OpenSUSE will install but cannot boot without USB.

English Install/Boot/Login
#1

Hello and thank you for reading!

Yesterday I installed openSUSE Leap 15 on an old XPS 13 L321X with fantastic hardware and a traditional BIOS.

However, after a successful install, the laptop fails to boot into the hard disk (“Operating System not found”) but is otherwise perfectly functional if I choose the “Boot from Hard Disk” GRUB option from the install medium.

To troubleshoot, I have

…toggled nearly every available option in my BIOS and am certain that the boot order is correct.

…unsuccessfully booted with every possible configuration in the Boot Loader YaST module. (Apart from changing the GRUB bootloader to UEFI or “unmanaged” and changing it, and I also have not edited the disk boot order.)

Because I used the network installer, I am having trouble using the “recovery” option as suggested somewhere, but I don’t see how that would necessary help since this is a fresh install.

Any perspective would be appreciated.

#2

Can you provide the output from:

grep LOADER /etc/sysconfig/bootloader

and the output from

parted -l

My first guess is that your install used GPT partitioning on your hard drive. And in some computers, the BIOS is a bit fussy about legacy booting with GPT partitioning. The information I requested is mostly to check on that.

Oops – I should have mentioned that you will need root for the second of those commands.

#3

It has definitely been set to msdos in the installer, but would you believe it, the disk is set to GPT…

Output from the grep:

LOADER_TYPE="grub2"

Output from parted:

Model: ATA LITEONIT LMT-256 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 256GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: **gpt**
Disk Flags: pmbr_boot

(unnecesary table here)

…and my install medium… is an msdos scheme.


Model: PNY USB 2.0 FD (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 15.5GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: **msdos**
Disk Flags:

(another screen-hoarding data table goes here)

So I’m assuming that I just re-install the O.S. and run through the horrendous partitioner one more time?

Thank you so much! Would’ve missed that.

#4

You can try toggling the “pmbr_boot” flag. I don’t know whether it will help, but it’s worth trying. Google “pmbr_boot” for how to toggle (not sure if it is in the man page for “parted”).

If that doesn’t work, then a reinstall would be the other option.

When you go with expert partitioner, click on “/dev/sda”. There should be an expert option near bottom right of the screen, to create a new partition table. And when you do that, there’s a choice to make it a DOS partition table.

#5

Hoooooold on a minute. Since it was a completely new installation, I decided to re-install since that was easier (albeit considerably slower.) BUT, I noticed that, despite setting the disk to an msdos partition table, the disk is labeled as a GPT scheme! For once, a computer failure definitely isn’t my fault! I think I applied the flag correctly, and will edit the result after a reboot. Even if that works, how would I go about reporting the issue?

#6

EDIT: That did not work. I’m running through the installer one… last… time… to ensure that there’s actually a problem and I’m not an utterly self-humiliating idiot.

#7

Update: The installer works, I’m just incompetent. Thanks again to nrickert for the help!

#8

LOL.

We all make dumb mistakes from time to time.

Your problem was a new one to me.

There was a similar problem a few weeks back. But that computer could be persuaded to do a legacy boot as long as we made sure that there was no way for it to UEFI boot.

I have used GPT partitioning with older computers, and it works fine. The BIOS just does what it should and the system boots. But your computer is new enough for the BIOS to know about GPT. And it was being too smart for its own good.