Cannot access 42.3

I have hung off on upgrading from 42.1 because of all the issues I had when I installed it but circumstances led me to bite the bullet and upgrade. I also wanted to update my windows 10 install on my dual boot. Windows 10 hadn’t updated in 18 months, but that is a different story.

I tried to do an upgrade of openSUSE from 42.1 to 42.3 and while it seemed to work grub didn’t, managed to get access but no Windows log in.

I have three HDs. 1 which was C and D, one which was openSUSE 42.1 and one which was completely NTFS as storage.

I deleted my C partition and all partitions on the openeSUSE drive, installed windows in EFI and let the installer do its thing into what used to be C. Windows installed and apparently OK. I then installed 42.3 and let the installer do its thing on the complete hard drive. Both installers set up different EFI partitions on each drive. 42.3 started as part of the install and apart from an issue with doubling up on icons seemed ok. I did an update and a reboot - straight into Windows, no menu, no choices. Checking bios and choosing opensuse secure boot did nothing. I have tried super grub 2 but can still cannot access 42.3.

If I could get it started at least I could try and see what is going on, but nothing I have tried will allow me access to 42.3. Fast boot is off.

Any ideas as to how to fix this would be gratefully received.

It might help if you can provide the output from:


parted -l

efibootmgr -v

Use code blocks around the output.

You should be able to boot into your install media in rescue mode, to run those commands.

If I were in your circumstances, I would first mount a Windows partition to “/mnt”.
And then:


cd /mnt
script
parted -l
efibootmgr -v
exit

Then, when you reboot into Windows, there should be a file named “typescript” in the partition that you mounted. And it will have the command output for posting.

Script started on Wed Nov 22 17:41:38 2017
1m31mrescue:/mnt #0;10m parted -l
Model: ATA HGST HTS541010A9 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 1000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    File system  Name  Flags
 1      1049kB  1000GB  1000GB  ntfs


Model: ATA WDC WD10EZEX-00K (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 1000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: msdos
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size   Type     File system  Flags
 1      1049kB  525MB   524MB  primary  ntfs         boot, type=07
 2      525MB   105GB   104GB  primary  ntfs         type=07
 3      105GB   1000GB  895GB  primary  ntfs         type=07


Model: ATA WDC WD10EZEX-00B (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdc: 1000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: msdos
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    Type      File system     Flags
 1      1049kB  1000GB  1000GB  extended                  lba, type=0f
 5      2097kB  165MB   163MB   logical   fat16           boot, type=83
 6      166MB   2319MB  2154MB  logical   linux-swap(v1)  type=82
 7      2320MB  45.3GB  43.0GB  logical   btrfs           type=83
 8      45.3GB  1000GB  955GB   logical   xfs             type=83

and

1m31mrescue:/mnt #0;10m efibootmgr -v
BootCurrent: 0005
Timeout: 1 seconds
BootOrder: 0000,0005,0002,0004,0003
Boot0000* opensuse-secureboot    HD(5,MBR,0x31a09,0x0,0x0)/File(\EFI\opensuse\shim.efi)
Boot0002* CD/DVD Drive     BBS(CDROM,,0x0)AMGOAMNO........o.A.T.A.P.I. . . .i.H.A.S.3.2.4. . . .B....................A...........................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.5.3.4.2.1.2. .9.6.2.1.8.8.4.0.5.5.0.6.3......AMBO
Boot0003  USB     BBS(USB,,0x0)AMGOAMNO........w.M.u.l.t.i. .F.l.a.s.h. .R.e.a.d.e.r. .1...0.0....................A.............................D..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.M.u.l.t.i. .F.l.a.s.h. .R.e.a.d.e.r. .1...0.0......AMBOAMNO........u.S.a.n.D.i.s.k. .C.r.u.z.e.r. .B.l.a.d.e. .1...2.6....................A.......................H..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.S.a.n.D.i.s.k. .C.r.u.z.e.r. .B.l.a.d.e. .1...2.6......AMBO
Boot0004* Hard Drive     BBS(HD,,0x0)AMGOAMNO........o.W.D.C. .W.D.1.0.E.Z.E.X.-.0.0.K.U.W.A.0....................A...........................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L. . . . .W. .-.D.C.W.1.C.5.S.6.4.2.4.3.8......AMBOAMNO........o.W.D.C. .W.D.1.0.E.Z.E.X.-.0.0.B.N.5.A.0....................A...........................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L. . . . .W. .-.D.C.W.3.C.E.F.K.P.5.A.C.N......AMBOAMNO........o.H.G.S.T. .H.T.S.5.4.1.0.1.0.A.9.E.6.8.0....................A...........................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L. . . . . . .D.J.0.1.8.0.C.C.A.0.6.K.V.R......AMBO
Boot0005* UEFI: SanDisk Cruzer Blade 1.26    PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x14,0x0)/USB(4,0)/HD(1,MBR,0x1b681c50,0x107c,0x1e84)AMBO

That looks weird.

There is no EFI partition shown on your hard drives. Yet “efibootmgr -v” shows a boot entry for “opensuse-secureboot” which would have to be in an EFI partition.

Is it possible that the EFI partition for booting openSUSE is actually on that Sandisk Cruzer USB? Can you boot openSUSE if that is plugged in?

I hadn’t thought of that but tried it and yes I can, I am now logged in here from 42.3. Interestingly when I F11’d on boot there were 2 entries for the Sandisk (which is what my 42.3 installation media is on) one for Sandisk UEFI and one without UEFI. The one with booted me straight into Windows the other got me here. A little strange, the installer did a bang up job of sticking the partition here.

If you can create an EFI partition somewhere, and mount it as “/boot/efi” (with an appropriate entry in “/etc/fstab”), then you can probably reinstall grub2 to boot from the hard drive.

The difficulty, though, is that your hard drives are mostly traditional MBR partitioned, where the EFI partition really needs to be on a GPT partitioned disk. Your first hard drive is GPT partitioned. But it seems to be totally in use, with no free space to add an EFI partition.

So I don’t really have a good suggestion.

If Windows is using Legacy booting (as it seems to be), then maybe you should just edit “/etc/fstab” to no longer mount the EFI partition (just comment out that line). Then use Yast bootloader to switch to “grub2” for booting (instead of “grub2-efi”). You will have to be careful to set the BIOS disk order, so that the MBR for the appropriate disk is used.

Or just keep it the way it is, and plug in that USB when you want to boot 42.3.

So, it is a bit of a dog’s breakfast. I really need to get this resolved once and for all as I am going to have the same issues the next time I update.

As the Windows and openSUSE installs were both clean installs I am thinking to nuke sdb and sdc, reformat them as gpt and start again. If the drives are gpt and I allow Windows then openSUSE to install as efi correctly it should fixed the issue in the correct way.

Can it be as straightforward as that or are there potholes I should be aware of?

That should do it and yes best to straighten it out now

I think that I am going around it circles with this. I did as I said above and windows installed. Installed 42.3 and it went OK, re boot and only 42.3 on boot menu. When I did an fdisk I got the following:

fdisk -l
Disk /dev/sdb: 931.5 GiB, 1000204886016 bytes, 1953525168 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x2c83e135

Device     Boot   Start        End    Sectors  Size Id Type
/dev/sdb1  *       2048    1026047    1024000  500M  7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sdb2       1026048 1953521663 1952495616  931G  7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT


Disk /dev/sda: 931.5 GiB, 1000204886016 bytes, 1953525168 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: B144976C-3784-4B3F-9075-FC412557400A

Device     Start        End    Sectors   Size Type
/dev/sda1   2048 1953523711 1953521664 931.5G Microsoft basic data


Disk /dev/sdc: 931.5 GiB, 1000204886016 bytes, 1953525168 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: 20A4D55C-F39D-4809-9E7A-F8830A35E827

Device        Start        End    Sectors   Size Type
/dev/sdc1      2048     321535     319488   156M EFI System
/dev/sdc2    321536    4530175    4208640     2G Microsoft basic data
/dev/sdc3   4530176   88422399   83892224    40G Microsoft basic data
/dev/sdc4  88422400 1953523711 1865101312 889.4G Microsoft basic data

sdb is where windows is installed, sdc for openSUSE. I am not convinced that Windows set up and loaded itself into UEFI, even thought I changed both drives to gpt. That being the case, I still have a mixed system and grub2 cannot find windows.

When I did a parted -l I got this for sdb (windows)

parted -l
Model: ATA HGST HTS541010A9 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 1000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    File system  Name  Flags
 1      1049kB  1000GB  1000GB  ntfs


Warning: /dev/sdb contains GPT signatures, indicating that it has a GPT table.
However, it does not have a valid fake msdos partition table, as it should.
Perhaps it was corrupted -- possibly by a program that doesn't understand GPT
partition tables.  Or perhaps you deleted the GPT table, and are now using an
msdos partition table.  Is this a GPT partition table?
Yes/No? y                                                                 
Model: ATA WDC WD10EZEX-00K (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 1000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags: pmbr_boot

Number  Start  End  Size  File system  Name  Flags


Model: ATA WDC WD10EZEX-00B (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdc: 1000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    File system     Name     Flags
 1      1049kB  165MB   164MB   fat16           primary  boot
 2      165MB   2319MB  2155MB  linux-swap(v1)  primary
 3      2319MB  45.3GB  43.0GB  btrfs           primary
 4      45.3GB  1000GB  955GB   xfs             primary

Given that I am guessing that something went horribly wrong with the windows install, if so how to fix it? . I am happy to repeat the whole process, again, but any ideas what may have cause this and what I can do to ensure it doesn’t happen again?

Just to round out what I did last time this is what I got for efibootmgr -v

efibootmgr -v
BootCurrent: 0000
Timeout: 1 seconds
BootOrder: 0000,0002,0004,0003
Boot0000* opensuse-secureboot   HD(1,GPT,db4f71a5-ff8f-4eea-a36e-779d83990822,0x800,0x4e000)/File(\EFI\opensuse\shim.efi)
Boot0002* CD/DVD Drive  BBS(CDROM,,0x0)AMGOAMNO........o.A.T.A.P.I. . . .i.H.A.S.3.2.4. . . .B....................A...........................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.5.3.4.2.1.2. .9.6.2.1.8.8.4.0.5.5.0.6.3......AMBO
Boot0003  USB   BBS(USB,,0x0)AMGOAMNO........w.M.u.l.t.i. .F.l.a.s.h. .R.e.a.d.e.r. .1...0.0....................A.............................D..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.M.u.l.t.i. .F.l.a.s.h. .R.e.a.d.e.r. .1...0.0......AMBOAMNO........m.W.D. .E.l.e.m.e.n.t.s. .1.0.2.3. .2.0.0.5....................A.......................@..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.W.D. .E.l.e.m.e.n.t.s. .1.0.2.3. .2.0.0.5......AMBO
Boot0004* Hard Drive    BBS(HD,,0x0)AMGOAMNO........o.W.D.C. .W.D.1.0.E.Z.E.X.-.0.0.K.U.W.A.0....................A...........................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L. . . . .W. .-.D.C.W.1.C.5.S.6.4.2.4.3.8......AMBOAMNO........o.W.D.C. .W.D.1.0.E.Z.E.X.-.0.0.B.N.5.A.0....................A...........................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L. . . . .W. .-.D.C.W.3.C.E.F.K.P.5.A.C.N......AMBOAMNO........o.H.G.S.T. .H.T.S.5.4.1.0.1.0.A.9.E.6.8.0....................A...........................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L. . . . . . .D.J.0.1.8.0.C.C.A.0.6.K.V.R......AMBO

Look in /boot/efi and see if there is a directory for MS boot

Yes there is.

But, I think that I figured out my mistake with Windows install, I didn’t realise that on booting (to do a MS install) one has to F11 and then specifically choose to boot the install media in UEFI mode - ie there is 2 entries, 1 UEFI and one not. Once I realised that I redid the MS install and it seemed to go as advertised. Still no MS boot prompt on start up.

Must do the same with openSUSE boot installer in EFI mode

Also be sure that fast boot is off in Windows it makes the Windows partitions unmountable in Linux

The Windows log in appeared on the Grub menu on reboot, but 42.3 wouldn’t boot so I did yet another clean install, I made sure that I booted the install media into UEFI and install went OK. Now I still don’t have a Windows boot entry, and it has disappeared from /boot/efi as well.