Unable to boot into Linux Mint 19 64-Bit With EasyBCD 2.3 (Dual Boot Setup Windows 10 )

[edjon2000]

For some time I have been using a Dual Boot Configuration on my main system Win10/Linux Mint and this has worked fine for me in various configurations, up until I decide to update my Linux Mint to Version 19 "Tara" which was recently released.

The setup I normally use works like this

Windows 10 is already installed and has been for some years currently version 1803 OS Build 17134.137 and this has been dual booting fine with versions of linux mint up to and including version 18.3 cinnamon edition based on ubuntu 16.04, linux mint 19 has now come out based on ubuntu 18.04 and I followed my usual procedure, I installed mint 19 in its own partition on a separate drive which seemed to work ok as it usually does i.e. boot into mint's live environment and install from there, I usually install Grub to the Linux partition and use EasyBCD to generate the Windows Bootloader entry using AutoNeoGrub.mbr and this has always worked for me until now since installing mint 19 everythng behaves as normal up until grub is loaded, instead of getting the grub bootloader menu I just end up at a Grub prompt, very strange. any ideas or suggestions about this would be greatly appreciated.

Just to be sure I re-installed mint 18.3 in the same way and everything works as it should, I wonder if there is something special about ubuntu 18.04 and its derivatives that could be causing problems

edit ... I have tried a few things as mentioned further down this thread and it seems that it could be an EasyBCD issue although still not sure, I have passed my findings on to the Neosmart forums.

Thank you in advance

[Linux-Bill]

I wasted hours yesterday trying to get 19 to install along side Windows 10 (same as I do with 18.3). Could not do it - 19 took over the drive and installed as the only OS. So I would go back, reclone the Windows drive, and try again with different settings - ETC!!!

I have yet to even see what 19 looks like in its final form. Can't see it if it doesn't install!!

My 18.3 dual boot with Windows 10 is the best system I have ever run - bar none. I am hoping that 19 will eventually afford the same.

After searching the Internet for solutions, I have learned I am sure not alone with this install failure.

I am not looking for a whole bunch of code that must be hand typed - I want what 18.3 offers - - - goof-proof dual boot installation. I use the dual boot on all my computers and it is the best of both worlds and do not relish "hard way" installations of each computer.

After years of Mint use, I am truly disappointed.

[Pierre]

you will find that the Real Issue is more, from Upstream:
- both from Ubuntu and from Debian Systems, that do feed the LinuxMint Project.
Yes- LM19 is somewhat different, to past releases, but the LinuxMint Team can only do so much . .

But - - your right - this will reflect on their work, nonetheless

[edjon2000]

Hi Linux-Bill,

Yeah it is a mystery this is one of the reasons I install grub to the linux partition and use easybcd to chainload grub, it keeps grub off my windows mbr so if at a later date I break linux my windows installation is unaffected.

@Pierre I thought it might be related to something like that I am just looking for suggestions and advice from the linux mint team about possible workarounds if there are any and also to highlight the issue, I also posted on the easybcd forums for the same reason
.

[edjon2000]

Hi all,

Ok, I had a thought, I re-installed Linux Mint 19 Cinnamon in place of Linux Mint 18.3 and went through the load live image and install and Mint 19 installed as it did before, however, I decided to watch the install procedure and everything seemed to install correctly I had prepared an internal drive just for Mint 19 as I did for Mint 18.3, Grub was installed to my Linux drive as it did for Mint 18.3 (in my case sdd) and it installed Grub to sdd again as it did for Mint 18.3 and I updated my menu entry in EasyBCD 2.3 and rebooted I selected the Mint19 menu entry, and sure enough it immediately went to a Grub prompt, so there is definitely some kind of an issue, but where ... I rebooted my system again but this time whilst BIOS was loading I chose the option to launch the BIOS boot menu, from there I selected the drive where I had installed Mint 19 and it immediately booted up the Grub loading screen for Mint 19 I hit that and lo and behold Mint 19 launched perfectly, I played about with it for a while applied all the updates that appeared (there were quite a few) and again rebooted ... on launching 19 from EasyBCD I again hit the Grub prompt but after rebooting again and launching via the BIOS Boot Menu Mint 19 again loaded perfectly, so I am wondering if this is indicating an issue with EasyBCD what do you think, I have passed a copy of my findings to the Neosmart(EasyBCD) Forums

[beachgardener]

hello edjon2000,
Thank you for this thread, I am in exactly the same position as you, a dual boot with Win 7 and now LM 19 (was 18.3 and worked ok) and thank you for the information about choosing boot in bios, will have to do that for a while, hope a fix comes soon.
Regards beachgardener

[edjon2000]

You're very welcome beachgardener, I am pleased it helped you out

[beachgardener]

Thanks, I do hope there is a fix fir this, even if it means a different boot loader in windows. Know of any?
Regards beachgardener.

[edjon2000]

I going to try a slightly different approach that may or may not work I got an idea from the ask ubuntu questions as detailed here which involves trying to get Mint 19 to boot from the grub menu first and then recreating the commands in a new menu.lst file in the easyBCD neogrub configuration file, so, I'll give it a try and see what happens.

[Biker]

I never could get easyBCD to work well in a dual boot environment with Windows and Linux. The one and only time I attempted to use it to manage a dual boot configuration resulted in the loss of the entire drive with years of data lost (yeah, yeah, yeah, I know.. No fresh backups before fiddling with it.)

Since then, I've always used the BIOS menu system to select the boot drive, whether it be Winderz or Linux.

[edjon2000]

Lol Biker, I would be the last person to lecture you about backups, I only recently started backing up my windows system regularly and the only reason I back up Mint 19 is because it has timeshift so I can

I never really had a problem with EasyBCD but I do setup up things slightly differently, when installing Mint from the live environment, I install the grub bootloader to my Linux partition rather than the default location, which is usually where your Windows Bootloader is (sda - by default), the reason I do it that way is, in case I mess up my Linux installation, I can still access my Windows installation without having to jump through hoops to repair my Windows MBR

The end result is that when I select my Linux installation it will chainload Grub and from there fire up Linux ... until Mint 19, I am still waiting for some kind of response from the EasyBCD people.

[amitabhranjan]

Same problem. Installing grub2 to the linux partition no longer works. Installs fine to the disk.
I too use easybcd to boot linux mint.

I got it booting with easybcd syslinux option but then tried to fix grub2 and broke the thing again.
(by doing --force and then changing my logical partition to normal since grub2 seemed to have problem with logical partitions as per google)

Its not a problem with easybcd as i installed 18.3 again and it was working. maybe the specific grub version has a problem. 2.02
Strangely when i land up at the grub prompt it always says grub4dos - maybe something is getting cludged up between easybcd grub & linux grub

[edjon2000]

Hi amitabhranjan

Yep it is certainly a mystery, I too reinstalled 18.3 and it worked fine, not sure about it being a problem with logical partitions, because I installed Mint 19 to its own SSD so that is using a primary partition, however it will always boot fine if I select that specific disk from my BIOS boot menu, it could be an issue with the version of GRUB in which case the problem could be upstream of Linux Mint perhaps the Ubuntu base, I don't know for sure though.

[cdgoldin]

I believe the problem is that EasyBCD and/or Grub4DOS (which it uses) can't handle more than one Linux system on a volume, probably because a data field is too small.

In my case:
HDD0 contains the following partitions: C=Windows7 (NTFS); D, E, F and G=Data partitions (FAT)
HDD1 contains the following partitions: sdb1=Mint 18.3 root (ext4), sdb2=Extended Partition, sdb5=Linux Swap, sdb6=Mint 18.3 home (ext4)

I have successfully used EASYBCD to boot using a Windows MBR. The Boot Menu has Windows and Linux. If Linux is selected, it brings up the Linux boot menu. I have NOT set the timout to 0, so that I can use the other Linux menu items (i.e. diagnostics mode, memtest, or returning to Windows7).

I've used this procedure with several versions of Ubuntu and Linux: [Install Windows7 to sda]; Install Linux so sdb. Using the Linux boot menu, boot into Windows7. Using EasyBCD3: [Add a new Entry for Linux]. Click BCD Backup/Repair > Recreate/repair boot files (which writes a Windows MBR and makes the Windows boot menu primary). Edit the BCD Boot Menu to set the default to Windows or Linux as desired.

In the past, I've replaced the Linux version installed on sdb1 with a new version. Recently I added Linux Mint 19 to HDD1. So now sdb1=Mint 18.3 root (ext4), sdb2=Extended Partition, sdb5=shared Linux Swap, sdb6=Mint 18.3 home (ext4); sdb7=Mint 19 root (ext4), sdb8=Mint 19 home (ext4)

When I use the procedure described above, windows boots fine, but selecting "Linux" from the Windows boot menu results in
"GRUB > Error 14: Filesystem compatibility error, cannot read whole file". Reportedly this error is generated because some of the filesystem reading code in GRUB4DOS has limits on the length of the files it can read. This error is returned when the user runs into such a limit. Also some old BIOS or BIOS settings if not AHCI may cause grub boot issues if boot files or grub files are beyond a very old BIOS limit of 137GB.

Note that when I installed Mint 19 on sdb1 or on a separate disc (so there is only one Linux system present on each disc), it works fine. So, the problem is NOT with Mint 19, but with multiple Linux systems on the same disc.

It seems that it would be fairly simply for EasyBCD to allow a larger file length and/or use a later version of Grub4DOS which should fix this problem. Until it does, we have to use the Linux boot menu rather than the Windows boot menu.

[edjon2000]

I believe the problem is that EasyBCD and/or Grub4DOS (which it uses) can't handle more than one Linux system on a volume, probably because a data field is too small.

In my case:
HDD0 contains the following partitions: C=Windows7 (NTFS); D, E, F and G=Data partitions (FAT)
HDD1 contains the following partitions: sdb1=Mint 18.3 root (ext4), sdb2=Extended Partition, sdb5=Linux Swap, sdb6=Mint 18.3 home (ext4)

I have successfully used EASYBCD to boot using a Windows MBR. The Boot Menu has Windows and Linux. If Linux is selected, it brings up the Linux boot menu. I have NOT set the timout to 0, so that I can use the other Linux menu items (i.e. diagnostics mode, memtest, or returning to Windows7).

I've used this procedure with several versions of Ubuntu and Linux: [Install Windows7 to sda]; Install Linux so sdb. Using the Linux boot menu, boot into Windows7. Using EasyBCD3: [Add a new Entry for Linux]. Click BCD Backup/Repair > Recreate/repair boot files (which writes a Windows MBR and makes the Windows boot menu primary). Edit the BCD Boot Menu to set the default to Windows or Linux as desired.

In the past, I've replaced the Linux version installed on sdb1 with a new version. Recently I added Linux Mint 19 to HDD1. So now sdb1=Mint 18.3 root (ext4), sdb2=Extended Partition, sdb5=shared Linux Swap, sdb6=Mint 18.3 home (ext4); sdb7=Mint 19 root (ext4), sdb8=Mint 19 home (ext4)

When I use the procedure described above, windows boots fine, but selecting "Linux" from the Windows boot menu results in
"GRUB > Error 14: Filesystem compatibility error, cannot read whole file". Reportedly this error is generated because some of the filesystem reading code in GRUB4DOS has limits on the length of the files it can read. This error is returned when the user runs into such a limit. Also some old BIOS or BIOS settings if not AHCI may cause grub boot issues if boot files or grub files are beyond a very old BIOS limit of 137GB.

Note that when I installed Mint 19 on sdb1 or on a separate disc (so there is only one Linux system present on each disc), it works fine. So, the problem is NOT with Mint 19, but with multiple Linux systems on the same disc.

It seems that it would be fairly simply for EasyBCD to allow a larger file length and/or use a later version of Grub4DOS which should fix this problem. Until it does, we have to use the Linux boot menu rather than the Windows boot menu.

Hi cdgoldin,
Apologies for not getting back to you sooner,

Yes, I agree completely it is a bit of a shame that this problem has not been addressed yet, but at the end of the day I think the issue is actually upstream of LinuxMint so I bet the same problem exists in Ubuntu, for now I have moved back to version 18.3 Cinnamon which works fine

[br1anstorm]

I believe the problem is that EasyBCD and/or Grub4DOS (which it uses) can't handle more than one Linux system on a volume, probably because a data field is too small.

....[edit].....

..... the problem is NOT with Mint 19, but with multiple Linux systems on the same disc.

I hesitate to post in this thread as I am still no expert in the mysteries of Grub. But I use EasyBCD, successfully, in a quad boot setup, so I am always interested in the experiences of others. The comment by cdgoldin quoted above caught my eye.

On my laptop I have Win7 (with its MBR intact) and I have Linux Mint 17.3, Linux Lite 2.6, and PCLinuxOS each with its own Grub, on separate partitions on the same hard drive. I also have a separate shared Data partition, but that's another story. I use EasyBCD to boot into whichever OS I wish to use.

So EasyBCD can handle more than one Linux system. But there is a caveat. As I found out, EasyBCD cannot handle more than one instance of Grub2. So I was able to install and boot Linux Mint (which uses Grub2) and PCLOS (which uses Grub Legacy) . But when I installed Linux Lite, EasyBCD could not "see" and boot into Lite (which also uses Grub 2).

With the help of goldfinger and austin.texas on the Linux Mint and Linux Lite forums, we found a workaround: basically to edit the (Mint) Grub2 so that it could also "see" Linux Lite, and thus boot into it. So the boot menu offered by EasyBCD offers i) Win7, ii) Mint or Lite, iii) PCLinuxOS. If I choose (ii), then the Grub2 menu gives the further option of Mint or Lite.

This is of course different from the OP's simple dual boot with Windows 10 and Mint. I can't comment on whether Win10 adds a further layer of complexity as I find Win10 (and UEFI) a total nightmare and am determined to stay away from it.

But my experience does suggest that the issue is not whether EasyBCD can work with more than one Linux OS - it can, but that's not what the OP wants. The original problem seems to be that EasyBCD works with the Grub2 of Linux Mint 17, or 18, but for some reason doesn't work with Mint 19.

It would be interesting to know the reason, because sooner or later I may want to move to Mint 19. Right now I'm holding back, as it does seem that people are having difficulties with various aspects of Mint 19's installation or configuration, perhaps especially in dual-boot setups.

[edjon2000]

Hi brianstorm,

Interesting comment, I too in the past tried multiple versions of Linux on the same HDD in separate partitions I think at one time I had Mint, Ubuntu, Fedora, was building a Gentoo linux installation( just to see if I could put together a Gentoo installation ) and everything worked together along with Windows 2000 on a separate HDD using Easy BCD, for the most part recently, have just been running various versions of windows dual booting with various versions of Mint without any kind of issue up to Mint 19 where it is looking more and more like the version of GRUB being used, right now I have gone back to Mint 18.3/Windows 10(non-uefi) with easyBCD and everything is ticking along nicely.

[Rocket_Raccoon]

Installed Mint 19 to seperate ssd with win 7 and 10 on each own ssd. Mint 19 only started grub command line with easy bcd. Tried every command line or solution on forums and internet. Solved issue with one simple solution: turn out my easy bcd was outdated (version 2.3); downloaded latest version of easy bcd from homepage (version 2.4), deleted linux mint entry in boot menu, added new boot entry linux with finding grub 2 automatically, rebooted and grub menu started with options to boot linux mint 19 or windows and linux mint 19 in 3-5 seconds on desktop.

[beachgardener]

Thank you very much for his, I'm so pleased, it seems all is fixed in version 2.4 of easybcd, fantastic

[edjon2000]

Apologies for the very late reply

That's great to know thank you