[SOLVED] Sudden failure to boot into any of the boot partitions

rnturn · 02-05-2020, 07:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by coderlen

Overnight, after having worked successfully the previous day, I get this when turning on the laptop:

Yikes! You have a full-evening's activities ahead of you. This is why I never want to dual boot with Windows ever again. Virtual machine? Sure.

Quote:

The "code" tags go in "[" and "]" not "<" and ">".

Cheers...

coderlen · 02-05-2020, 10:32 PM

colorpurple, I am not afraid to format partitions, copy Windows files, perform final boot repair of Windows, reinstall the boot loader, or anything else required. But, I don't know how to do it. Can you please give me step-by-step directions, or, point me to a website which will tell me exactly what to do? Thanks.

yancek, I will keep your comments in mind when I have gotten Windows and Ubuntu up and running. Thanks.

colorpurple21859 · 02-06-2020, 05:59 AM

according to your info-text you have mint installed on sda5 and sda6
and ubuntu on sda7. both mint and ubuntu grub bootloader is setup to boot in cms mode, but should be using efi mode. Disable csm and secureboot in bios
gparted from a live usb is a good graphical tool for editing partitions
https://www.lifewire.com/use-gparted...-drive-2205693
You will need to format the efi partition sda1 to fat32
to fix windows booting http://woshub.com/how-to-repair-dele...-in-windows-7/

How to reinstall grub https://linuxsuperuser.com/reinstall...loader-ubuntu/ You only need to reinstall grub for either ubuntu or mint to get a working grub bootloader using the live usb. The sda2 in the link will be sda 6 7 or 8.

coderlen · 02-09-2020, 08:36 PM

Wow. I had a lot of trouble trying to save my partitions and get the laptop working again. I tried for a couple of days with all your suggestions, I just couldn't get it to happen.

So instead, I decided to just install Windows, and then Ubuntu. The Windows install worked just fine.

Then I did something stupid. I installed Ubuntu 19.10 right on top of the Windows installation, in the same partition. Crazy. But then something fascinating happened: I could not get into the BIOS, and the computer just wouldn't boot into any OS at all. It kept saying something like "Insert a valid boot device", but no USB would boot.

I surmised that I must have really confused the BIOS when I overlaid Ubuntu on top of Windows, as it couldn't find the hard disk. So I took the laptop apart, disconnected the hard drive, and rebooted the computer. THEN I could get into the BIOS. I set the options to make sure that I could boot into a USB, and then I reattached the hard drive. Problem solved.

So then I installed Windows again, worked fine.

Then I went into Windows and used diskmgmt.msc to shrink Windows and allow enough space for Ubuntu.

My install of Ubuntu was the Beta version, 19.10. It ended up on a teeny partition for some reason, and it never really had enough space to work properly. I just left it where it was.

Then I used the stable Ubuntu 18.04 version, and it went into the ample unused area of the disk. That version works just fine, and I am very happy with it.

But then I checked on the Windows installation. It has disappeared. There are some remnants of it left, but it does not show up on my boot screen. The following two links show the current layout via GParted:

GParted Screen Print #1:
https://pasteboard.co/ITY3sFj.png

GParted Screen Print #2:
https://pasteboard.co/ITY4OC6.png

I'm not broken-hearted that Windows is not bootable, but it would be nice to get it back. Any suggestions? Can I just do a brand-new install, or will that mess things up? I tried to give Windows all the elbow room it likes to have. Thanks.

mrmazda · 02-09-2020, 11:29 PM

I never install Windows first on any system that will have Linux on it. It simply is not necessary if you plan for the inevitable. I plan ahead by doing 100% of the required partitioning, and most filesystem formatting, prior to beginning the first installation. All Linux installers I've used, and all Windows installers I can recall going back at least to XP, will accept admin/owner direction where to install and/or mount partitions. Their "partitioning" steps need not touch the actual partition tables, but merely format those partitions not prepared in advance, and know what you want mounted where. The result is operating systems don't get lost when others are added, and lost bootability, when it occurs, is infrequent, and easy to fix.

The sharing of EFI boot names is easily solved by customizing GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR= in /etc/default/grub. At first boot after the conclusion of each Linux installation, make that edit, then run grub-mkconfig to implement it. I comment out or noauto the ESP partition in the fstabs of those installations I don't want trying to usurp boot control from my selection, and I either don't have Grub installed on them at all, and/or I at least set GRUB_DISABLE_OS_PROBER="true" in each respective /etc/default/grub.

That was a good move to remove the disk to get into your BIOS. UEFI BIOS are a mess. Every one of them seems to have different foibles from any other any individual has experienced. I doubt their writers spend much time with multiboot installations or their consequent boot complications from adding, removing, and reinstalling. It infuriates me when I temporarily add or remove a drive that it thinks I want any temporary changes made to persist when the original configuration is restored. I've learned to use efibootmgr to delete all entries except those attributable to the OS I wish to be in control of booting, plus USB, OM, PXE, etc. as applicable.

mrmazda · 02-10-2020, 12:03 AM

If you install Windows first, and do not partition in advance, Windows will create a 100MB ESP partition. Linux installers typically complain about that ("small") size, and/or create an additional ESP partition that you do not want or need. If you fully partition in advance, including creation of a FAT32 partition of size 260MB or more for ESP, Linux installers will not complain, and Windows will not care about its size. My ESP partitions are all 320MB, and none of them as yet use more than about 3% of that with eight or so distros installed. IIRC, 260MB is the minimum required when a boot disk's physical and logical block size is 4k and its size is 16TB or more, so gross overkill with smaller disk sizes and/or the 512 byte physical and logical disk blocks used by SSDs.

yancek · 02-10-2020, 06:18 AM

Quote:

But then I checked on the Windows installation. It has disappeared. There are some remnants of it left, but it does not show up on my boot screen. The following two links show the current layout via GParted

I'm not sure where you get that from as it is obvious from the first link you posted that the windows partitions are taking up half the space on your drive. Note that sda2 is an EFI partition and that sda5 is a bios_grub partition. You have windows installed EFI on the GPT drive and Ubuntu installed in Legacy mode on the GPT drive. Installing windows in Legacy mode on a GPT drive apparently (from all I have read) is not possible while it is possible with Linux. My experience with this is that there is no way for a Legacy install of Grub to boot a windows EFI install, hence your problem. I have booted EFI installs of Linux on a separate drive from a Legacy install of Linux, doesn't work with windows.

Your options are to either convert Ubuntu to UEFI or reinstall it as UEFI. The link below is the official Ubuntu documentation on dual booting UEFI with windows and explains how to convert to UEFI (good luck!). I expect you would not have had these problems if you had come across this link before installing.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UEFI

colorpurple21859 · 02-10-2020, 09:31 AM

boot ubuntu,
sudo apt install grub-efi

Code:

mkdir /boot/efi
mount /dev/sdb1 /boot/efi
grub-install --target=x86_64-efi

You will get an error about nvram, but ignore
create a entry in your /etc/fstab for the efi partition

Code:

/dev/sdb1              /boot/efi             vfat              noauto,noatime             0    2

reboot go into firmware/bios boot menu, select boot from file, find the EFI/Ubuntu/grubx64.efi select and boot. Once booted back into ubuntu in efi mode rerun

Code:

 grub-install

coderlen · 02-11-2020, 02:06 AM

mrmazda and yancek, thanks for the information. I read everything, and now I am a better informed user of Linux. In short, I learned that I need to use UEFI.

colorpurple, thanks to you, my Windows installation is now working. But the Linux stopped working, probably because I didn't get all the way through your instructions. It's the last part that I'm having trouble understanding. I need you to explain to me what you mean by:

Quote:

reboot go into firmware/bios boot menu, select boot from file, find the EFI/Ubuntu/grubx64.efi select and boot.

I looked everywhere, I can't find how to select "EFI/Ubuntu/grubx64.efi". I'll wait for your response. Thanks so much.

colorpurple21859 · 02-11-2020, 05:02 AM

The same key you use to get to the boot menu where you select a usb to boot.
If you still don't have that option boot the live usb open a terminal
Make sure your booted in uefi mode

Code:

cat /sys/firmware/efi

will give you "this is a directory" if your in efi mode.

Code:

sudo mkdir /mnt/hd
sudo mount /dev/sda2 /mnt/hd
sudo mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/hd/boot/efi
sudo mount --bind /dev /mnt/hd/dev
sudo mount --bind /proc /mnt/hd/proc
sudo mount --bind /sys /mnt/hd/sys
sudo mount --bind /run /mnt/hd/run
sudo chroot /mnt/hd
grub-install
exit

reboot

coderlen · 02-11-2020, 11:07 PM

colorpurple, I am in a Catch 22 situation. The only way I can get the USB live Ubuntu to boot is if I go into the BIOS and change to CSM boot. But then I'm not in UEFI mode, so I can't execute your instructions. And of course, if I change the BIOS to boot as UEFI, I can't get the live Ubuntu USB to kick in.

The laptop has 2 USB 3.0 ports, and 1 USB 2.0 port. The reason I say this is that some people have been unable to boot when using 3.0 USB sticks in a 2.0 port. My USB stick is a Cruzer Glide 3.0, so it should be fine in my 3.0 port.

Perhaps you can help me figure out how to get out of this quandary. Thanks again for your support.

mrmazda · 02-11-2020, 11:22 PM

You should be able to boot EFI using the F12 key before POST completes. With CSM enabled in BIOS, all the PCs I've used present two devices per bootable device in the menu , one for the device's description alone, the other for the device's description plus UEFI prepended or appended. The F12 is not the universal menu key, so if you can't make it work, you might need to Google your particular Toshiba model for a different key, maybe F8 or F9 or F2 or F11.

coderlen · 02-12-2020, 12:23 PM

mrmazda, I tried every combination I could think of for F12, FnKey, WindowsKey, & AltKey. Also all combinations of those last 3 keys with F1 thru F11. Nothing takes me into the BIOS.

Now, only Ubuntu will boot, and Windows doesn't even appear as an option. I'll just be patient, because at least I can still function. If any of you have any other suggestions, I'm willing to listen. Thanks for your expert help.

colorpurple21859 · 02-12-2020, 02:00 PM

try holding down the delete key or enter key when you turn it on.

colorpurple21859 · 02-12-2020, 02:02 PM

Is the ubuntu usb 64 or 32bit and how did you put the iso onto the usb