How to install Ubuntu to GUID partition table for UEFI booting on a non-Mac?

[SniperSlap]

I have a PC that supports UEFI booting and I've got Windows set up with it's EFI boot loader all fine. I tried installing the latest beta image of 11.04, but it didn't boot after install.

Grub seemed to not install correctly, despite me choosing to install it to my primary EFI system partition. My guess is that it installed itself the old BIOS way.

So, what exactly is the trick to getting Ubuntu installed with full UEFI support?

Shouldn't the installer have said "Oh, you have a GPT partition table and an EFI System partition, let me install an EFI bootloader for you!"

??

[psusi]

Did you boot the install cd in uefi mode, or bios mode?

[SniperSlap]

UEFI. The disc drive had two entires in my EFI boot menu and I selected the non-BIOS mode one.

[srs5694]

The alpha-2 release worked fine when I tested it this way on an EFI system (using an Intel motherboard), but I don't recall the details, and it was only a test installation, so I can't go and check how it was installed.

One thing I do recall is that EFI includes its own boot loader. Thus, you may need to add a file called grub.efi to your EFI's boot loader in order to launch GRUB, and from that Linux. I recommend you use your EFI to look for that file, which should be on the EFI System Partition, probably in a subdirectory of the EFI directory (as in EFI/ubuntu or EFI/grub). My Intel board has an option to set an EFI booting mode, and to add items to the EFI menu, I had to use an option in the CMOS menus to change the boot order to set which .efi file was used as the default boot item. The latest generation of UEFI boards seem to have flashy GUI firmware interfaces, and I don't know how you'd adjust their built-in boot loaders.

If you can't find such a file, you could boot the Ubuntu installer in "live CD" mode and examine the EFI System Partition's and Linux /boot directory's contents in more detail. Look for a file called grub.efi, and if it's present, copy it to the EFI System Partition, in a subdirectory of EFI, and try adding it to the EFI's boot loader. You might also need to create an EFI/grub directory and copy your GRUB files there. More generally, this page (http://grub.enbug.org/TestingOnMacbook) describes setting up EFI booting; however, it assumes you've got a working installation to compile GRUB and prepare the files. You should be able to use another Linux installation for this, if you've got one, but you'd need to copy the files over (via network, USB flash drive, or whatever).

[SniperSlap]

EFI can have multiple bootloaders if I recall correctly. The System partition is where all of them are stored.

So I guess this is more an issue of Ubuntu not installing grub to it correctly.

I don't really have an option in my bios to "edit the efi menu". EFI generates the list of boot options based on what it finds in the system partition as per a standard...

[psusi]

I don't think the efi version of grub is on the livecd or that the installer knows to use it. You will have to install it manually.

[SniperSlap]

Strange. This needs to be addressed by Ubuntu ASAP. Lots of new EFI boards coming out and Windows makes it a cinch.

[the-ridikulus-rat]

You can use efibootmgr to add grub-efi-amd64 to the efi boot manager. See https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/GRUB2#Bootloader_Installation_for_UEFI_systems , although it is slightly specific to Archlinux, it may be useful. See https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=910369#p910369 on how to use efibootmgr.

[psusi]

Windows really finally has support for EFI? Wow.

I have a brand new board that supports EFI, but it works just fine in bios mode too.

[the-ridikulus-rat]

Windows really finally has support for EFI? Wow.

I have a brand new board that supports EFI, but it works just fine in bios mode too.

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=186440

[oldfred]

The old version of boot info script does not parse gpt partitions and the new does. Not sure if it works with efi. You could try testing it.

Get last development version of Boot Info Script:

wget -O boot_info_script.sh 'http://bootinfoscript.git.sourceforge.net/git/gitweb.cgi?p=bootinfoscript/bootinfoscript;a=blob_plain;f=boot_info_script.sh; hb=HEAD'


Old version is here.
Boot Info Script courtesy of forum members meierfra & Gert Hulselmans
Page with instructions and download:
http://bootinfoscript.sourceforge.net/
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[srs5694]

Windows really finally has support for EFI? Wow.

I have a brand new board that supports EFI, but it works just fine in bios mode too.

Windows has supported EFI for a long time, but this is true only of certain versions of Windows. IIRC, the x86-64 version of Windows Vista and 7 can boot using EFI, and the Itanium version of Windows XP and later can boot using EFI. AFAIK, no 32-bit version of Windows can boot using EFI, but that's not a big problem, since AFAIK, the only 32-bit (x86) EFI systems are some of the earliest Intel-based Macs, and Microsoft doesn't support the version of EFI that Apple uses even on its 64-bit Intel Macs.

There are some more details in Microsoft's GPT FAQ, (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/gg463525.aspx) although that document is focused on GPT rather than EFI.

[rijnsma]

I hope not, but I think Linux is going to lose a lot of people this way, while it has never been very 'big'. Grub2, ext4, Unity, Gnome3 were problems for the user, this is worse. It cumulates.
And this in a time of much bought smartphone and tablet...

I think there will have to be a solution or more then one, which make(s) install (or install of more systems on partitions: multiboot) as 'simple' or 'easy' as it was. Or else we can forget it I am afraid.
Ubuntu was always easy installing and it has payed off.
I hope I'm too pessimistic.