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Hello together,
I've bought a new Dell 6430u some days ago and wanted to install Arch on it.
It was my first installation on a computer with UEFI (and GPT), so i followed the wiki closely. Everything went fine, I was even able to dual boot (Windows 8), but then I realized that I forgot to set up seperate partitions for /home and /var, like I wanted to. I started off with a new installation, editing the GPT and creating new filesystems on the new partitions. In the process of installation I did everything exactly the way I did it the first time, but I forgot the Multiboot-part of the GRUB article.
I rebooted and... it didn't get any further then the "Dell"-logo. I can't even get access to the setup or boot menu anymore!
I would really appreciate any help.
Last edited by WeeMan (2013-06-21 09:22:58)
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Using another computer, try preparing a USB flash drive or CD-R with rEFInd. (There are download links for both USB flash drive and CD-R image files on the linked-to page.) With any luck, your computer will boot to the USB flash drive even if it's failing to boot from your hard disk, and you'll then be able to use rEFInd to launch a shell and/or launch an OS boot loader.
If that fails, try disconnecting the hard disk from the computer and boot without it. With any luck that will let you get into the firmware, or it will cause the firmware to forget any boot entries that are causing it to choke. If you're successful, you may then be able to reconnect the disk and boot. If the computer starts hanging again at that point, perhaps you'll be able to plug the disk into another computer and erase the files on its EFI System Partition (ESP).
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Thank you! Disconnecting the hard drive did the trick. I was able to get into the setup and load the default configuration. But now I'm only able to boot into Windows (which doesn't let me log in because of an error with the TPM-module) and booting Arch requires my USB flash drive with rEFInd.
Thank you for your help in this matter.
EDIT: Windows just doesn't let me log in with my fingerprint anymore
Last edited by WeeMan (2013-06-15 15:26:09)
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You can try to boot windows in safe mode and fix your windows login (e.g. removing fingerprint software) . If it will help install arch again carefully.
If restore will fail you have another one options: disable Secure Boot and UEFI in bios, download windows installation and install it in usual way, activate it with your key that should be sticked (I think it is legal since you paid for this key when bought laptop) and finally install arch without uefi crap.
Anyway it worth to make your harddrive backup image right now.
P.S.
What about full system restore? This option should be included in your bios
Last edited by chord (2013-06-15 15:52:20)
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I tried to restore the system using "Dell Backup and Recovery" (I did not find any restore-option in the BIOS), but it just gave me a new Windows 8 installation.
Any idea how I could fix the (UEFI) boot loader so I can dual boot again? There is a fresh Arch installation on sda7/8.
Thank you in advance.
EDIT: Or does anyone know how I can factory-reset the ESP?
Last edited by WeeMan (2013-06-16 11:51:46)
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But now I'm only able to boot into Windows (which doesn't let me log in because of an error with the TPM-module) and booting Arch requires my USB flash drive with rEFInd.
You should be able to install rEFInd from Linux, as per the rEFInd documentation. (Note, however, that Arch's rEFInd package is missing the install.sh script, or was the last time I checked.)
Or does anyone know how I can factory-reset the ESP?
The ESP is just a partition. You can completely erase it by removing all the files it contains, but as delivered from the factory, the ESP normally contains enough files to boot Windows. There's really no way to do a "factory reset" on it except by running whatever system-restore tools the manufacturer provides, and those tend to wipe everything. If you had the foresight to make a backup of the ESP before doing anything else, though, you could restore it using that backup.
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I'm just trying to get things clean again, so wiping everything would not be a problem, but the only system-restore tool from Dell i found did just clean up the Windows installation.
I just reinstalled Windows 8, but it did not effect the ESP (there ist still the /EFI/arch_grub dir on it).
If I want to reinstall Arch now, is it an option to just delete that dir and re-create it in the process of installing grub? My only goal ist to get my Laptop booting to grub with a multi-boot option, like it was before I decided to delete and re-install Arch the first time.
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Removing or erasing the ESP will prevent any disk-based OS from booting. If you've got an external restore medium, you could delete the ESP and then use the external medium to re-install everything. That's probably overkill, though. The boot loaders on the ESP all have .efi extensions or are Linux kernels, so tracking them down and removing them piecemeal is easy enough to do.
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Thank you for your help.
I just reinstalled Arch, but I'm still not able to boot into grub. The problem is that there's no UEFI-Boot-entry for "EFI/arch_grub/grubx64.efi" and I'm not able to create one manualy (using efibootmgr).
EDIT: If I enter the UEFI Shell (v1 & v2) (from the Arch USB device), it tells me that there is no command called "bcfg" (UEFI Firmware Version is 2.31).
So installing rEFInd instead of GRUB doesn't seem to be an option to solve this.
Last edited by WeeMan (2013-06-20 09:38:02)
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The version 2 shell should definitely have a "bcfg" command. If you don't have that command, then chances are you've accidentally booted into a version 1 shell. I recommend you try again, starting with downloading the correct shell. If nothing else, try the latest version (0.6.12) on the rEFInd CD-R or USB flash drive. Those versions include a version 2 shell binary (at least, for x86-64 systems) that includes the "bcfg" command.
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It's working!
Turns out that I entered "bfcg" instead of "bcfg"...
I really have to thank you for your help with my first installation on a UEFI system!
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Hi,
I'm happy to read that you solved your problem, by the way I'm writing here for another reason : we've bought 4 of these laptops (6430u) and noticed that 2 of them are horribly noisy. I mean, the cpu fan starts working even if you don't do anything special and continue blowing for a long time. Did you noticed this kind of problem on your laptop ?
Thanks in advance
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Please excuse my late answer.
My 6430u is very silent and is only getting loud if I'm compiling something.
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