Trying to sort my driver problems:
Added: The steps proposed bby Dave H to get round a previous problem
(recreate /home/user did not work
drakx11 tells me the proprietary driver wasn't installed correctly
I can find no combination of driver module/monitor parameter values that
doesn't end in EE error
startx as root give me a poor definition GUI - nowhere near the 1920 x
1080 the monitor is capable of.
So I thought :enough (or words to that effect) reinstall Mageia 8
So now I can't complete the partition step because apparently I must
have a BIOS boot partition. How did the previous installation complete?
Confused of Dorset
--
Grimble
Registered Linux User #450547
Machine 'Bach' running Plasma 5.20.4 on 5.15.6-desktop-2.mga8 kernel.
Mageia release 8 (Official) for x86_64

On Mon, 27 Dec 2021 11:23:58 -0500, Grimble <grimble@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:

> Trying to sort my driver problems:
> Added: The steps proposed bby Dave H to get round a previous problem
> (recreate /home/user did not work
> drakx11 tells me the proprietary driver wasn't installed correctly
> I can find no combination of driver module/monitor parameter values that
> doesn't end in EE error
> startx as root give me a poor definition GUI - nowhere near the 1920 x
> 1080 the monitor is capable of.
> So I thought :enough (or words to that effect) reinstall Mageia 8
> So now I can't complete the partition step because apparently I must
> have a BIOS boot partition. How did the previous installation complete?
> Confused of Dorset

The partition table layout has been changed from dos mbr format to gpt format.

With dos mbr format, grub stores it's boot loader starting in sector 2 of track
0 (sector 1 contains the master boot record).

With gpt, there is no room in the first track, so a empty partition (not formatted,
called the bios boot partition) is required for grub to store it's loader.

Either switch back to using the dos mbr partition table layout or create the empty
bios boot partition.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

On 27/12/2021 18:00, David W. Hodgins wrote:
> On Mon, 27 Dec 2021 11:23:58 -0500, Grimble <grimble@nomail.afraid.org>
> wrote:
>
SNIP
>
> The partition table layout has been changed from dos mbr format to gpt
> format.
>
> With dos mbr format, grub stores it's boot loader starting in sector 2
> of track
> 0 (sector 1 contains the master boot record).
>
> With gpt, there is no room in the first track, so a empty partition (not
> formatted,
> called the bios boot partition) is required for grub to store it's loader.
>
> Either switch back to using the dos mbr partition table layout or create
> the empty
> bios boot partition.
>
> Regards, Dave Hodgins
OK, created an empty partition (/dev/sda7 on my disk, parted calls it
grub2 core.img)
Installation completed but reboot landed me in grub rescue mode. A file
/boot/grub2/x86_64-efi/normal.mod
doesn't exist: very true, the directory x86_64-efi hasn't been created.
I notice on another Mageia8 installation normal.mod is located in the
sub-directory grub2/i386-pc.
Thought I could place normal.mod where grub could find it, but no:
"invalid arch-dependent ELF magic"
So why has boot loader installation created a different architecture
from precvious installation. Can I use Mageia rescue function to
re-install boot loader?
--
Grimble
Registered Linux User #450547
Machine 'Bach' running Plasma 5.20.4 on 5.15.6-desktop-2.mga8 kernel.
Mageia release 8 (Official) for x86_64

On 28.12.2021 at 15:57, Grimble scribbled:

> On 27/12/2021 18:00, David W. Hodgins wrote:
> > On Mon, 27 Dec 2021 11:23:58 -0500, Grimble
> > <grimble@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
> >
> SNIP
> >
> > The partition table layout has been changed from dos mbr format to
> > gpt format.
> >
> > With dos mbr format, grub stores it's boot loader starting in
> > sector 2 of track 0 (sector 1 contains the master boot record).
> >
> > With gpt, there is no room in the first track, so a empty partition
> > (not formatted, called the bios boot partition) is required for
> > grub to store it's loader.
> >
> > Either switch back to using the dos mbr partition table layout or
> > create the empty bios boot partition.

Note that the above is only relevant if the system boots up in legacy
BIOS mode.

If the system instead boots up in native UEFI mode, then the bios_grub
partition is not needed, but then there must be an EFI system partition
instead, of about 300 MiB in size (in order to be compliant with most
installers), and formatted as vfat (FAT32). This partition must be
marked with the "esp" flag.

> OK, created an empty partition (/dev/sda7 on my disk, parted calls it
> grub2 core.img)
> Installation completed but reboot landed me in grub rescue mode. A
> file /boot/grub2/x86_64-efi/normal.mod
> doesn't exist: very true, the directory x86_64-efi hasn't been
> created. I notice on another Mageia8 installation normal.mod is
> located in the sub-directory grub2/i386-pc.
> Thought I could place normal.mod where grub could find it, but no:
> "invalid arch-dependent ELF magic"
> So why has boot loader installation created a different architecture
> from precvious installation. Can I use Mageia rescue function to
> re-install boot loader?

I am guessing that your system attempts to boots up in native UEFI mode
when booting from the internal drive but that you did the partitioning
from the live CD/USB in legacy BIOS mode. "x86_64-efi" is the GRUB
designation for a native UEFI boot, while 386pc is the GRUB designation
for a legacy BIOS boot.

While GRUB visually looks the same across both boot methods, the
versions of the boot loader installed are very different. The legacy
BIOS version is 16-bit and runs in the boot processor's real mode — on
one core only, without hyperthreading — while the UEFI-aware version of
GRUB is a 64-bit UEFI executable running in the processor's long mode.

UEFI executables are themselves running as extensions of the UEFI
firmware, and their binary format is the same as that of the NT-based
versions of Microsoft Windows, because Microsoft is on the UEFI
Committee.

[nx-74205:/dev/pts/3][/root] # file /boot/efi/EFI/boot/bootx64.efi
/boot/efi/EFI/boot/bootx64.efi: PE32+ executable (EFI application)
x86-64 (stripped to external PDB), for MS Windows

--
With respect,
= Aragorn

On Tue, 28 Dec 2021 11:55:51 -0500, Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be> wrote:
> While GRUB visually looks the same across both boot methods, the
> versions of the boot loader installed are very different. The legacy
> BIOS version is 16-bit and runs in the boot processor's real mode — on
> one core only, without hyperthreading — while the UEFI-aware version of
> GRUB is a 64-bit UEFI executable running in the processor's long mode.

There is a slight difference in the installer boot screen so you can tell if
it's been booted in uefi mode or not.

https://wiki.mageia.org/en/Installing_on_systems_with_UEFI_firmware#How_to_distinguish_between_UEFI_and_BIOS_mode_for_Mageia_boot_media

To see if a currently booted system was booted in uefi mode or not, check to see
if /sys/firmware/efi/ exists. If it does, the boot was done in uefi mode.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

On 28/12/2021 15:57, Grimble wrote:
> On 27/12/2021 18:00, David W. Hodgins wrote:
>> On Mon, 27 Dec 2021 11:23:58 -0500, Grimble
>> <grimble@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
>>
> SNIP
>>
Thanks Aragorn, David. Reinstalled from the correct partition of my USB
stick and now everythings OK.

--
Grimble
Registered Linux User #450547
Machine 'Bach' running Plasma 5.20.4 on 5.15.6-desktop-2.mga8 kernel.
Mageia release 8 (Official) for x86_64