Monday, October 29, 2018

dual boot - Need Help Fixing Grub after Installing Ubuntu 13.04 x64 Alongside Windows 8 on a Lenovo IdeaPad Y400 with UEFI

I have a Lenovo IdeaPad Y400 that came pre-installed with Windows 8. I would like to run Ubuntu alongside it in a dual-boot configuration. I've spent the past week fiddling around, re-installing both Windows and Linux in various configurations, and I've come awfully close to success, but seem to have hit a snag with Grub.


For my most recent attempt, I took the following steps:



  • Disabled Secure Boot

  • Re-imaged Windows 8 from a hidden recovery partition, effectively restoring the machine to factory state

  • Activated an option called Legacy Support in the BIOS (or is it UEFI
    now?)

  • Booted Ubuntu 13.04 x64 from a USB stick, chose "install alongside Windows" and accepted all default options

  • After a restart, found that I could boot Ubuntu, but could not boot Windows

  • Once into Ubuntu, I ran Boot Repair with recommended settings and accepted all defaults.

  • When Boot Repair finished, I was presented with the following message:



The boot files of [The OS now in use - Ubuntu 13.04] are far from the
start of the disk. Your BIOS may not detect them. You may want to
retry after creating a /boot partition (EXT4, >200MB, start of the
disk). This can be performed via tools such as gParted. Then select
this partition via the [Separate /boot partition:] option of [Boot
Repair]. (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BootPartition)




  • I followed the instructions at the url in the message, creating a 1GB EXT 4 partition near the start of the drive

  • when I tried to run Boot Repair again, the "Separate /boot partition" option on the "Grub Location" tab was disabled.

  • The new partition is /dev/sda11 and has the label GRUB.

  • On restart, I get the following error message:



error: file '/boot/grub/i386-pc/normal.mod' not found.
grub rescue>




  • However, if I manually choose the boot partition by hitting F12, I can boot into Windows no problems. Selecting Ubuntu from the boot device menu gives me a Grub menu with the following options:



Ubuntu


Advanced options for Ubuntu


Windows UEFI recovery bootmgfw.efi


Windows Boot UEFI recovery


Windows UEFI recovery LrsBootmgr.efi


Windows Boot UEFI recovery bkpbootx64.efi


Windows Recovery Environment (loader) (on /dev/sda3)


Windows 8 (loader) (on /dev/sda5) System setup




  • Selecting Ubuntu from this menu allows me to get to my Ubuntu desktop. I haven't tried the other options yet for fear of losing the progress that I've made.


So it looks like I have successfully dual-booted the machine, but that Grub is broken for some reason or another.


My current partition scheme can be seen at:
http://paste.ubuntu.com/5948753/


Thanks in advance - Jonathan

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