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Dual booting with an external HDD

I wanted to try out a fresh different install of Artix on an external HDD, without it affecting my current Artix install on the internal HDD.
After creating a bootable LiveUSB, and booting into it, I've connected my external HDD and ran the installation normally.
The external HDD is partitioned as follows:
  • 1 GB fat32(vfat) for /boot/efi
  • 16 GB swap
  • 250 GB ext4 for /
  • rest for /home
I did not set any flags (e.g. boot) for any partition.
After the installation was done, I removed both the external HDD and the liveUSB,
however now my internal HDD was not recognized as bootable by the (UEFI) BIOS.
After plugging in the external HDD and booting into it I was presented with the GRUB menu
and the option to start either the fresh install of Artix on the external HDD or the internal Artix install (the one I'm currently on and writing this post from).
All of my files and everything are fine, it's just that I can not boot into my internal install without connecting the external HDD first.

How can I make it so that my internal install does not require the external HDD?
Also, does the external installation require some tweaking of /etc/fstab?
I've been reading some advices about dual booting and they tend to recommend keeping track of the UUID for the /boot/efi partition.
Have I half-bricked my system yet again?

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #1 –
Quote from: kayvaan – on
however now my internal HDD was not recognized as bootable by the (UEFI) BIOS.
It seems that the problem lies within your UEFI configuration. There are two options: you may enter your BIOS/UEFI setup, go to the boot menu and add a boot entry for your internal HDD Artix installation manually (if your UEFI firmware allows this, of course; there are some weird and inconvenient BIOSes btw). Or you may try to run update-grub from within your internal Artix installation, this should update the UEFI configuration automatically. If this doesn't work, try to reinstall grub onto your internal HDD from within this installation (or from within chroot environment, if you use an installation media).

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #2 –
unplug your external hdd, boot into bios and select the option for your usual artix install

after booting into your usual, plug in you external hdd and then from a terminal run

sudo update-grub

then your normal artix will boot with a grub showing your internal artix first and the externall hdd install second
Cat Herders of Linux

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #3 –
Quote from: VictorBrand – on
you may enter your BIOS/UEFI setup, go to the boot menu and add a boot entry for your internal HDD Artix installation manually
The internal HDD is shown as a boot option, but if I select it, it tries to boot and just gives me the message:
"Insert or select a proper boot device and reboot".
And I don't really see an option to (re-)add something manually.
Quote
Or you may try to run update-grub from within your internal Artix installation
Tried that, it changed nothing.
Was I supposed to unplug the external HDD first before running that?
Quote
If this doesn't work, try to reinstall grub
I can try that, I assume you mean # pacman -S --force --noconfirm grub this?

Quote from: cat herders of linux – on
unplug your external hdd, boot into bios and select the option for your usual artix install

after booting into your usual, plug in you external hdd and then from a terminal run
It doesn't boot into my usual, that's the problem here.
Quote
sudo update-grub

then your normal artix will boot with a grub showing your internal artix first and the externall hdd install second
Everything remains the same still.
 

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #4 –
OK. So if you boot from your external HDD, you have a grub that shows both installs?

Chose to start the one on your internal HDD.  Once you're in unplug your external HDD and run

sudo update-grub

The reboot.  You should be back to normal at that point


The after you reboot into artix like usual, attach the external HDD. And

Sudo update-grub again
Cat Herders of Linux

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #5 –
One way or the other the solutions will resolve the issue. 
Cat Herders of Linux

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #6 –
I think perhaps your grub-install command pointed to your external HDD so the initial boot loader stage is on that and not your internal drive, which is currently configured as a secondary boot stage, see the Artix wiki for details:
https://wiki.artixlinux.org/Main/Installation#Boot_Loader

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #7 –
Quote from: kayvaan – on
"Insert or select a proper boot device and reboot".
This tells ya that something is wrong with your grub installation on your internal HDD. Either your grub installation or your EFI partition are somehow corrupted. Check if EFI partition on your internal HDD has proper flags for a bootable partition (efi and whatever).

Quote from: kayvaan – on
I assume you mean # pacman -S --force --noconfirm grub this?
Nope. This command only reinstalls the grub package, but you should reinstall the bootloader onto  your internal HDD by running something like that:
Code: [Select]
sudo grub-install --target=x86_64 --efi-directory=/boot/efi
sudo update-grub
(mount the EFI partition from your internal HDD to /boot/efi before that, of course).

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #8 –
Quote from: cat herders of linux – on
Chose to start the one on your internal HDD.  Once you're in unplug your external HDD and run
sudo update-grub
The reboot.  You should be back to normal at that point
Tried that, but still to no avail.
The internal HDD still isn't recognized by the BIOS.
Quote from: ####### – on
I think perhaps your grub-install command pointed to your external HDD so the initial boot loader stage is on that and not your internal drive, which is currently configured as a secondary boot stage, see the Artix wiki for details:
https://wiki.artixlinux.org/Main/Installation#Boot_Loader
Yes I belive so too.
Code: [Select]
$ sudo efibootmgr
BootCurrent: 0004
Timeout: 0 seconds
BootOrder: 0004,0003,0002,0001
Boot0001* CD/DVD Drive
Boot0002* Hard Drive
Boot0003* Removable Drive
Boot0004* UEFI: WD Elements 25A3 1030
Even with the external HDD unplugged, it is still set as the current boot location.
Quote from: VictorBrand – on
Check if EFI partition on your internal HDD has proper flags for a bootable partition (efi and whatever).
Both fdisk and lsblk aren't showing any flag whatsoever.
I was under the impression UEFI systems didn't require/straight up ignore boot flags.
Quote
Nope. This command only reinstalls the grub package, but you should reinstall the bootloader onto  your internal HDD by running something like that:
Code: [Select]
sudo grub-install --target=x86_64 --efi-directory=/boot/efi
sudo update-grub
(mount the EFI partition from your internal HDD to /boot/efi before that, of course).
I will try this and report back with the results, thank you.
Code: [Select]
$ mount -l | grep boot
/dev/sda1 on /boot/efi type vfat...
The EFI partition is at least still being automatically mounted to /boot/efi, thankfully.

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #9 –
Quote from: kayvaan – on
Both fdisk and lsblk aren't showing any flag whatsoever.
I was under the impression UEFI systems didn't require/straight up ignore boot flags.
Yeah, I confused you a little bit. That's gparted which shows flags. In fdisk, an EFI partition is marked as 'Type: EFI System'. If everything is OK, you'll see this label, and not 'W95 FAT32' or anything else.

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #10 –
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/EFI_system_partition#Create_the_partition
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Partitioning

Possible combinations are:
  • UEFI/GPT
  • BIOS/MBR
  • BIOS/GPT
Quote
Note:
UEFI booting does not involve any "boot" flag, booting relies solely on the boot entries in NVRAM. Parted and its front-ends use a "boot" flag on GPT to indicate that a partition is an EFI system partition.

Re: Dual booting with an external HDD

Reply #11 –
Quote from: VictorBrand – on
Yeah, I confused you a little bit. That's gparted which shows flags. In fdisk, an EFI partition is marked as 'Type: EFI System'. If everything is OK, you'll see this label, and not 'W95 FAT32' or anything else.
In that case everything is indeed OK.
Reinstalling grub and updating it has worked, my BIOS is recognizing the internal HDD as bootable at last.

Thanks @VictorBrand .