Pop OS Fresh Install Bootloader not present

[Ricks_Williams]

Hi Guys,

I have done a fresh install on an old Asus T100TA and have finally managed to get Pop OS installed after manually creating the partitions. This is a single install after clearing the disk of the previous Windows instance. I am now not able to boot and suspect this to be a problem with the Systemd-boot. I am looking to follow the steps listed on the below however getting problems as the disks listed on the device is named mmcblk1 and there is no nvme0n1* or sda* listed on the disk

https://support.system76.com/articles/bootloader

 

I can't seem to find the

/mnt/boot/efi

 

I do have the following listed on the disk (mmcblk1)

mmcblk1p1

mmcblk1p2

mmcblk1p3

mmcblk1p4

When I try to carry out the first steps in the systemd-boot EFI Boot I receive the following:

unknown filesystem type 'swap'

 

I am very much rusty on Linux so very much appreciate any help!

pop-os@pop-os:/dev$ sudo parted -ls

Model: MMC HBG4e (sd/mmc)

Disk /dev/mmcblk1: 31.3GB

Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B

Partition Table: gpt

Disk Flags:

 

Number Start End Size File system Name Flags

1 1049kB 2149MB 2147MB fat32 boot, esp

2 2149MB 6443MB 4295MB ext4 /home

3 6443MB 8591MB 2147MB linux-swap(v1) swap

4 8591MB 31.3GB 22.7GB ext4

Edited September 1, 2021 by minibois
Set text to automatic color, for visibility on the Night Theme

[grg994]

 

1 hour ago, Ricks_Williams said:

getting problems as the disks listed on the device is named mmcblk1 and there is no nvme0n1* or sda* listed on the disk

In your case mmcblk1 equals nvme0n1* or sda*. This is because you have integrated eMMC storage, not the common NVME or SATA.

 

1 hour ago, Ricks_Williams said:

I am now not able to boot and suspect this to be a problem with the Systemd-boot.

Could you please give some more details on this? What are the symptoms? Are you keep getting into emergency mode?

 

1 hour ago, Ricks_Williams said:

I can't seem to find the

/mnt/boot/efi

If you are booted from a live USB, it should be an empty directory, unless you mount there your EFI partition manually after mounting your system partition to /mnt

 

This is because /boot/efi  is a mount point for your EFI partition when you are booting from the system, and then it is need to be mounted by the OS at startup automatically.

If your system cannot find it when you are booting normally, and this is the only problem then my first guess a broken fstab. Could you copy the content of your  /etc/fstab  file form your installed system partition (will be at  /mnt/etc/fstab  if you follow the system76.com guide that you mentioned)?

[Ricks_Williams]

Thank you so much grg994 for your reply!

I understand about the disk types in use now thank you.

 

I am booting to Live disk now.

 

When I try to boot to the install there is no error the system simply hangs.  I can press F2 which then returns me to the Bios.  The boot selections within the bios show the Live USB stick and the POP OS install to select from.

 

Embarrassingly I have gotten myself very much confused by the concept of mounting.  In order to send you the fstab info is this the location at the point of booting the Live USB and looking in /etc/fstab or will I first need to mount the boot partition.  If I am to mount the boot partition how do I then navgate within.  Apologies in advance.

 

My fstab at that location is:

 

overlay / overlay rw 0 0

tmpfs /tmp tmpfs nosuid,nodev 0 0

[grg994]

4 hours ago, Ricks_Williams said:

When I try to boot to the install there is no error the system simply hangs.  I can press F2 which then returns me to the Bios.  The boot selections within the bios show the Live USB stick and the POP OS install to select from.

Ohhh, that's not good... Honestly I am not familiar with systemd-boot, only with the GRUB bootloader. But whatever is the bootloader it is not working. (Forget fstab in this case, I thought you were making it at least to emergency mode)

 

What I can do for you is to translate the commands on the system76 link you posted - for your config. So back to this:

6 hours ago, Ricks_Williams said:

When I try to carry out the first steps in the systemd-boot EFI Boot I receive the following:

unknown filesystem type 'swap'

 

Boot with the live installation media and then for your config the correct command in the "systemd-boot EFI Boot" paragraph should mean:

sudo mount /dev/mmcblk1p4 /mnt
sudo mount /dev/mmcblk1p1 /mnt/boot/efi
for i in /dev /dev/pts /proc /sys /run; do sudo mount -B $i /mnt$i; done
sudo cp -n /etc/resolv.conf /mnt/etc/

sudo chroot /mnt
apt install --reinstall linux-generic linux-headers-generic
update-initramfs -c -k all
exit
sudo bootctl --path=/mnt/boot/efi install

 

[Ricks_Williams]

Thank you so much for taking me through the steps grg 994.  I went through them and they all went through this time without error.  Unfortunately the system still refuses to boot.  I can see that Linux Boot manager is listed in the bios however there still appears to be a discconnect as there is no output at startup.  If I select the Linux Boot Manager from within the Bios I am returned back to the Bios.  Gutted.  All the output from the above gave the impression that all was well!