What is the safe way of using efibootmgr in a dual boot setup?

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Last week, I installed efibootmgr, modified the boot order, then reboot.

Then I discover the grub2 boot menu is gone, and EFI always boot into Windows directly. (It is a due boot setup)

When entering system EFI, the boot options for Fedora is gone. Even after hard reset of the “BIOS” settings.

I fixed my problem by manually:

  • install systemd-boot (still not helping)
  • remove the MS reserved partition that Windows auto created

Then suddenly EFI can detect both boot entries for Windows and Fedora.

What is the safe way of using efibootmgr in a dual boot setup? Any known precautions?

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I had to use efibootmgr in the past to re-arrange the Boot Order on a dual boot system.
Here is some documentation of what had happened on how I fixed the issue: https://askbot.fedoraproject.org/en/question/111637/how-can-i-create-a-efi-boot-menu-entry-using-efibootmgr/

In addition, here are a few examples for different tasks… Use Linux efibootmgr Command to Manage UEFI Boot Menu - LinuxBabe

May you could post your commands (with the intention of what it was supposed to do) and we can help you analyze what went wrong.

Is that an EFI partition? Did you have to EFI boot partitions?

1 Like
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Thank you for your reply, florian.

As it is fixed already, I cannot do any further investigation on the system.

I will try to reproduce this KVM to see if it happens a gain or not.

The only change I made in efibootmgr is just to change the boot order, from Windows first to Fedora first.

If it is just my systemboard’s EFI is buggy, then it should be OK.

No That is the MSR partition. The EFI partition is still there, which is created by Windows installation.

The screen shot is a newly installed Win10 inside KVM. Partitions auto created by Windows installer.

I manually removed Partition 3, then Fedora is detected by my systemboard’s EFI again.

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I simply cannot reproduce the issue inside KVM.

I will say it is must my bad luck.

edit
It turns out I have bigger problems inside KVM.

I need to re-run the procedure and record down the details carefully.

Inside that KVM, now, none if Fedora nor Windows can boot.