Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

rfg · 2012-11-06 05:39:23

I just felt that I should probably report this, or at least mention it to somebody... you know... just on the off chance that it isn't already common knowledge.

I just downloaded the 2012.11.01 ISO and the dd'ed it onto a couple of different USB flash drives I own. The other machines I have here seem to be entirely happy to boot from those, but when either USB flash drive is inserted into my HP 8530p while it is still in any of the BIOS setup screens, apparently, the very act of inserting the USB stick into the machine causes the whole machine to freeze up right where it is. If it was in the process of going to another screen, that stops, and the thing ceases entire to accept either keyboard input or mouse input. The only way to get it back is to power cycle. (Scratch that. Apparently Cntl-Alt-Del _does_ cause the thing to reboot when it gets in this state, but if I leave the ArchLinux install USB plugged in then the thing just freezes up again as soon as it gets to the first BIOS splash screen.

If anybody thinks that this is something that I should file a formal bug report on, let me know and I'll be happy to do so.

P.S. The machine in question... the HP 8530p... is not entirely broken when it comes to booting from a USB flash stick. I was actually able to get it to boot a FreeBSD install "memstick" image from a USB flash drive.

DSpider · 2012-11-06 10:19:54

Did you check if there's a BIOS update on hp's website?

Because I think the model is from 2009 or so. An update could be available.

Trilby · 2012-11-06 10:58:40

Funny that you mention this, I just had the exact same problem on an HP laptop - I just looked up that model number and it does look like the same one.

The BIOS menus had all the options to boot from a USB, but it froze whenever I tried to boot to the installation iso. I first thought the machine could actually boot to USB.

Later, however, I installed an arch system onto a USB and was able to boot to arch from the USB on that machine. So there is something specific to the combination of the laptop and the iso that leads to these symptoms.

If you are trying to install arch, you can install to a USB, and add the install-scripts package, then boot to that USB and install from there just like it were the installation iso.

rfg · 2012-11-06 11:28:52

Responding to DSpider...

Yes, I had an old and out-of-date BIOS.

Yes, it was a good suggestion that I should update it, and I thank you for that.

Yes, I just now re-flashed to the latest BIOS.

No, it apparently made no difference whatsoever to the problem.

(In fact, now that I think about it, although I have flashed/upgraded many many BIOSes in my lifetime, I cannot recall now a single occasion when doing so has _ever_ corrected any of the specific problems/bugs that were actually of concern TO ME. The Gods of BIOS are apparently always fixing OTHER PEOPLE's bugs.)

Responding to Trilby...

Your problem sounds a tiny bit different from mine. In my case, the machine does not freeze when I try to boot from the USB with the ArchLinux install ISO image on it. No no! It freezes even before I get the chance to ever try booting from that! It freezes the very second that I plug the USB stick in, even before I can make my way to the boot device selection menu.

Whatever is causing this, it is like the machine is alergic, quite specifically, to the current ArchLinux installation ISO, *but only* when it is on a UBS stick. (I checked, and I _can_ successfully boot the exact same ISO image on this same machine so long as I record it onto a CD and then boot from the CD. It just has a stroke and dies IMMEDIATELY when it sees the image on a USB stick.)

My best guess is that this problem is most probably related in some way to UEFI. (Apparently this laptop has UEFI.)

I read a little about thuis UEFI stuff, and I see that there are _supposedly_ ways to create ISOs for USB stacks that will be bootable on both UEFI and non-UEFI systems (and I gather that this is what ArchLinux has tried to do) but I think that perhaps all of the bugs have not quite been fully shaken out of this process just yet (and I suspect that my laptop's BIOS is looking for a traditional partition table on the USB stick, and getting horribly confused by what it finds whatever is actually there instead).

Personally, I never even knew that there was such a thing as UEFI until a day or two ago. I don't know anything about it, but I already don't like it. I'm conservative (in the original sense of the word) and I don't like change, particularly when it breaks things. If I could figure out a way to turn it off (on the laptop) and get to a normal/traditional BIOS, I would, in a heartbeat.

Trilby · 2012-11-06 11:59:08

rfg wrote:

Your problem sounds a tiny bit different from mine. In my case, the machine does not freeze when I try to boot from the USB with the ArchLinux install ISO image on it. No no! It freezes even before I get the chance to ever try booting from that! It freezes the very second that I plug the USB stick in, even before I can make my way to the boot device selection menu.

That sounds the same. The only way I could get to the boot options was to boot without the usb plugged in and hit the right key (was it F10) to open the BIOS options. I could then change the boot priority to boot first from usb/removable media.

But whenever I plugged the usb in it would completely freeze. If I powered on with the usb plugged in and with the bios boot priority set to favor the USB, it wouldn't get past the BIOS POST.

the.ridikulus.rat · 2012-11-06 13:10:06

@rfg: Just rename [USB]/EFI/boot/bootx64.efi and try booting from the USB again. Renaming the file will disable UEFI boot of the USB.

rfg · 2012-11-06 13:14:34

But whenever I plugged the usb in it would completely freeze.

I feel better already! At least now I know that it wasn't just me being delusional.

It would be Nice to see if anybody else out there has tried booting any recent ArchLinux release ISOs from USB on any other kinds of machines that have UEFI.

But I have no idea where to solicit for such folks.

rfg · 2012-11-06 13:47:36

Just rename [USB]/EFI/boot/bootx64.efi and try booting from the USB again. Renaming the file will disable UEFI boot of the USB.

If you could give me a clue or three on how to accomplish what you just said, I sure would appreciate it. Please undersand that it has been years since I last used Linux.

I took the (failing) USB stick and booted my other laptop from it and got to the shell prompt. Then I found the location of the file you said I should rename, and I cd'ed into the containing directory and then tried:

mv bootx64.efi foobar

but that failed, because apparently, at that moment, the file in question was on a read-only file system.

I tried just remounting the FS in question read/write, but apparently I don't how hot to do that anymore in Linux, if I ever did.

(I am somewhat handicapped because I don't actually have any flavor of Linux actually installed on anything here just yet. I just have the install ISOs on two USB flash drives and one CD.

Trilby · 2012-11-06 20:28:39

Not a solution, but the read-only problem is because it is an iso. Iso images can not be modified - at least not trivially.

I've never tried it yet, but the installation page has information on network booting ... which frankly seems a bit like the waving of a big magic wand at this point in my (lack-of-)understanding, but it may be an option worth checking out.

Alternately, if you have any computer that can boot from the current iso, you can install a base arch system onto a different usb (actual install treating the new usb as the target drive, not copy the iso), then you could boot that new usb in the HP and install to the HDD from within that running environment. It's a big extra step, but then you have a full live and modifiable system on usb as a nice backup and you'll have gotten two run-throughs of the install procedure ... more opportunity to learn.

rfg · 2012-11-06 21:19:20

the read-only problem is because it is an iso. Iso images can not be modified

Yes, actually, I was aware of that. (But some "Live CD" systems read everything into R/W main memory before they really get rolling. Not this one, apparently.)

...you can install a base arch system onto a different usb...

That pre-supposes that I have another spare USB stick lying around.

Sigh.

It's OK. I do have an actual spare harddrive I can install ArchLinux on and then see if I can diddle the USB stick from that. And I shall, as soon as I can come up for air.

lobodo · 2012-11-08 08:09:44

I had a similar issue with the HP 8510w. I worked around it by manually selecting the boot device (F9?) and just before or after choosing for USB i inserted the usb-stick. I don't remember exactly because it's a couple of years ago.

rfg · 2012-11-08 10:58:39

I had a similar issue with the HP 8510w. I worked around it by manually selecting the boot device (F9?) and just before or after choosing for USB i inserted the usb-stick.

I can't do that. The problem is that a USB device does not even show up as an option in the F9 boot devices menu unless and until there is some sort of USB mass storage thing plugged in, and as I've mentioned, the very second that I plug in the USB stick with the latest Archlinux ISO on it, the machine freezes, so then I can't do anything.

I still need to try checking what happens when I diddle the bootx64.efi file. (I did not get time to check this yet today. Maybe tomorrow.) But I have some suspicion that it is not actually a UEFI problem anyway. Rather, I suspect that either the firmware on this machine is just really really buggy, or else (more likely) this has something to do with machine security. (The HP folks who implemented this laptop seem to have been VERY concerned about security, perhaps because this is billed as a "business class" laptop.)

Part of what makes me think this has got to be either a a BIOS firmware bug or else a deliberate security ``feature'' of the BIOS is that there is also very very peculiar behavior when it comes to booting this laptop from a bootable CD or DVD. If I have a bootable CD or DVD in the CD/DVD drive upon power-up, the machine also freezes. But if I take that out, power cycle the machine, then press F9 (for the boot devices menu) and *then* insert the bootable CD or DVD, *then* I can boot from that.

It seems like this may be to cater to (reasonable?) corporate paranoia. After all, if you have been away from your desk for awhile who knows what some Evil Doer might have put into your CD/DVD drive? You might power up without even knowing that there is anything in there at all, and thus become inadvertently pwned. But the way this machine works, you have to really think about it and be deliberate if you are going to boot from a DC or DVD.

Trilby · 2012-11-08 11:23:00

So ... if your goal is to install arch, have you considered just burning the iso to a CD?

DSpider · 2012-11-08 11:40:05

rfg wrote:

I just downloaded the 2012.11.01 ISO and the dd'ed it onto a couple of different USB flash drives I own.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UE … B_from_ISO

Note: dd'ing the ISO (isohybrid method) to the USB drive will not work for UEFI boot.

Edit: But then again, since it's from 2009... and UEFI wasn't really adopted since around 2010... I guess it either has an older implementation, or doesn't have one at all. Don't bother with it. Boot into BIOS compatibility mode and you should be fine.

Last edited by DSpider (2012-11-08 11:42:44)

brain0 · 2012-11-08 12:45:20

dd'ing the USB to the stick causes trouble with some BIOSes, due to the isohybrid method. You can try booting with pure syslinux: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/US … _USB_drive

rfg · 2012-11-09 06:45:11

So ... if your goal is to install arch, have you considered just burning the iso to a CD?

I guess that I should have been clearer.

Yes, I have no trouble working around the problem. However I felt some civic responsibility to report the issue, you know, so that the community would be aware of it, and my experience.

rfg · 2012-11-09 06:46:45

Boot into BIOS compatibility mode and you should be fine.

At the risk of looking like a total imbecile, I must ask: What is "BIOS compatibility mode" and how would one boot into it?

rfg · 2012-11-09 06:50:32

dd'ing the USB to the stick causes trouble with some BIOSes, due to the isohybrid method.

I'm sorry, could you elaborate on that a bit? What exactly is the issue?

P.S. I have a confession to make... I was using a FreeBSD system when I did the dd onto the USB thumb drive. Could this have caused some problem?

I guess that I was under the impression that blocks were blocks and the dd was dd, and that if one is just simply copying blocks verbatim (with dd) it should not matter whose dd one uses.

No?

DSpider · 2012-11-09 08:32:25

"BIOS compatibility mode" is what most (if not all) UEFI systems have. If you don't have a UEFI-capable motherboard, then you would be booting using a BIOS.

A hybrid ISO means that it has a CD/DVD partition table (ISO9660) with an EXT4 filesystem. This means that it can be either burned to a disc or directly written with dd and similar applications. Perhaps some BIOS systems may not like this very much and may refuse to boot if it's not a pure optical drive or a pure external device. Or it could mistake it for an external optical drive. But it's probably very rare, and may only happen if you have a buggy BIOS. I have never experienced issues using dd.

Try a different method:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/US … tion_Media

My favourite is Boot the entire ISO from RAM - which can work just as well on Linux by substituting the *.bat file with the instructions from here.

brain0 · 2012-11-09 10:24:28

rfg wrote:

dd'ing the USB to the stick causes trouble with some BIOSes, due to the isohybrid method.
I'm sorry, could you elaborate on that a bit? What exactly is the issue?

The ISO image is made with a program called 'isohybrid'. It takes a normal ISO (CD/DVD) image and adds a partition table that makes it look like a hard drive, thus you can dd it to a normal drive. However, the start of said partition is the sector that holds partition table, so it is not a valid partition table (fdisk will also complain). Most BIOSes will still boot it, and Linux properly mounts it, but there is no guarantee.

Thus, if you properly format your USB drive, extract the ISO to it, install the syslinux bootloader correctly and fix the configuration (as described in the wiki), it is much more likely to work well with any BIOS - but that is a bit more work than just running 'dd'. (BTW, this method has the advantage that you can keep using the USB drive for normal data storage, which you can't with the 'dd' method.)

Arch Linux

#1 2012-11-06 05:39:23

Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#2 2012-11-06 10:19:54

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#3 2012-11-06 10:58:40

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#4 2012-11-06 11:28:52

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#5 2012-11-06 11:59:08

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#6 2012-11-06 13:10:06

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#7 2012-11-06 13:14:34

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#8 2012-11-06 13:47:36

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#9 2012-11-06 20:28:39

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#10 2012-11-06 21:19:20

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#11 2012-11-08 08:09:44

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#12 2012-11-08 10:58:39

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#13 2012-11-08 11:23:00

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#14 2012-11-08 11:40:05

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#15 2012-11-08 12:45:20

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#16 2012-11-09 06:45:11

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#17 2012-11-09 06:46:45

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#18 2012-11-09 06:50:32

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#19 2012-11-09 08:32:25

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

#20 2012-11-09 10:24:28

Re: Boot ArchLinux 2012.11.01 on HP 8530p from USB stick -- no workie

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