Wait. XTreeGold?

Yep, it's what I used to use in the old DOS days, though I think it might have been XTreePro rather than 'gold'. Too long ago, can't remember for sure.

I've upgraded one Windoze 7, one Windoze 8.1, and did one full Windoze 10 install. All went without any real problems. Well, except for the fact that I had to purchase more RAM.

Yeah, it seems any one can upgrade a regularly used windows. There are some electronics packages that will not go in wine, and need a real windows. SoI don't use, but don't throw out any windows I get forced on me when I buy a laptop.

Windows does not like being archived for years on end, until I decide to keep it alive. I am like a newbie all over again with it.UEFI only adds trouble, because I have just disabled it.
I found a vbs script to get to the real product key on some forum, and will go after it. I am having trouble registering. It's of passing interest only now. My (UEFI disabled) box is set to remain 100% Linux ATM.

Not that you necessarily want to, but you can do EFI with Slackware. There's a couple of helpful threads in the Slackware-installation sub-forum if the docs haven't been updated. Haven't looked recently..

I think EFI is a vain attempt to make windows more secure, that causes huge problems. I cannot use a gpt disk on this box without automatically invokinhg it. I hope it will be seen as that and go away. Why should booting be such a PITA?

I use GPT disks and boot BIOS, in some cases you need to make your boot partition bootable on protective MBR to make it work, though.

I much prefer EFI. I think it's so much simpler, and easier than MBR, and recovery from crashes is so much easier, as well. I've never enjoyed playing with computers as much since EFI became the standard. Now SECURE BOOT, that's different, but EFI is IMO the best development in quite a long time.

For someone who started with LiLo as bootloader having a separate partition just for a bootloader seems like an overkill. BTW, I'm still using LiLo. It boots, what else do you need?

Also there is ELILO if one wants to use LILO with EFI.

Depends on theManufacturer. Samsung is awful. Sure, it stops boot viruses like Form & co. It doesn't stop you getting hacked, and certainly doesn't make booting any LESS complicated. I resent needless change in software. So when I see a big change coming, I look for WHY it was introduced. Efi was introduced because m$ systems are insecure.

Its bizzare that crippleware has become the de facto standard.

Yes, it's XTreeGold, at least that's the version I inherited. I was still using it until about two years ago in DOSBox, which I keep around for some proprietary reference materials and classic games. (It didn't survive the last upgrade, but I might still copy it across one of these days.) I had FreeDOS set to boot straight to XTree's built-in menu, and occasionally played around with it to remind myself what a file manager should look like. :D

Absolutely false. EFI was developed by Intel because current BIOS at the time of the Itanic were incapable of taking advantage of the Itanic's abilities. EFI was developed in order to be able to deploy servers that were able to fully utilize the Itanium capabilities (obviously not that it made a lick of difference given that years later the chips are commonly called Itanic).

OK, why must I have it as crippleware in a vastly oversized BIOS in this Samsung i3 (not itanium) laptop (not server)whose sole function in life seems to be to stop me booting anything that isn't m$?? What you say doesn't make sense. There's a bit missing.

The problem with (U)EFI is the 'Extensible' bit. Vendors still don't understand that just because they *can* doesn't mean that they *should*. The problem is not with the underlying technology, it's all those 'Marketing' types trying to find "innovative and exciting ways of leveraging UEFI in order to add to the value proposition and positively differentiate their product"(*). Sadly, "less is more" is lost on them.


(*) Yes, I know! Please shoot me now... No, on reflection I take that back... shoot them! ;)