Arch Linux

Greed1sGood

Member

Registered: 2012-02-11

Posts: 44

[SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

I've already spend a more than a whole day trying to install archlinux using a live usb on the following system:

Thinkpad t420s (UEFI supported)
*ocz nocti 30gb ssd (msata) <---- (\boot, root and \home are mounted here)
*hitachi 320gb hdd (sata) (\var and data)
* 8gb ram (x2 dims)

1. Partitoned and aligned the ssd drive using gdisk (GPT) as follows:
    *100 MiB - boot partition
    *16GiB    - root partition
    * the rest is for /home
I've decided to use syslinux as the bootloader so I've changed the boot partition attribute to "Legacy boot partition" (as noted in the wiki) .
The installation went without any errors until the bootloader installation phase, where it gives me the following error: "Failde to set boot flag(s)". I then exited the installer, updated pacman and tried to manually install syslinux as described in the wiki, but got the same error. After a rebbot the pc just moves to the next boot device without booting from the ssd.

I've also tried to use GRUB2, but couldn't boot to arch either. I've also found a thread with a similar problem: [SOLVED] syslinux-install_update -a failed, err3. but the guy ended up resorting to just using fdisk.

Thanks

Last edited by Greed1sGood (2012-02-15 16:33:19)

/dev/zero

Member

From: Melbourne, Australia

Registered: 2011-10-20

Posts: 1,247

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

What was the problem when you tried Grub 2? Certainly not the same error message, which I think is specific to syslinux.

Greed1sGood

Member

Registered: 2012-02-11

Posts: 44

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

Unfortunately I don't remember (it was very late at night) I'll try to repartition and install grub2 again, and report back.

Greed1sGood

Member

Registered: 2012-02-11

Posts: 44

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

Ok I'm back. After I exit the arch installer and try to install grub2 manually following the instructions on wiki I get the following errors:

error: could not determine filesystem mount points
error: not enough free disk space
error: failed to commit transaction (unexpected error)
Errors occured, no packages were upgraded.

Greed1sGood

Member

Registered: 2012-02-11

Posts: 44

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

Ok this is getting ridiculous, isn't there a structured way of getting archlinux to boot on this standard configuration (GPT+SSD). I've already followed all the guides on wiki without success. I'm sure there are forum members with a similar configuration as mine that succeeded in installing and booting into arch.

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

lilsirecho

Veteran

Registered: 2003-10-24

Posts: 5,000

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

Partitioned boot may be your problem with grub2 which is not implemented except by special procedure and is frowned on by the arch dev's.

If you get it going, be sure to outline the method....

Good luck.

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/dev/zero

Member

From: Melbourne, Australia

Registered: 2011-10-20

Posts: 1,247

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

I think this is the same problem I had, a few months ago.

If you're using a GUID Partition Table (GPT) instead of MBR, you need to allow an extra 1 or 2 MB at the start of your drive for the BIOS Boot Partition. IIRC, you also need to take care to ensure partitions line up with disk sectors. I can't remember the exact procedure I used, but it just took a bit of stfw and experimentation.

Greed1sGood

Member

Registered: 2012-02-11

Posts: 44

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

If you're using a GUID Partition Table (GPT) instead of MBR, you need to allow an extra 1 or 2 MB at the start of your drive for the BIOS Boot Partition. IIRC, you also need to take care to ensure partitions line up with disk sectors. I can't remember the exact procedure I used, but it just took a bit of stfw and experimentation.

I forgot to mention that i already did that. I've also read that this is necessary for bios systems, UEFI systems can do without it. Anyway I created a bootable usb with archboot and booted in UEFI mode only, installed grub2_uefi_x86_64bit. For some unknown reason I was thrown 2 times into the bootloader installation, anyway I've ended up with these entries in my bios. None of them is bootable, so I conclude that the bootloader was not installed successfully although it said it did after I finished installing grub2.

Last edited by Greed1sGood (2012-02-11 20:42:31)

cfr

Member

From: Cymru

Registered: 2011-11-27

Posts: 7,132

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

When you say "none of them is bootable", what happens exactly?

What UEFI/BIOS firmware version do you have?

Are you trying to boot in bios or uefi mode? If the latter, you need an EFI partition which you don't mention creating.

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Greed1sGood

Member

Registered: 2012-02-11

Posts: 44

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

"none of them is bootable" - when I choose one of them and click "enter" the bios screen just flashes and nothing happens.

UEFI bios version - 8CET51WW (1.31)
UEFI bios date - 2011-11-29

I've created the EFI partition as outlined in the wiki.

Greed1sGood

Member

Registered: 2012-02-11

Posts: 44

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

I've used a script (a modified arch by hand script created by "altercation") by beta990   that can be found in the following thread https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php … 4#p1041884 and it worked, although I've got a redundant entry in my bios now and some errors reported by arch. Anyway I've redirected the script output to a file, so if anyone is interested I can post the log. I hope it will be helpful to people with similar configuration to mine.

p.s.
Should have said it in the first post: I've started using Linux just a few days ago so maybe, things that seem obvious to some people here are not so obvious to me.

daedhel

Member

From: Québec, Canada

Registered: 2009-01-17

Posts: 40

Website

Re: [SOLVED] can't boot into arch after installation

I also have a Thinkpad T420i and I have never been able to boot either the UEFI not the normal Grub partition from it.

There must be somehting wrong with the bios of the new Thinkpads.

I have read a lot of recent posts and wikis about this lately and haven't found a solution yet.