system76 galago ultra pro uefi issues [SOLVED]

FSMaxB · 2013-10-18 23:51:50

I just got a System76 Galago Ultra Pro (which is a Clevo W740SU basically) and wanted to share my experience with UEFI on the device, so you won't go through the troubles I had.

Keep in mind: System76 doesn't officially support UEFI but the builtin firmware has partial support for it which can lead to confusion.

My first attempt to use UEFI didn't succeed very well because no system boots in UEFI mode but in the setup there's a button that allows you to get in the UEFI shell. So I made an EFI system partition installed a bootloader onto it and copied an UEFI shell onto it ( AUR: uefi-shell-svn the name has to be shellx64.efi on the root of the partition ). From the UEFI shell I could start the bootloader manually but changing the UEFI boot menu entries didn't have any effect because the boot menu built into the firmware doesn't support UEFI, so If you don't want to change the firmware you will have to use a BIOS boot partition with GPT or use a MBR partition table (another option would be to boot the system manually every time via the UEFI shell, wich isn't much fun).

Because I really wanted UEFI, I downloaded the firmware for the Clevo W740SU from here and flashed the firmware using FreeDOS from my USB-Stick. Now UEFI works fine. Keep in mind though that you can't boot non UEFI boot media without first switching it off in the setup and vice versa (in contrast to some firmwares that support both at the same time via boot menu selection).

I hope I could help anybody with this!

the.ridikulus.rat · 2013-10-22 05:31:07

FSMaxB wrote:

I just got a System76 Galago Ultra Pro (which is a Clevo W740SU basically) and wanted to share my experience with UEFI on the device, so you won't go through the troubles I had.
Keep in mind: System76 doesn't officially support UEFI but the builtin firmware has partial support for it which can lead to confusion.
My first attempt to use UEFI didn't succeed very well because no system boots in UEFI mode but in the setup there's a button that allows you to get in the UEFI shell. So I made an EFI system partition installed a bootloader onto it and copied an UEFI shell onto it ( AUR: uefi-shell-svn the name has to be shellx64.efi on the root of the partition ). From the UEFI shell I could start the bootloader manually but changing the UEFI boot menu entries didn't have any effect because the boot menu built into the firmware doesn't support UEFI, so If you don't want to change the firmware you will have to use a BIOS boot partition with GPT or use a MBR partition table (another option would be to boot the system manually every time via the UEFI shell, wich isn't much fun).
Because I really wanted UEFI, I downloaded the firmware for the Clevo W740SU from here and flashed the firmware using FreeDOS from my USB-Stick. Now UEFI works fine. Keep in mind though that you can't boot non UEFI boot media without first switching it off in the setup and vice versa (in contrast to some firmwares that support both at the same time via boot menu selection).
I hope I could help anybody with this!

@FSMaxB: Can you post this info in https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/HCL/Firmwares/UEFI ?

FSMaxB · 2013-10-22 13:42:54

@the.ridikulus.rat: did so, thanks for referring me to that wiki page

tdr4d2 · 2016-02-17 17:47:55

For anybody that ends up here, I just updated my Galago's firmware using the E0303.zip and B0305.zip (12/05/2014) packages, in that order, and am now able to utilize UEFI. Lost the pretty System76 BIOS logo image, however. ;-)

Last edited by tdr4d2 (2016-02-17 17:48:34)

djolk · 2016-04-13 04:05:52

I am not sure if this of interest, I have the exact (I believe so anyhow) same laptop, except I bought it through a wholesaler because I wanted to purchase in CAD and knew I did not want Ubuntu. It came with UEFI capable firmware, though it took me a long time to figure out I had to turn it on in the BIOS..

pablox · 2017-08-14 04:04:53

tdr4d2 wrote:

For anybody that ends up here, I just updated my Galago's firmware using the E0303.zip and B0305.zip (12/05/2014) packages, in that order, and am now able to utilize UEFI. Lost the pretty System76 BIOS logo image, however. ;-)

I have the same laptop a galago ultra pro built over a clevo w740su... I tried to follow your steps, but on the second one I get an error:

"Error 25: The host CPU does not have write access to the target flash area. To enable write access for this opertaion you must modify the descriptor setting to give host access to this region"

EDIT

Weird... I found a similar error on another forum, I ran meset.exe, the laptop shutted down, I tried again, and now I can enable UEFI from the menu (now it also appears Intel Rapid Start, but the Virtuialization Technology dissappeared... O.o).

Last edited by pablox (2017-08-14 04:26:15)

Arch Linux

#1 2013-10-18 23:51:50

system76 galago ultra pro uefi issues [SOLVED]

#2 2013-10-22 05:31:07

Re: system76 galago ultra pro uefi issues [SOLVED]

#3 2013-10-22 13:42:54

Re: system76 galago ultra pro uefi issues [SOLVED]

#4 2016-02-17 17:47:55

Re: system76 galago ultra pro uefi issues [SOLVED]

#5 2016-04-13 04:05:52

Re: system76 galago ultra pro uefi issues [SOLVED]

#6 2017-08-14 04:04:53

Re: system76 galago ultra pro uefi issues [SOLVED]

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