Solved: Linux Mint 13 Maya UEFI boot (with / and /home on LV)

[powerhouse32]

This is a little challenging. I'm trying to install Linux Mint 13 Maya using the UEFI or EFI boot loader, that is grub-efi. At the same time I want to install Linux Mint on LVM2 partitions like that:

Separate /dev/sda2 Linux partition for /boot
/ (root) is on a logical volume /dev/mapper/vol1-root using LVM
/home is on a logical volume /dev/mapper/vol1-home using LVM

I have a separate fat32 partition mounted on /boot/efi marked as EFI system on /dev/sda1

I've created a life USB stick with LM13 that boots as UEFI !

In the life system I install lvm2 and grub-efi to be able to format the disk (SSD) and prepare it for the installation.

I format the SSD like mentioned above and install Linux Mint 13. The installation works smooth and installs also onto the LVM partitions.

Since the installed initram filesystem doesn't support LVM I do the following:

Mount all the partitions (/, /boot, /boot/efi, and /home). Then I chroot to the installed system and mount the sys, proc, etc. partitions. After that I install lvm2 and grub-efi on the installed system, and perform grub-update and grub-install.

However, when I reboot I get a black screen asking me to insert a boot disk or media and reboot. In other words, it doesn't discover the /boot/efi/EFI/linuxmint/grubx64.efi file. It doesn't even reach grub.

To check that everything is OK, I downloaded the Fedora 17 DVD ISO, put it on a USB stick and installed it using the same partition theme mentioned above (including LVM). It boots perfectly and works fine. Unfortunately Fedora gives me fits with its user interface and I don't even want to consider it.

My ultimate goal is to get a Xen kernel with VGA passthrough to allow me to run Win 7 alongside Linux with Windows having direct access to the graphics adapter (this is a must for my applications).

So, I first need to solve the UEFI boot issue with LM13. Any ideas how to make that happen?

 

[powerhouse32]

I solved it!

If anyone is interested, let me know and I am happy to share a how-to I prepared. This is for Linux Mint 13 Maya 64 bit. Ubuntu, Fedora and some other distributions have installers that do the job for you (well, in most cases).

 

[mangine]

I solved it!

If anyone is interested, let me know and I am happy to share a how-to I prepared. This is for Linux Mint 13 Maya 64 bit. Ubuntu, Fedora and some other distributions have installers that do the job for you (well, in most cases).

Hello, yesterday I was trying to make this work too, but I couldn't, I will be very thankfull if you share your how-to. Thanks in advance.

 

[powerhouse32]

Hello, yesterday I was trying to make this work too, but I couldn't, I will be very thankfull if you share your how-to. Thanks in advance.

Ok, but first a word of caution: My know-how hasn't been confirmed yet. So if you are willing to try it it's on your own risk. In any case, the drive you install to will be wiped clean of all data. So backup any data you wish to retain.

Here is the link: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=46&t=107620

Go further down the first page and you will see it.

Important: Let me know how it works for you.

 

[powerhouse32]

For those interested in installing Linux Mint 13 with LVM on an MBR formatted disk (that is NOT using UEFI), have a look at this how-to I wrote: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=108442

LM13 comes with grub2 1.99 at the moment. There are some issues with this grub version with regard to UEFI boot. While I managed to install it with UEFI boot, I didn't manage to boot into a Xen dom0 that I installed subsequently. However, installing on an MBR disk works with Xen.

Unless there is a real need for UEFI boot, I suggest to use the old MBR method. I've read some comments on the Archlinux forum that grub2 2.x may solve the UEFI issues. But it's still not released (as stable) for LM13.

 

[powerhouse32]

Hello, yesterday I was trying to make this work too, but I couldn't, I will be very thankfull if you share your how-to. Thanks in advance.

Did it work for you?