[SOLVED] EFI partition too small; need an alternative

Kryzen · 2017-05-12 17:12:28

Hey guys,

So, a few weeks ago I got a new laptop, but unfortunately I haven't been able to dual boot Arch with Windows 10 yet. Here's the deal: I have an EFI partition (courtesy of Windows 10), but it's a little small. The Arch wiki mentioned something about having at least 512MB/1GB (not sure which one, but it doesn't matter) and it's currently at about 260MB. Anyway, resizing it proved to be a little difficult since there is a Windows Reserved Partition in the way and Gparted doesn't recognize its file system.

Several people have suggested not installing a bootloader at all, recreating the EFI partition, creating a second EFI partition, and several other things, but finding a way to install Arch without irreversibly damaging the Window installation would be fantastic. While the Wiki is absolutely amazing, unfortunately it doesn't say anything about what to do if your EFI partition is too small. And yes, I googled.

TL;DR: What I'd like to know is the following: if you have ever had the same issue (or if you've ever dreamed about having the same issue), how did you solve it?

Partitions
/dev/nvme0n1p1: EFI
/dev/nvme0n1p2: Microsoft Reserved Partition
/dev/nvme0n1p3: Microsoft Basic Data (C)
/dev/nvme0n1p4: Windows Recovery environment
/dev/nvme0n1p5: Microsoft basic data

Some more data that might be helpful
- UEFI system (obviously )
- Windows 10 pre-installed

If you need to know anything else, please do let me know. Any help would be most appreciated!

Regards,
Robert

Last edited by Kryzen (2017-05-26 14:31:46)

Ropid · 2017-05-12 17:17:18

Are you sure it's too small for you? I have two kernels and Microsoft's stuff in my EFI partition and this uses around 100MB.

Kryzen · 2017-05-12 17:30:52

Well, several months ago I had a boot partition that was only 1GB large and when I tried installing GRUB, it told me that there wasn't enough space, but now that you mention it, I wouldn't know if this applies to other boot loaders as well. 100MB should be perfectly possible, however. Could you tell me what boot loader you're using?

Trilby · 2017-05-12 17:32:22

I use systemd-boot. My (arch-only) system only uses 35M of the EFI partition.

I don't know how much space grub needs - but 1GB is *huge* for an efi partition. I suspect the previous error was misleading: something else was wrong, space wasn't the real problem.

tom.ty89 · 2017-05-13 19:27:34

[tom@localhost storage]$ du -d 1 -h EFI/ grub/
128K	EFI/BOOT
136K	EFI/
3.8M	grub/x86_64-efi
4.0M	grub/locale
3.0M	grub/themes
2.3M	grub/fonts
13M	grub/

And the 13M grub directory (and the kernels and initramfs images) does not have to be in the ESP either.

R00KIE · 2017-05-14 13:46:28

I'd say 260MB is more than enough for grub or whatever else you want it to be your bootloader, the kernel and initramfs images and the windows bootloader. I currently have grub setup for both bios and uefi boot and both stable and lts kernels with the respective initramfs images and all of that comes at around 95MiB.

Like Trilby says, the error about space is most probably about something else.

Kryzen · 2017-05-19 15:05:52

Sorry for the late reply. So the day before yesterday I've succeeded at installing Arch next to Windows. Although I was originally going to use systemd-boot as the bootloader, GRUB seemed a little more familiar so I ended up using that instead. 260MB was indeed enough and things worked out just fine.

Thanks for your help guys! After having used Windows for the past two months it's amazing to be back on Arch again.

Arch Linux

#1 2017-05-12 17:12:28

[SOLVED] EFI partition too small; need an alternative

#2 2017-05-12 17:17:18

Re: [SOLVED] EFI partition too small; need an alternative

#3 2017-05-12 17:30:52

Re: [SOLVED] EFI partition too small; need an alternative

#4 2017-05-12 17:32:22

Re: [SOLVED] EFI partition too small; need an alternative

#5 2017-05-13 19:27:34

Re: [SOLVED] EFI partition too small; need an alternative

#6 2017-05-14 13:46:28

Re: [SOLVED] EFI partition too small; need an alternative

#7 2017-05-19 15:05:52

Re: [SOLVED] EFI partition too small; need an alternative

Board footer