rEFInd options clarification

[Pinokkio]

I have rEFInd installed on Mac Mojave / Linux Tricia ( works great ) .
Now I have 5 options I don't really understand :

1) EFI\ubuntu\grubx64.efi from efi ( What is this and what does it do ? )
2) Fallback boot loader from EFI ( What is this and what does it do ? )
3) boot\vllinux-5.3.0-28 generic 686 GiB ext4 volume
is this generic OK and what does that mean ?
Will " 5.3.0-28 " change when I upgrade the kernel ?

4) macOS from Preboot ( What is this and what does it do ? )
5) macOS from Macintosh HD

[Moonstone Man]

I have rEFInd installed on Mac Mojave / Linux Tricia ( works great ) .
Now I have 5 options I don't really understand :

1) EFI\ubuntu\grubx64.efi from efi ( What is this and what does it do ? )
2) Fallback boot loader from EFI ( What is this and what does it do ? )
3) boot\vllinux-5.3.0-28 generic 686 GiB ext4 volume
is this generic OK and what does that mean ?
Will " 5.3.0-28 " change when I upgrade the kernel ?

4) macOS from Preboot ( What is this and what does it do ? )
5) macOS from Macintosh HD

http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/

[fabien85]

Hi,
1) is GRUB which can load Linux
If you want to remove it, go to Mint, open a terminal and run apt purge grub-efi-amd64

2) it's an entry for EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi on the EFI partition
as refind states this is the location for the fallback bootloader. i.e. if the machine forgets what it needs to boot (after a reset of the NVRAM, or a faulty CMOS battery), it will normally boot that file.
What it is we can't know for sure, it depends on what you did previously. If you ever ran boot-repair from Linux, then this would be the source of it : boot-repair will have copied grubx64.efi there. Try the option and tell us what it does.
Also tell us the output of the two following commands, run from the terminal in Linux

Code: Select all

sudo ls -R /boot/efi
sudo find /boot/efi -name "*.efi" -print | xargs md5sum

3) this is the Mint kernel. Refind directly launches it, that's how you should boot Mint. I have the same basically.
"generic" is normal, that's the version of the kernel you have and the normal one to have.
5.3.0-28 is the kernel version number. When you upgrade the kernel you will indeed have a different number there. Refind defaults to using the latest kernel available (that can be tweaked if needed). And it gives you the possibility to boot previous kernel still installed : if you select the entry with the arrow keys and press F2 you will get to a submenu with different options, where you can boot previous kernels.

4) I think it's normal. It's related to changes in the way the newest macOS boot (at least for 10.14 and 10.15, not sure about the previous one). I dont have any of these latest versions, I stopped at 10.11, so I do not understand the details. I think it's related to the release of APFS (Apple filesystem), while formerly macOS would use HFS as filesystem. It may also be linked with filevault encryption : my guess is that if you turn on encryption, then option 5) would disappear because refind cannot read anymore the macOS partition (that's the point of encryption indeed).

[Pinokkio]

Output :
:~$ sudo ls -R /boot/efi
[sudo] wachtwoord voor XXXXXXXXX:
/boot/efi:
BOOTLOG EFI

/boot/efi/EFI:
APPLE BOOT refind tools ubuntu

/boot/efi/EFI/APPLE:
CACHES EXTENSIONS FIRMWARE

/boot/efi/EFI/APPLE/CACHES:
CAFEBEEF

/boot/efi/EFI/APPLE/CACHES/CAFEBEEF:

/boot/efi/EFI/APPLE/EXTENSIONS:
Firmware.scap

/boot/efi/EFI/APPLE/FIRMWARE:
IM141.scap

/boot/efi/EFI/BOOT:
BOOTX64.EFI fbx64.efi

/boot/efi/EFI/refind:
BOOT.CSV icons keys refind.conf-sample
drivers_x64 icons-backup refind.conf refind_x64.efi

/boot/efi/EFI/refind/drivers_x64:
ext4_x64.efi

/boot/efi/EFI/refind/icons:
arrow_left.png os_fedora.png os_trusty.png
arrow_right.png os_freebsd.png os_ubuntu.png
boot_linux.png os_frugalware.png os_unknown.png
boot_win.png os_gentoo.png os_void.png
func_about.png os_gummiboot.png os_win8.png
func_csr_rotate.png os_haiku.png os_win.png
func_exit.png os_hwtest.png os_xenial.png
func_firmware.png os_kubuntu.png os_xubuntu.png
func_hidden.png os_legacy.png os_zesty.png
func_reset.png os_linuxmint.png README
func_shutdown.png os_linux.png tool_apple_rescue.png
licenses os_lubuntu.png tool_fwupdate.png
mouse.png os_mac.png tool_memtest.png
os_arch.png os_mageia.png tool_mok_tool.png
os_artful.png os_mandriva.png tool_netboot.png
os_bionic.png os_netbsd.png tool_part.png
os_centos.png os_network.png tool_rescue.png
os_chakra.png os_opensuse.png tool_shell.png
os_chrome.png os_redhat.png tool_windows_rescue.png
os_clover.png os_refind.png transparent.png
os_crunchbang.png os_refit.png vol_external.png
os_debian.png os_slackware.png vol_internal.png
os_devuan.png os_suse.png vol_net.png
os_elementary.png os_systemd.png vol_optical.png

/boot/efi/EFI/refind/icons/licenses:
cc-3.0.txt cc-by-sa-4.0.txt gpl-2.0.txt lgpl-3.0.txt

/boot/efi/EFI/refind/icons-backup:
arrow_left.png os_fedora.png os_trusty.png
arrow_right.png os_freebsd.png os_ubuntu.png
boot_linux.png os_frugalware.png os_unknown.png
boot_win.png os_gentoo.png os_void.png
func_about.png os_gummiboot.png os_win8.png
func_csr_rotate.png os_haiku.png os_win.png
func_exit.png os_hwtest.png os_xenial.png
func_firmware.png os_kubuntu.png os_xubuntu.png
func_hidden.png os_legacy.png os_zesty.png
func_reset.png os_linuxmint.png README
func_shutdown.png os_linux.png tool_apple_rescue.png
licenses os_lubuntu.png tool_fwupdate.png
mouse.png os_mac.png tool_memtest.png
os_arch.png os_mageia.png tool_mok_tool.png
os_artful.png os_mandriva.png tool_netboot.png
os_bionic.png os_netbsd.png tool_part.png
os_centos.png os_network.png tool_rescue.png
os_chakra.png os_opensuse.png tool_shell.png
os_chrome.png os_redhat.png tool_windows_rescue.png
os_clover.png os_refind.png transparent.png
os_crunchbang.png os_refit.png vol_external.png
os_debian.png os_slackware.png vol_internal.png
os_devuan.png os_suse.png vol_net.png
os_elementary.png os_systemd.png vol_optical.png

/boot/efi/EFI/refind/icons-backup/licenses:
cc-3.0.txt cc-by-sa-4.0.txt gpl-2.0.txt lgpl-3.0.txt

/boot/efi/EFI/refind/keys:
altlinux.cer microsoft-uefica-public.cer
canonical-uefi-ca.cer openSUSE-UEFI-CA-Certificate-4096.cer
centos.cer openSUSE-UEFI-CA-Certificate.cer
fedora-ca.cer refind.cer
microsoft-kekca-public.cer SLES-UEFI-CA-Certificate.cer
microsoft-pca-public.cer

/boot/efi/EFI/tools:
gptsync_x64.efi

/boot/efi/EFI/ubuntu:
BOOTX64.CSV fw fwupx64.efi grub.cfg grubx64.efi mmx64.efi shimx64.efi

/boot/efi/EFI/ubuntu/fw:


~$ sudo find /boot/efi -name "*.efi" -print | xargs md5sum
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/refind/refind_x64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/refind/._refind_x64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/refind/drivers_x64/ext4_x64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/refind/drivers_x64/._ext4_x64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/tools/gptsync_x64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/tools/._gptsync_x64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/ubuntu/fwupx64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/ubuntu/grubx64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/ubuntu/shimx64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/ubuntu/mmx64.efi: Toegang geweigerd
md5sum: /boot/efi/EFI/BOOT/fbx64.efi: Toegang geweigerd

[Pinokkio]

Also , when I boot now "option 3" into Mint .Instead of waiting until the booting process is over and I have to give my password .
I see a lot of lines passing ...
Interesting but can I make this process invisible again , if I would want to ?
When I stop Mint , the same .A lot of lines are shown .

[fabien85]

Ok, next time put these kind of long outputs between code tags : button </> above the typing area.

I had to google translate "Toegang geweigerd". The second commands needs another sudo. Can you post the output of

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sudo find /boot/efi -name "*.efi" -print | sudo xargs md5sum

?

For the lines of text during boot and shutdown, it's normal. The boot is verbose because no option is passed to the kernel to tell it to be quiet.
The simplest GUI way to tell it to be quiet :
- boot Mint via GRUB (not directly the kernel)
- download refind from its website, decompress the zip, open the file manager and go to where you unzipped the folder
- find the file 'mkrlconf', double-click on it, select 'run in terminal'.
- shutdown and reboot. Now when you boot directly the kernel (option 3) the boot should be quiet with a Mint splash screen.

You did not tell, what happens when you boot option 2 ?

[Pinokkio]

Sorry , only after I'd send the post , I saw that I didn't translate " Toegang geweigerd " (acces denied) .In fact I should always download and install English versions,
but in the end I always get cold feet and hit "Dutch" , giving me extra troubles ( Keyboard , shortcuts, syntax ) eg "Desktop" = 'Bureaublad " and "v" instead of "d"
for delete .Anyway I did boot option 2 , and when booting saw something like ext/efi/amd64 or so passing .Then I found myself back in Mint 19.3 , and all was going well... Then instead of restarting, I stupidly changed some things and thus changed more parameters .
Installed Samba trying to change permissions on an external HDD .
Then also did :

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sudo umount /dev/sdb1
sudo mkdir /mnt/mydisk
sudo mount -t ntfs -o rw /dev/sdb1 /mnt/mydisk 

So now I am back in the situation of my other post " reFind making it permanent "
1) Start computer : I directly boot in Cinnamon 19.3 ( no advanced options or anything dispayed )
2) Start computer and hold option/alt Key : choice between efi boot or Mac .
3) Start computer and hold esc Key : the " >grub " shows and then I need to type " exit" and the reFind shows its options ( Ubuntu /Mint /Mac )


I 'll give

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sudo find /boot/efi -name "*.efi" -print | sudo xargs md5sum

a try and let you know later .

[Pinokkio]

I installed refind again . Working fine . I think I better only start " Fallback boot loader from EFI " in case I want to fallback to previous situation .

Code: Select all

1) Start computer : I directly boot in Cinnamon 19.3 ( no advanced options or anything dispayed )
2) Start computer and hold option/alt Key : choice between efi boot or Mac .
3) Start computer and hold esc Key : the " >grub " shows and then I need to type " exit" and the reFind shows its options ( Ubuntu /Mint /Mac 

Thanks again a lot for helping me out !

[fabien85]

I have a suspicion that you will find out that most times where you use that option "Fallback bootloader", you will find that you go back to this situation where you directly boot to Mint, skipping refind. i.e. a boot coup where grub retakes control of the boot.
If that is the case, go to Mint, and in the terminal run apt purge grub-efi-amd64 and reboot.

Also it's best to use the refind entry that directly boots the kernel.
The entry "fallback bootloader' can be removed from refind's menu if you want, just tell me. If you give the output of the md5sum command I posted above, I can confirm my suspicion, explain what it is, and tell you how to either hide the entry or delete the associated files, at your choice.

[Pinokkio]

Thank you , rEFInd works nicely again . I'll leave it as it is ,since I now feel comfortable with it , and if necessary can use it , or change it .
I know now were it all serves for .The verbose boot doesn't bother me , now I can see all de green passing lines with an "OK" !