tab, and there you'll find a grub64x.efi entry; pust that first of all in the boot order, or after cd/usb drive if you wish so
6. save and exit, reboot.
7. lappy will launch grub with no need of usb or dvd.

Oh, this supposing rEFInd doesn't change something, I don't understand if in the end you are usingit or not.

Now, seeing you succeded to install mint15 on it, I'm pretty sure I'll manage too, only thing is I plan to use MATE instead of Cinnamon, and the setup doesn't seem to detect windows8... for now.

[nobugs]

It's not a bad little laptop. On the cheaper side but for me, it is fine.

Your trick is noted and welcomed. I'll examine this and see how I go. BTW, I installed Mint 15 with the Mate desktop. Nice and simple! Best of the bunch at the moment although LXLE is quite nice. And everthing works!

On reflection, my initial installation was doomed from the start as I had to get my head around the UEFI secure boot thing. Kept tripping over conflicting advice and the application of it, due to my limited experience with the booting side of things. Tried different distros before settling on Mint 15. Have been using Mint 9 since release and never had any trouble whatsoever. Tried easyBCD only to discover it did not support 64bit and the other tools and distros had similar gotchas. In the end I was not only fed up, but totally confused as well.

I reason that the installation of another OS should be a painless exercise, almost point and click. Having to engage in a steep learning curve, much of which is not remembered, just to install an operating system. It might be fun for some, but for me is a pain in the A. I just want to use my computer productively, not figure out how the thing works.

Having said that, I know my machine is not perfectly set up. I installed the rEFInd loader, but it only works from within the grub menu, which only appears when F12 is pressed at bootup. It should fire up first as the only bootloader, however, I'm too far annoyed to spend any more time figuring it out and am happy just to let it sit as an entry in the grub menu. I have a working machine able to boot up either OS and that to me is a win.

BTW, if I don't press F12 at bootup, the computer defaults to Win8 and boots up automatically, which for me is fine.

My Mint 15 is now a nice clean install and I have been able to update and install Wine, Skype and a few other of my favourite apps. No errors and seemless installs. My initial attempt resulted in missing files, the inability to read the repositories and many other quirks. That's why, in conjunction with the dual booting attempts and my inexperience messed up the boot loaders.

Mint 15 runs really well on this machine. The screen is clear and of course the OS is highly configurable. A happy chap at the moment! Mint15 and Win8 is like chalk and cheese.

The only thing not working on the computer is the ability to use the function+left and right arrows for screen brightness. They don't work and the screen is locked on full brightness. I find this an extraordinary stupid bug, whether it be with the machine itself or Mint or a combination of both. After all, it's a laptop capable of running on batteries. A primary function IMHO is the ability to save battery power by manipulating this control, a very serious omission and an inexcusable flaw.

Anyway, good luck with your installation. If I can be of help, even if it is just comparing our files or setup, please just post and I will try and assist.

Cheers!

Just read your post again. On my machine, I have UEFI enabled and secure boot disabled. I thought, like you that one went hand in hand with the other and it caught me out big time. If you enable secure boot, it will automatically enable UEFI as well. You have to install Mint by firstly setting an admin password, which let's you change the boot options, then set Legacy and secure boot off. Fire up Mint from the DVD or USB and install it. Then go back in to the bios and set the UEFI to on, but leave secure boot disabled. That's what I did after hours of mucking around. Conversely, if you set UEFI to enable, as Win8 only runs with this turned on, the secure boot is also re-enabled. I had to keep checking to ensure one was not enabling the other, thus preventing Mint from starting. Chicken and egg! HTH.

[srs5694]

Please type "sudo efibootmgr -v" in a Terminal window and post the output here. This will show us how your boot loaders are configured in the computer's built-in boot manager (that's what you get when you hit F12 at boot time). It may be possible to fix your problem by cleaning up that list and/or re-ordering its entries via the "-o" option to efibootmgr. See [url=http://www.rodsbooks.com/efi-bootloaders/installation.html]this page[/url] for some introductory information on efibootmgr.

[piovrauz]

yes, I'd be interested in that too (F12 gives you the EFI boot menu, the one builtin in the laptop FW. that's not grub)
side note: mint15 live USB was able to boot fine withouth changing any option here, strange it didn't for you.
was the mint15 installer able to detect windows8 when installing (when it ask how to partition the HDD)? This is something I'd like to know.

Considering MS is part of the EFI "creators", we all can see what is the real use of it (protect their monopoly)
The pain in the ass installing other OSes started with EFI and secureboot, secure as "secure (MS interests, keeping out unwanted OS from) boot"
/end of rant.

[nobugs]

Thanks for replies! Working thru suggestions.

srs5694, I'm away from computer at momemt and will report back.

piovrauz, that's something I've learned --- the diff between the inbuilt boot and grub. The penny is starting to drop. lol!

My computer came with the boot order starting with the HDD. (In fact, I think it was Windows boot loader 1st, from memory and CD rom and USB hdd were well down the list).

It would not boot from a CD or USB until I changed the boot order. Nor would it boot external devices with UEFI on and SB disabled. That then led to the secure boot/EFI dramas. But with legacyOS and SB disabled, I could boot Mint15 (or any other linuxOS) from either a liveUSB or liveDVD. But upon removing these devices, Win8 refused to boot until the bios was changed back to UEFI which automatically enabled SBoot and so the circle continued.

The mint15 installer did not recognise any other OS when installing. (UEFI and SB were disabled in order to boot from external devices). But I had empty space of 35GB from my earlier install attempt after I deleted the partition and installed into this. Boot sda, Ext4 and mount point=/

Will try the other suggestions later today. Come back if I can assist further.
Cheers

[nobugs]

Please type "sudo efibootmgr -v" in a Terminal window and post the output here.

Here is output:-

***@***-Aspire-E1-571 ~ $ sudo efibootmgr -v
[sudo] password for ***:
BootCurrent: 0004
Timeout: 0 seconds
BootOrder: 0000,0005,0004
Boot0000* Windows Boot Manager HD(2,c8800,96000,ef1e5681-b8a9-4636-9233-eae89611ad36)File(\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi)WINDOWS.........x...B.C.D.O.B.J.E.C.T.=.{.9.d.e.a.8.6.2.c.-.5.c.d.d.-.4.e.7.0.-.a.c.c.1.-.f.3.2.b.3.4.4.d.4.7.9.5.}....................
Boot0002* ST9500325AS BIOS(2,500,00)................-...........A..........................................
Boot0003* PIONEER DVD-RW DVRTD11RS BIOS(3,500,00)................-...........A......#...................................
Boot0004* linuxmint HD(2,c8800,96000,ef1e5681-b8a9-4636-9233-eae89611ad36)File(\EFI\linuxmint\grubx64.efi)
Boot0005* rEFInd Boot Manager HD(2,c8800,96000,ef1e5681-b8a9-4636-9233-eae89611ad36)File(\EFI\refind\refind_x64.efi)
Boot0006* PIONEER DVD-RW DVRTD11RS BIOS(3,500,00)................-...........A......#...................................
Boot0007* USB DISK 2.0 BIOS(6,500,00).......................................................................
Boot0008* BRCM MBA Slot 0200 v15.0.11 BIOS(80,500,00)................a........ ..E............ .............................
Boot0009* BRCM MBA Slot 0200 v15.0.11 BIOS(80,500,00)................a........ ..E............ .............................
Boot000A* ST9500325AS BIOS(2,500,00)................-...........A..........................................
Boot000B* USB DISK 2.0 BIOS(6,500,00).......................................................................
Boot000C* BRCM MBA Slot 0200 v15.0.11 BIOS(80,500,00)................a........ ..E............ .............................

[srs5694]

Try booting to Linux in EFI mode and then type the following in a Terminal:

Code: Select all

sudo efibootmgr -o 5,4,0

(If you prefer GRUB to rEFInd, change "5,4,0" to "4,5,0".)

When you reboot, rEFInd should come up by default. If it doesn't, your firmware is buggy. A firmware upgrade might fix the problem (you might need to retype the efibootmgr command). Another option that works for some people in this situation is to boot to Windows, open an Administrator Command Prompt window, and type:

Code: Select all

bcdedit /set {bootmgr} path \EFI\refind\refind_x64.efi

If this also fails, the only way I know of to get rEFInd (or GRUB) to appear is to juggle files. This can be done via the mvrefind.sh script that comes with rEFInd, as in:

Code: Select all

sudo mvrefind.sh /boot/efi/EFI/refind /boot/efi/EFI/Microsoft/Boot

The Boot Repair utility can do something similar for GRUB, but you need to access the advanced options and check the box to rename the GRUB files.

[piovrauz]

If it's not asking too much: what version of the bios and the insydeh2o "setup utility" is your 571 running?
for bios version check first tab, the one with the infos, for the insydeh2o setup utility just the top of the screen.
thanks, I'm being curious since it seems a little different from mine.
here I have the 2.15 bios, and the 3.7 insydeh2o setup utility. HW may be a little diferent too.

[nobugs]

Hi srs5694,
Good news. The solution was simply to F2 at boot and change the boot order. rEFInd had inserted itself before the windows bootloader in the bios and swapping them around, now goes directly into the rEFI menu from which I can select any chosen OS. Thank you!

Hi piovrauz,
Bios version is 2.15
Insydehz0 is 3.7
ram 4096MB
Video 128MB
Intel i3-3110M
2.4GHzkernel 3.8.0-19-generic(x86_64)
HDD Seagate ATA ST9500325as 500GB
DVD-rw pIONEER DVRTD11RS

Is that enough data for you.
Cheers!

[piovrauz]

@nobugs
ok, so same bios and setu utility, which is what matters.
hw is the same, just got the i3-3120M (2.5GHz) instead, should make no difference.
btw, got same issue as you with the screen brightness always at max (slider changes, but not the screen), will check if there's a bug filed for that.
Also, let's hope the kernel is actually throttling the CPU... or battery won't last.

@srs5694
just a question: where is the linux boot stuff supposed to go in a dualboot? Right now playing around with external hdd.
Referring to the E1-571, there are partitions Recover (200MB), EFI, MS reserved, OS (450GB), and Push button (The restore, bsically the rest of the recover partition, 15GB or so)
EFI would seems the more logical choice, but I was thinking if MS "system file protection" wouldn't want to mess with that.