Laptop only boots off an ISO

Software & Operating Systems Linux
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Hi,
I have been having issues with my laptop (Acer S5-317T) after having tried to reinstall Antergos, but for some reason I could not get it to install and actually boot off the hard drive (LITEON CV3-8D128). It boots ISOs off flash drives easily but ever since I originally installed linux I can not get it to install, currently writing this on a Fedora 26 Live CD.

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Alright, there’s a list of things that we can check, but let’s start from the beginning.

“actually boot off the hard drive” I’m assuming that means it won’t get to the bootloader. If that’s the case, it’s very likely a UEFI issue.

Your laptop is newer, so that means it supports UEFI boot. Did you configure the installer to use a UEFI or legacy bootloader? Some laptops (mine does this) disable legacy boot by default and you need to enable it in settings.

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I have installed Fedora 26 Workstation using Automatic partitioning and from there have attempted to boot in UEFI (with and without secure boot) and also in Legacy mode with no results.

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What do you mean configure the installer? I booted the flash drive in UEFI with and without secure boot many times without the installation on the hard drive booting.

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I finally got it to boot from the hard drive! I tried selecting the .efi file as “trusted for executing” and it worked. I thought disabling secure boot would circumvent that.

Thanks for your help.

1 Like
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UEFI is a pain in the ass. Secure boot will usually do that, but keep in mind that manufacturers will often times modify it which has the side effect (sometimes it’s the intended outcome) of making non-windows OS a bit more difficult to work with.

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Antergos has some odd things happen in Cnchi. For one, you should be using the manual partitioner, at least in my opinion. Cnchi has had some problems in the past of detecting bios or efi/uefi. Your laptop may also have a combo of the two systems, which Cnchi also doesn’t know how to handle very well (as in, needing a bios boot part as well as a uefi part). To this, I would google and see if anyone else has had problems with your unit.