Lenovo all-in-one not booting from ssd **Solved - sort of**

[ted_rmt]

UPDATE
This same Lenovo machine is now running the latest Lubuntu Bionic Beaver with no hardware changes. All UEFI options were turned off in BIOS before install. I let the installer set partitions automatically and install was fast and effortless.


I am trying to run Linux Mint 18.2 Cinnamon edition on a Lenovo M72z all-in-one pc, and cannot get it to boot from the hard drive.

I tested the live CD I used for the install before swapping out hard drives to the new SSD. It recognizes everything and the OS is running well.
Intalled a brand new Kingston 120 Gig ssd, rebooted the live cd and installed the OS with no errors.

Rebooting came up with an error stating that no OS was found.
I tried several changes to the BIOS, always with the same result.

Currently, I can hold F12 to enter a boot menu. The hard drive is listed and selectable (same result) so it is not a boot priority issue.

Running the live CD, I can access the SSD and see all the normal folders, including a boot folder with the kernel.

Using the Disks app, I can see that the ssd has been formatted with three partitions, including a FAT32 partition. Mounting that partition titled [AF5D-612F] and opening it in the file manager shows a folder called EFI with subfolder Ubuntu containing several .efi files, including grubx64.efi.

The second partition is formatted as ext4 and contains the /Boot folder.

In the BIOS, I have all security features turned off, including secure boot, and of course there is that annoying fact that I can run the same linux OS from the DVD ROM. I can also boot an older version of Puppy from USB.

So I have questions apart from the obvious, "Why doesn't it boot."
Are there older versions of a BIOS that do not recognize ext 4?
How do the .efi files work? Do they just keep multiple paths to whatever bootloader the system might recognise? Does it simply just redirect to the /boot folder in the second partition?

Looking at the EFI/ubuntu/grub.cfg file I see:

search.fs_uuid 6d3fb391-9b58-417c-9ce4-8445a574d837 root hd0,gpt2
set prefix=($root)'/boot/grub'
configfile $prefix/grub.cfg

My working theories, without really knowing how this works s that either my BIOS does not recognise UEFI and gets stopped, or it gets redirected to a partition it cannot read and gets stopped.
Will reinstalling with simpler partitioning and the older ext3 filesystem format  work?


I am looking for advice rather than just trial and error to save writing an entire OS to my SSD too many times.

[Jason]

Welcome to the forums, Ted!

Just to clarify, are you saying you cloned the previous hard drive install to a SSD drive or that you performed a fresh install of LM to the SSD?

Secure boot relies on EUFI so your computer must support it. But since the partitions were setup with EFI, you have to make sure you don't have it on legacy mode which wouldn't support EFI partitions. That should be in the setup screen somewhere. Not really sure if you need secure boot on or not. I'm thinking if you cloned this install from another PC that was setup in UEFI mode with Secure boot, you may need the same settings to get it to boot. It's worth trying unless you already have.

Ext4 shouldn't matter, that's not something that UEFI or a BIOS worries about or needs support for. That'd dependent on the boot loader, a Linux one, in this case which will have no trouble accessing that partition.

Don't worry about how many times you write to a SSD drive nowadays. With the TRIM command built into SSDs wear-leveling means drives will last probably 6 years or more. You'll likely need a new drive before then, anyway.

[ted_rmt]

Thank you, Jason.
To clarify, it is a fresh install of Linux Mint 18.2 Cinnamon 64 bit to a new SSD from a Live DVD that is running the OS beautifully on this machine.
I am running the Live CD now and I can read the drive.
I have installed linux on several machines over the years. Back in the day, I would have checked to see if the drive was still in slave mode and moved its jumper to master, but I take it that with SATA there are no such concerns

There are a number of settings I have tried changing in the BIOS, but in my attempts today, I have kept the boot mode constant with the UEFI setting.

Other settings:
CSM - if disabled, it grays out the boot mode options and the ssd does not appear as an option when I hit F12 to open the boot loader.
Quickboot- enabled or disabled gives same result

Under the security tab there is an option for Secure Boot and a TCG feature. Enabling them or disabling them does not seem to matter.

Under devices
Sata Controller- Enabled
Configure Sata as AHCI,  or IDE,  or IDE with Native Mode disabled - Tried all three and they made no difference.

I graphed my choices on a table and marked the result each time I failed, just in case there was a combination of settings that caused it to fail.
None of these settings has made a difference.

Previously, I had tried several changes, one at a time using the Legacy Boot mode option, but I was not as systematic as today. The boot mode options are UEFI, Legacy and Auto, but none of them work.

The Lenovo M72z shipped out with Win8.1 64 bit OS
The Exit menu includes options to set BIOS to factory defaults or an "OS optimized default" for windows 8. Staying away from that.

Tis M72z was refurbished to run Win 10 Home, which ran well when it wasn't updating or sending information back to the mother ship - which is to say almost never. The live DVD of Mint 18.2 continues to run well.

I may need to make a bootable flash drive with this OS on it. I have already booted puppy from USB on this machine. At least then I would have access to the DVD drive for music, then and I could save changes to Casper.

Anyway, it is good to hear about modern ssd's being more robust.
My concern now it that there is some other unknown, like there is some flaw on the SSD that I cannot detect which is crucial for the BIOS to start reading.

So the question now, do you think I should try to reinstall with simpler partitions? Try installing the same OS in its 32 bit version that will not add EFI folders? Remove the hard drive, format and test in another machine? Or is there some other tricky BIOS I might be overlooking?

[Jason]

So the question now, do you think I should try to reinstall with simpler partitions? Try installing the same OS in its 32 bit version that will not add EFI folders? Remove the hard drive, format and test in another machine? Or is there some other tricky BIOS I might be overlooking?

Sounds like you've been super thorough!

When you say that you tested the DVD before the install, I assume you mean you used the test option on the DVD boot menu? Is that correct? If you didn't run that test, make sure you do before proceeding.

I'd try re-installing LM on the same machine firstly. This time, keep it in legacy mode and it should try to put everything on one partition though you could make a separate /home partition if you like.

If it still doesn't boot, try the SSD in a different machine. If you're still having issues on another machine (even after doing a fresh install) take the SSD drive back.

[ted_rmt]

Bumping the thread for anyone who finds one of these machines and is considering it for a light Linux OS.

A friend told me he ran into UEFI problems with Linux Mint a while back and made no changes to hardware or BIOS, then installed Ubuntu Unity with no problems.

Note that the linux mint blog states that the 32 bit edition will not install with UEFI, but that 64 bit will.

[BrianP]

Did you try partitioning or initializing the ssd using MBR rather than GPT.?
This is an older machine. Also does it have a 32 or 64 bit cpu?

[cod3poet]

https://www.lenovo.com/ca/en/desktops/thinkcentre/m-series-all-in-ones/m72z/?gclid=CjwKCAjwxILdBRBqEiwAHL2R8125hffw9E8zaqWbo8oaa217sBL5WSLQjlrJHcR3QwxlBC-63w_6phoCV5AQAvD_BwE&cid=ca:sem|se|google|All_Products|NX_Lenovo_All_Products_DSA&s_kwcid=AL!4030!3!61944765458!b!!g!!&ef_id=Wz-_dgAAAGonuRCq:20180918210545:s

I assume a 64 bit CPU and considering the hardware Ubuntu Vs. Mint there is very little difference in performance between the two, other than the fact that one works, and the other does not.

If you are looking for a Mint-Like experience you can always swap out the display manager for something a little lighter. I am a huge fan of 18.04 and am excited to see the changes in 18.10.

From the looks if it that looks like a mighty fine machine you have there.

*waves* Hi by the way welcome to the Forums!