Fedora 44 / KDE Boot

Ask Fedora
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1

HI everybody,

First, I’m sorry if this subject has been treated before, I tried to search, didn’t find.
3 days ago, I made a fresh install of Fedora 44 / KDE , last stable release on this laptop, an old LENOVO T530, erasing everything, Windows10, and OpenSuse that I tried before.
This is my second install, my desktop is under same Fedora’s configuration, starting in December 2025, and I’m completely more than satisfied with it!
So, this time on the LENOVO, everything is working fine too, except one little case :
I noticed that when booting, I don’t see any boot menu like on myy desktop, or even this laptop when OpenSuse was installed ! First I have the fedora’s logo appearing, then a Plasma logo that I don’t have on the desktop, and then … the KDE desktop is displayed.
As far as now , I can’t say it’s a drama, but I’d like to understand why this behaviour, is it linked with something from the bios settings ? Or whatever … I’d like to get your thoughts about that, before going further in my installations (MAO). Thanks for any answer !
Will

2

If you were dual-booting previously, the default GRUB configuration is to show its menu so you can choose which operating system to boot.

From inside Fedora, open a terminal and paste the output of this cat /etc/default/grub

In your reply, click on the </> icon in the composer and paste the terminal output inside.

Hopefully, this will tell us what we need to know.

3

Legacy BIOS behaves differently from newer UEFI booting. Which are your systems using?

/etc/default/grub has options to manage boot behaviour.

For a simplified guide, see: https://linuxvox.com/blog/linux-grub-menu/.

4

Thanks for the answers!
I’m not and wasn’t in dual boot before. After some tries of the Fedora-Jam lab witch I’ve been unable to make work on the LENOVO, my Fedora last installation was supposed to erase everything, for I asked it to use the whole disk!
Anyway, I’m using UEFI (gonna verify …)
Here is the result of : cat /etc/default/grub:

cat /etc/default/grub
GRUB_TIMEOUT=5
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=“$(sed ‘s, release .*$,g’ /etc/system-release)”
GRUB_DEFAULT=saved
GRUB_DISABLE_SUBMENU=true
GRUB_TERMINAL_OUTPUT=“console”
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=“rhgb quiet”
GRUB_DISABLE_RECOVERY=“true”
GRUB_ENABLE_BLSCFG=true

will

5

Nothing more to help ?

Will

6

That should mean you see the grub menu for 5 seconds.

7

If I am not mistaken, you need to add this line to the GRUB file:

GRUB_TIMEOUT_STYLE=menu

Then update and reboot.

8

Thank you RubiRod for the answer ! I’m just a new Linux user, even if I’ve been a DP guy for 30 years, but never on Linux ! Couls you just tell me how I do an ‘update’ of grub’s conf. ? Just saving the file ?
Thanks again, and btw, using the ‘shift’ key while booting shows up the Grub menu !
Will

9

After saving the changes run this:

sudo grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg

Then reboot.

10

Thank you sir !

11

Sorry RubiRod, but it doesn’t work … at all ! I made the changes, then updated and rebooted twice, no menu ! Well If no more suggestions, I will read the grub manual and hope I will find it out ! Thank you for your help.
Will

12

Let’s check the config file one more time please.

cat /etc/default/grub

13

Finally, after some search, I fixed it :

I found that running ’ grub2-editenv - unset menu_auto_hide’ made GRUB show it’s menu !

My config file now :

cat /etc/default/grub
GRUB_TIMEOUT=5
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=“$(sed ‘s, release .*$,g’ /etc/system-release)”
GRUB_DEFAULT=saved
GRUB_DISABLE_SUBMENU=true
GRUB_TERMINAL_OUTPUT=“console”
GRUB_DISABLE_RECOVERY=“true”
GRUB_ENABLE_BLSCFG=true
GRUB_TIMEOUT_STYLE=menu

as you can see, I erased : GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=“rhgb quiet”, so that I can see everything made by the boot sequence.
Thank you for your help.

14

Caveat: I am not as familiar with how Fedora handles GRUB as I am with other distros.

That said, are those smart quotes literally in the file or it was a pasting issue?

The config expects plain ASCII quotes.

Let’s also check these:

ls -l /etc/grub2*

and

sudo grub2-editenv list

Let us know what it shows.

16

RubiRod, these ‘smart quotes’ are exactly what I see in my terminal screen !! No magical mystery tour round here…
here are what you asked for :

ls -l /etc/grub2*
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 root root 22 5 juin 02:00 /etc/grub2.cfg → ../boot/grub2/grub.cfg
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 root root 22 5 juin 02:00 /etc/grub2-efi.cfg → ../boot/grub2/grub.cfg

sudo grub2-editenv list
[sudo] Mot de passe de wm :
saved_entry=6b0336df87b8474384994915737092d9-7.0.13-200.fc44.x86_64
boot_success=1
boot_indeterminate=0

is it OK ?
Will

17

You can simply press ESC once when the Lenovo logo appears and wait for the menu.

18

Thank you petergrig, the shift key works too. Anyway my issue is now solved, I think. I’m gonna try a last reboot to be sure.

19

Just as a side note:
Using…

Is the correct way of doing it. Fedora is a bit unique in that way. You never touch the main Grub config file itself as that will break the build in auto update function.
Fedora will give you the option to boot from up to 3 Kernels with the latest Kernel being on the top and made the default when booting.
After unhiding your Grub menu, you will see those Kernels as new ones come in and the old ones being pushed down.
So if the new Kernel causes problems, you can simply reboot and select the last working Kernel.

20

Thank you for the ‘Just a side note’, Sir ‘AI the Teutonian’, but this is not exactly true : I’ve been installing Linux Mint Cinnamon, OpenSuse Tumbleweed (very good one), and I can tell you these two distros apparently act the same way, showing in their grub menu at least the 3 last Kernels I’ve installed ! Of course I don’t know about others, but maybe it is the ‘rule’.

Will

22

Everyone above this comment appeared to miss the fact that the default setting within the /boot/grub/grubenv file is themenu_auto_hide=1 parameter. This automatically hides the grub menu during boot. When dual booting with windows that setting is over-ridden/ignored by grub to show the menu so windows can be booted.

Removing that parameter caused grub to always display the menu.