Windows borked on my dual boot Dell xps

[Jason]

Interesting. Is your drive an NVME SSD or a SATA SSD, Bill? I didn't think a NVME drive could boot in legacy mode.

There are drives now that won't boot in legacy mode? That makes me sad. What is the world coming to!!?!?!

[fox]

Fox, I am just grasping at straws here, for a way to solve your Windows boot problem.
Last evening you were able to boot from a different menu, into Win 10 or 11 and your Dell XPS was running on battery.
Maybe try running on battery at your home, instead of being powered by the power adapter, and see if you can still boot from a menu, into Win 10 or 11?

Whatever I did yesterday, I can't duplicate today, and I tried running on battery. What was weird yesterday was that when the Windows menu started, I got the more graphical Windows startup menu instead of the text-based BCDboot menu. I don't know what I did to get that, but it only happened once and after that I was able to boot Windows from the grub menu - again only once. Go figure!

[fox]

There are drives now that won't boot in legacy mode? That makes me sad. What is the world coming to!!?!?!

Apparently I was wrong. Bill has a NVME SSD in his Dell xps 13, and it boots in legacy mode. I think that's the key here - to get Windows and Ubuntu booting in legacy mode. I think if I could do that, the grub menu would start up Windows once again.

[fox]

I think I may have found the answer and if this is correct, it's not a good thing for dual booters on Dell computers. According to this post:

Class 3 Bios DOES NOT HAVE CSM and DOES NOT ALLOW windows XP/VISTA/7/8 or any 32 Bit software to be installed.

Does not Support GRUB or MSDOS or many thousands of versions of Linux or OS2 etc.

These systems past Skylake from 2016 are 64 bit only, Windows 10 only, UEFI only and GPT only.  There is no legacy or CSM or MBR booting EVER.

and

Intel  Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) mechanism with legacy CSM support as an additional option. Intel intends to remove legacy BIOS  CSM support from UEFI by Jan 2020.   This is also when WINDOWS 7 is totally end of life.

If true, Bill's xps might be Skylake or before, and mine might be after. Or alternatively, grub booting of Windows was supported in BIOS until the firmware update I did. Bill is more conservative about applying firmware updates, whereas I just apply them as they become available.

[Jason]

I find that comment very confusing. I'm not sure if the author is saying that 32-bit software isn't supported and neither is legacy booting or just that what he refers to applies to is only 32-bit OSes/software. In any case, where you got the firmware update should be a download for a previous or original version that you can restore to it.

I agree with Bill's opinion here - don't apply every firmware update that comes out. You're just asking for trouble. The exception is if the firmware update specifically addresses an issue you're having. Firmware is like the foundation of your house on a device. Updating it as you would software can introduce a whole world of pain, and not just what you've experienced. Should you make a slight mistake, you could brick your whole PC. Apply it when you need to; you don't have to have the latest firmware version.

[Jason]

Here's an article supporting the more conservative approach to updating firmware on devices:

"Whenever you see a firmware update for whatever electronic device youââ,¬â,,¢re using, always read the release notes thoroughly. This documentation is always provided and is usually on the same page where the download is, or as a PDF or some other web page describing whatââ,¬â,,¢s in that particular version. If you see nothing in there that fixes anything or adds in features, donââ,¬â,,¢t apply it, because having an update applied that breaks your stuff will ruin your day real quick. Every time it happens itââ,¬â,,¢s money wasted that you have to spend all over again." (Source: TechJunkie, "When should you update your firmware?")

As King would have said had he been a computer tech/geek today: "A firmware update if necessary, but not necessarily a firmware update."

[fox]

Hmm. Wish I had known that a few weeks ago. One of the reasons I applied it was because I was having trouble installing some of the Windows updates, but I never read the firmware description to know whether it addressed this. I had always figured that one should always update firmware in the same way as security updates.

So the question is whether I should try to downgrade my firmware, which I think I can on a Dell computer. Is there any potential downside to that?

[Jason]

I believe it's similar reasoning. To decide on a firmware update you look at its release notes to see if fixes a problem, usually with hardware. If it does, you decide if the problem you're having is tolerable because you may make the problem worse. If it's not tolerable, then you update it.

So now that you're considering restoring the original firmware, there are similar considerations. Check the release notes. Will it fix a problem or in this case did it introduce a problem? Can you tolerate the problem? If not, instead of downgrading, leave it alone. Otherwise, restore the firmware.

I can't remember if the firmware update was what caused your dual-boot issues or whether it was before that. If you can wait until later, I'll re-read your posts and see if I can make a suggestion.

[fox]

The dual boot issue occurred right after a firmware update. As I recall, I was running a Dell diagnostic tool and it noted that there were about 10 updates available, including the firmware. When I allowed it to install the updates, something failed, so I rebooted and installed the firmware update only. After that, I tried rebooting from the grub menu and that's when I discovered the problem. The reason I ran the Dell diagnostic tool was because a regular Windows update wouldn't install. I figured that maybe one of the Dell updates would fix the problem. It never occurred to me to read what changes the firmware update would make.

In summary, I can't say for sure that the firmware update caused the problem of booting Windows from the grub menu, only that the problem occurred right after the Dell firmware update was administered.

[fox]

I went to the Dell site and looked at the description for the firmware update (see attached). Earlier firmware versions are available on Dell's site.

Note that I actually bought a new (larger capacity) NVME SSD and am currently using it. There was nothing wrong with the older one other than it wouldn't boot Windows from the grub menu, even after a Windows reinstallation. I'm wondering what would happen if I put the old one back in, wipe it, and install Windows from scratch with the Dell image for my laptop instead of the Windows 10 image. Would it reinstall the old firmware along with that older image?

[Jason]

It mentions that when a firmware update with security updates is applied, you lost the ability to restore a previous version so that pretty much removes any decision on your part. But to be sure, you should look at the previous version you had.

But to answer your question anywhere, the firmware is in a chip on the motherboard. It's entirely separate from any peripherals like a drive so restoring a previous Dell drive image wouldn't put back the old firmware version. While there would be hardware support in that image for drivers, it doesn't affect the firmware which has support for hardware at a much more basic level.

On a positive note, security vulnerabilities are a good reason to apply firmware updates.

[fox]

It mentions that when a firmware update with security updates is applied, you lost the ability to restore a previous version so that pretty much removes any decision on your part. But to be sure, you should look at the previous version you had.
....

I didn't take it quite that way. What it says is once the firmware is upgraded to version 2.2 or later (which mine is), you can't downgrade it to version 2.1.2 or earlier. Looking on Dell's website for older firmware, there looks to be 11 firmware versions between my current version (2.16.2) and version 2.1.2, including the previous one: 2.15.0. The earliest firmware version shown for my model is 2.2.
-----

Your comment about the firmware being on a chip rather than the software does suggest that installing an earlier Dell installation image won't change anything substantially. Where it could potentially help is if a firmware downgrade restores the grub Windows boot but I'm still having problems with Windows updates. Even there, the problem looks less important given that an official version of Windows 11 will be available later this fall (October?).

[buster]

Fox, I assume you read in the Lancet Journal about the professor who disappeared for 3 days and he was finally found in the attic singing to himself and marking every surface with the letters GRUB. He was sedated and apparently a full recovery is expected.

About six years ago I was visited by an angel of the Lord, who spoke and said, "Be not afraid my little one. The Devil's minion Grub will never entrap thee. Get thee to a market of virtue and purchase a superior computer. I command thee never to co-mingle  with the temptress Grub. Install your Linux friends in Virtual, for Virtual is virtuous, and will never lead you to evil and despair. Hearken to my words."

And of course, I obeyed. Who is stupid enough to ignore an angel?

[Jason]

Install your Linux friends in Virtual, for Virtual is virtuous, and will never lead you to evil and despair. Hearken to my words."

A Windows update started this mess so, if anything, Fox would be better to run Windows in a VM, not the other way around.

[buster]

"Fox would be better to run Windows in a VM, not the other way around. "

Very good point. However, I've never managed to find a way to put a legitimate Win10 in virtual. And if you do buy a license, there's a good chance it will apply only to that virtual machine and be non-transferable. A number of people have asked me this.

Second, the laptop has a Win10 license already. Easy to start here.

Third, and I may be mistaken here, but wasn't the firmware update handled by Dell, rather than Microsoft?