Attempting to install on an HP Stream netbook (problems dealing with EFI)
 

I'm not sure if this is a good idea but Slackware is familiar so I thought I'd give it a shot...

First I attempted with secure boot enabled, but the system complains that the image on the USB does not pass authentication. So I enabled legacy boot expecting to be able to install Slackware like normal but the installer is still enforcing EFI by telling me to create a 100MB EFI partition and installing ELILO. Regardless, once installed, whether legacy boot is enabled or not, the system says there is no bootable device.

And that's where I'm at.

According to this article 14.1 and onward support EFI booting by default, so maybe it's this netbook itself being pissy.

What do you guys think? Am I just doing something wrong during the installation? Or maybe this is not a good device for Slackware? Any help getting this installed would be awesome, but I'll take recs for other distros to try as well(except GalliumOS -- it has its own issues relating to the trackpad not working properly).

Apparently booting from the USB in UEFI mode was the default even with legacy mode enabled. So I could get around that and install Slackware normally by selecting the non-UEFI boot option in the boot menu. However it still says "No bootable device" after Slackware is installed.

Not familiar with your laptop. In my system there are two UEFI options - one to disable secure boot and another to enable legacy bios through CSM. Perhaps there's another option you have to disable or enable in your firmware?

First thing you have to do is to disable Secure Boot. Maybe this will help you, https://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c04784866.

I have disabled secure boot and enabled legacy(as I said in the original post). I can install Slackware like normal, but I still get this "No bootable device". In the firmware settings there are very few options, besides secure boot and legacy boot there are only options for network boot and boot order.

I've tried gpt and mbr partition tables. On mbr I gave the root partition a bootable flag just in case. Nothing wants to work.

have you tried with GRUB2?
it works on my laptop and my desktop with UEFI

I have never really used UEFI or GRUB so I suppose I'll have to do some research.

Right now I created a gpt table with a 100MB EFI partition, a small swap partition, and the rest for root. I'm doing the full Slackware install. I tried this previously and the install got so far and said that one of my partitions became full. Root is a 30GB partition so I guess it's the EFI partition becoming full? The installer recommended 100MB for EFI and that's what I did.

Also a weird thing with cgdisk: there's about 1M of free space above all the partitions in the list. Not sure why it's there or if I should do something with it or just ignore it.

EDIT: Well, damn it. Same result: "Boot Device Not Found -- Please install an operating system on your hard disk."

The boot manager is empty. Selecting Boot From EFI File shows an empty file manager. Does the problem lie with ELILO? Must I configure it manually?

Some firmwares (aka BIOSes) are pretty buggy when trying to boot non-Windows systems. Have you verified you're running the latest firmware from HP?

According to the HP product page there is no software at all. It doesn't list much for specs either. I'd like to know the exact make and model of the ethernet card in it, but can't seem to find it.

Edit: Nevermind lol I found the software and there is a BIOS update. Everything is an EXE file though

Many boises/EFI can be flashed with freedos on a stick.

During the partitioning section of the installation is the efi partition selected to be mounted at /boot/efi?

Some of the atom based netbooks require a goofy two grub boot. They seem to need both a 32 and 64 bit loader.

You disabled secure boot and then changed to legacy and ... did you install LILO? I would expect lilo to be used installed to the mbr

I don't know about that. Does setup do this automatically for you, because I don't see it as an option?

Yep I tried installing to the MBR as well as to root.

I feel like UEFI is the way to go.I've tried some other distros and they get along fine with it. I still haven't had a chance to try GRUB yet. I will update this topic as soon as I do.

Well, I did get GRUB installed using the following:

Now it boots up and I see "Welcome to GRUB" for a split second and then nothing but a blank screen. This netbook is a pain in the ass I tell you. So this thing can boot GRUB from the MBR, but not LILO("no bootable device")? Hmmm