[SOLVED] boot setup for Slackware on HP laptop

BW-userx · 02-04-2019, 10:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rdx

I chose GPT simply b/c it was first. Last time I did an istall it was 14.2 on a Dell desktop and it used GRUB but that option did not present itself during the setup. I do installs so rarely that I forget how between. If I am going to have to start over and reinstall, I want to know it now, before I add any more apps. I have BIOS set for UEFI but that doesn't work any better than Legacy.

One bright spot here: when I shut the system down, it remembers where I was so rebooting isn't the issue it would be on a desktop. I can boot up to the initial login prompt, close the lid and when I come back, still have that screen waiting for me.

lilo-efi is the trick for slack and uefi booting if you are going to stick with gpt partition table. this you'll have to have others that use slack uefi booting using lilo-efi to rely on, I do not use it.

to me being that your hdd is only 1tb you can still get away with mbr booting, I'd use a live usb distro and partition table msdos and set your BIOS back to legacy (i'd have to reboot and go into my BIOS to get the actual name it uses) nevertheless, this way you can just do the simple install defaul lilo to mbr and it should Outa better work.

grub is installed after you get your Slackware established with lilo, which is easy enough.

Code:

# grub-install /dev/sda
# grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

I had other linux distros installed before I install SLack so as I said I just skip installing lilo all together then boot into the other linux and updates its grub and it picks up slack then i reboot into slack and do the rest.

rdx · 02-04-2019, 01:09 PM

It is looking like I am going to have to reinstall and use another choice on type. Besides GPT there was DOS, Sun and IRIS(?) so I guess I'm going to have to go DOS so the Legacy boot will work.

WRT using cfdisk to make the partition bootable, apparently that doesn't work on mounted file systems because it is ignoring that command.

BW-userx · 02-04-2019, 01:25 PM

dos is what you're looking for, to get mbr bootable. It needs to be unmouted to do that. you might be able to unmout it using slack dvd install usb stick. at the prompt before issuing cfdisk issue an unmount to the drive, should be umount /dev/sda then see if that works then save/write to it, me if it takes I'd just reboot but maybe remounting might work too, I've never had to change the partition table like that before.

that just seems the logical way for trying to do it. else get a distro live usb boot, with gparted then the partition tabe is 'msdos' using gparted.

camorri · 02-04-2019, 01:59 PM

If there is a GPT partition, there are two partition tables, both have to be removed. See this link for a how to.

-->http://blog.gnub.net/2009/03/die-gpt-die.html

There are others, duckduckgo turns up a few.

rdx · 02-04-2019, 06:55 PM

I have now reinstalled, set the label to DOS (no more GPT), put LiLO in the MBR, set the partition to "bootable" (an option not available under GPT, mounted or not) and the system booted right up without any problme. Thank you all for your helpful advice and comments.