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Thread: Lenovo UEFI issues

  1. #1
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    Arrow Lenovo UEFI issues

    Well, I've managed to brick my new laptop and am hoping someone can help me.

    Brand new Lenovo Ideapad. Decided I couldn't handle Windows 8 and so try to set up a dual boot to 12.10, 64-bit.

    Installed as a separate partition and everything seemed to go well, but when I rebooted I got "Image failed to verify with *ACCESS DENIED*" From there it proceeded to boot into Windows.

    OK, so I ran boot-repair. Boot-repair says it ran successfully but now nothing works. I get the grub menu but selecting ubuntu gives me a blank screen and nothing else and selecting anything else gives me an invalid image error. So right now I have nothing.

    The url it gave me is http://paste.ubuntu.com/1679821

    Please tell me I haven't given myself an expensive doorstop. Any suggestions?
    Last edited by tanstaaflwdm; March 18th, 2013 at 02:55 AM. Reason: Solved it

  2. #2
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    Welcome to the forums.

    Moved to your own thread as in the mega-tread it gets confusing on who is getting what instructions.

    Did you turn off secure boot and fast boot in Windows first. And can you still get into UEFI/BIOS?

    You may be having video issue or other boot parameter is required with Ubuntu. At grub menu press e and replace quiet splash with nomodeset. Screens shown:
    How to set NOMODESET and other kernel boot options in grub2 - both liveCD & first boot, but different
    http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1613132
    https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BootOptions


    Or from Boot-Repair:
    Boot-Repair --> Advanced options --> GRUB options tab --> tick "Add kernel option: nomodeset" --> Apply

    It looks like Boot-Repair added the correct entries to boot. This is the correct one even though it says recovery.
    "Windows UEFI recovery bootmgfw.efi"

    These are incorrect as grub still has a bug.
    'Windows 8 (loader) (on /dev/sda5)'
    UEFI boot install & repair info - Regularly Updated :
    https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2147295
    Please use Thread Tools above first post to change to [Solved] when/if answered completely.

  3. #3
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    Thanks for the move. Was just following the link from the boot-repair page.

    Quote Originally Posted by oldfred View Post
    Did you turn off secure boot and fast boot in Windows first. And can you still get into UEFI/BIOS?
    Uh-oh. Might have shot myself in the foot then. I thought the secure boot/fast boot options were in the BIOS, not in Windows. I didn't see them so didn't change anything.

    Since it's a brand-new machine if I could get to the recovery partition I would just reset the thing and start over; there's no data to lose. But I can't seem to get it to boot either. On this Lenovo there is a smaller button next to the power button that is used to access the BIOS/recovery partition, but boot-repair has apparently grabbed it too.

  4. #4
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    Secure Boot is definitely in UEFI/BIOS.
    But fast boot may be a Windows setting or in UEFI. It seems that it bypasses UEFI booting like with BIOS we had the BIOS loading before grub. But it may be a Windows setting that changes UEFI?
    And on some systems then you cannot get into UEFI at all unless Windows is working. Grub has added a new entry to get into UEFI, it should be the last on the grub menu.

    Some have totally reset system by reinstalling UEFI/BIOS, but I do not know how to do that unless you can get into UEFI?
    And some systems with UEFI have just totally reset (the key you are talking about?) and then it boots Windows again. But this varies by Vendor as each has implemented UEFI differently.

    UEFI/BIOS Boot keys - about halfway down on this Microsoft page
    http://social.technet.microsoft.com/...ows-to-go.aspx


    Two that have worked: lenovo may have similar UEFI but only minor differences for each version?
    Lenovo Z580 laptop
    http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2112271
    Lenovo Ideapad Y500 LiveUSB Problem
    http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2095063


    But some have reported issues.

    The current state of UEFI and Linux = Feb 1, 2013 - Matthew Garrett
    Samsung, Lenovo & Toshiba UEFI issues
    http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/22028.html
    Matthew Garrett's Blog
    http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/
    UEFI boot install & repair info - Regularly Updated :
    https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2147295
    Please use Thread Tools above first post to change to [Solved] when/if answered completely.

  5. #5
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    OK, I have the z580 too but I didn't see an option to turn off secure boot in the bios. I'll check again.

  6. #6
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    OK, I haven't made too much progress, but my system is partially useful.

    Normally I get the Grub menu. Selecting "ubuntu" gives me a blank, grey screen and selecting anything else gives me a variety of errors.

    But if I power off and on a few times it will eventually let me into ubuntu. At this point it seems to work fine until I shut down again. Then I have to try a few more times before it will work again.

    The power cycle sounds like something is getting caught in cache somewhere or something, if that makes any sense at all, but I can't imagine what it could be. Or maybe hardware related. I'm not sure.

    I'm going to avoid doing anything else to the system right at the moment. The reason this became an issue is that I'm in a training class the next few days (mongo db), needed the laptop for it, and my old laptop was a 6 year old Celeron with a bad power switch. So if I can get through the class I'll have time to sort things out.

    Our company is moving towards Linux in general and are trying to get us developers migrated over, hence the class, so I'm not exactly bleeding edge when it comes to setting this stuff up. I did perl development on hp-ux for a while, but apparently it's easier to use a server that someone else set up than to do it myself.

    I'm tempted just to blow Windows completely away and do a full ubuntu install but I'm afraid it may make this worse at this point. Cthulhu knows that what little I saw of Windows 8 before everything went west did nothing to make me want to use it, but I guess I still need my security blanket.

    Anyway, thanks for the help so far. It's given me something to investigate at least. I'll be back in a few days probably asking a lot of dumb questions.

  7. #7
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    Can you get to diagnostics by pressing F1 upon immediate startup, or boot menu by pressing F12? Both might allow you get get back to the UEFI settings.

    I have a new Lenovo T430s, but I would bet the general setup (keys for getting to UEFI) are the same.

    But maybe I'm misreading, and your issue is a little deeper than that...

  8. #8
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    I would not un-install Windows 8.

    There are some UEFI systems that just do not work without Windows being able to do some things. Not sure about your system but better to be safe for now. Its a lot of changes with new UEFI designs, Windows requirements and the usual Linux developers having to find the work arounds to bugs by others (and fixing their own).
    UEFI boot install & repair info - Regularly Updated :
    https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2147295
    Please use Thread Tools above first post to change to [Solved] when/if answered completely.

  9. #9
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    Thanks for the warning. I'll hold off nuking from orbit until a final resort.

    I did find what seems to be the cause of my having to boot a few times to get anything to load. This is from the Lenovo support forums

    To get windows to boot fast, it takes some shortcuts and bypasses the BIOS. Turn off your computer by holding the power button (a dry shutdown). If when you turn on the computer, you still don't see the bios option, redo the dry shutdown. After the 2nd or 3rd shutdown, windows will let go of the bios.
    Full support thread here

    This seems to be what I'm seeing. I failed to disable that because I thought it was a bios setting, not a Windows setting. My mistake there. First thing I'm fixing when I manage to get back into Windows again.

    OTOH, it's working well in my class. I'll pass on that the version of mongodb that ubuntu installs through apt-get is an out of date version. I had to manually add a repository at 10gen and install their package to get an up-to-date version.

  10. #10
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    Re: Lenovo UEFI issues

    Progress! Some good, some frustrating, but progress!

    First, I've managed to get back into Windows again.

    Apparently the button next to the power button isn't the only way to get into the bios. With the laptop off, if you hold down the F2 key then push the power button the laptop goes straight into the bios.

    But, if you hold down the F12 key and power on, you go into a "boot menu". One of the options here was the hard drive (ubuntu was another) and selecting the hard drive booted into Windows.

    So I can dual-boot as long as I power on while holding the F12 key.

    I'm not quite ready to call this solved though as this is more of a workaround than a fix. Booting normally into grub is still a mess.

    Here's the ongoing problem. I can't access the part of the bios that lets me turn off secure boot. Here's what the screen looks like.

    https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D8551579_760_898129724

    I can only select the first two items on this screen. The other items are grayed out and inaccessible. Unfortunately, that's the secure boot settings.

    So, if I can figure out how to access those I may be able to run boot-fix and get grub working correctly.

    But things are looking up. I'll keep everyone informed as to what I find.

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