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#1 2013-01-26 15:16:27

erro
Member
Registered: 2013-01-17
Posts: 9

Arch Linux on MacBook 7.1 bootloader problem

Hi,

I tried installing Arch Linux on a MacBook for a friend. However, I must have done something wrong.

I'm sure the problem lies somewhere related to UEFI, as this is the first time I try installing Arch on a MacBook or other UEFI-system.
I've tried several times, though what's described below is what I just tried.
I used gdisk for partitioning, and set up

/dev/sda1

as apple boot (first error?) and

/dev/sda2

as Linux filesystem and proceeded with

mkfs.ext4

on both partitions (second error?).
After that I mounted

/dev/sda2

to

/mnt

and

/dev/sda1

to

/mnt/boot/efi

and installed like I've always done, until I came to the bootloader. Tried Grub.

I ran

pacman -S grub-efi-x86_64 efibootmgr
grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/boot/efi --bootloader-id=arch_grub --recheck
cp /usr/share/locale/en\@quot/LC_MESSAGES/grub.mo /boot/grub/locale/en.mo

I'll add some images related to what I did after I installed GRUB.

img20130126154851.th.jpg

img20130126155344.th.jpg


I noticed the fstub for the boot partition was odd, related to second (?)error I guess.
All help appreciated

Last edited by erro (2013-01-26 21:07:42)

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#2 2013-01-26 15:22:18

erro
Member
Registered: 2013-01-17
Posts: 9

Re: Arch Linux on MacBook 7.1 bootloader problem

End result, no bootloader found.
img20130126155536.th.jpg

Last edited by erro (2013-01-26 15:22:37)

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#3 2013-01-26 18:15:34

srs5694
Member
From: Woonsocket, RI
Registered: 2012-11-06
Posts: 719
Website

Re: Arch Linux on MacBook 7.1 bootloader problem

Macs are weird. First, they aren't UEFI; they're EFI 1.x. (UEFI is EFI 2.x.) This isn't the root cause of your problem, though, just something to keep in the back of your head. The root cause of your problem is that efibootmgr won't work on Macs, because in its Infinite Wisdom, Apple decided to ditch the EFI standard when it comes to managing boot loaders, and instead use its own proprietary system.

The easiest way to install a boot loader on a Mac is to do so from OS X using the "bless" utility. Given the partition scheme you've described, it sounds like you may have completely removed OS X from your computer, or at the very least broken it to the extent that it won't work. This gives you two options:

  • Boot OS X from a removable disk. Something like an OS X installation disc should work. This will enable you to use "bless" to manage your boot loaders.

  • Boot Linux in EFI mode and use a stripped-down version of "bless" on it. It's part of the mactel-boot package. I think there's an Arch package for this, but I'm not positive of that.

There are various descriptions online of how to use "bless." The one for which I have a link is my own rEFInd documentation, in its manual OS X installation section; however, that's a "cookbook recipe" description that just presents a couple of example uses of "bless." You might want to try a Web search to find more detailed documentation. The Linux version is stripped-down and different, and I don't happen to know the details of how you'd use it.

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#4 2013-01-26 19:18:37

erro
Member
Registered: 2013-01-17
Posts: 9

Re: Arch Linux on MacBook 7.1 bootloader problem

I removed OS X from the system before installing Arch, I guess I shouldn't have done that.. I guess my friend has an OS X medium somewhere, I'll ask him later. However, I don't think he wants Arch anymore, probably due to my mistakes and hard time regarding his MacBook.
I thought it'd be straight forward, got Arch on all my computers and the raspberry. Darn those apples.

Consider this thread closed, thanks for your reply srs5694.

Edit: Typo

Last edited by erro (2013-01-26 19:19:03)

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#5 2013-01-26 19:30:20

jasonwryan
Anarchist
From: .nz
Registered: 2009-05-09
Posts: 30,424
Website

Re: Arch Linux on MacBook 7.1 bootloader problem

Please don't use [Closed] for threads; that is how we denote locked threads; it is sufficient to just leave it with the original title if it is not solved.


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