[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread] 

List:       gentoo-user
Subject:    Re: [gentoo-user] updating /boot directory EFI
From:       Michael <confabulate () kintzios ! com>
Date:       2023-04-17 11:56:49
Message-ID: 7648906.lvqk35OSZv () lenovo ! localdomain
[Download RAW message or body]

On Monday, 17 April 2023 00:29:49 BST Arsen Arsenović wrote:
> Wol <antlists@youngman.org.uk> writes:
> > On 16/04/2023 22:30, Mitch D. wrote:
> >> Wol, can you elaborate on why you think Grub is deprecated on EFI
> >> systems?
> > 
> > Because EFI is a boot manager?
> 
> That is not the case any more than the classic IBM PC boot procedure is.
> There is technical capability for UEFI firmware to act in such a manner,
> but, in practice, this is not at all the case.
> 
> The technical capability comes from the fact that boot entities have a
> lil' bit of metadata attached to them.

The ability of UEFI to boot linux kernels, as long as they are built with the 
EFI boot stub enabled, may render 3rd party boot managers and their boot 
loaders redundant.  However, as already mentioned below, the flexibility and 
customisability of GRUB and other boot manager exceeds any UEFI firmware I've 
come across.


> > Why chain-load boot managers?
> 
> In theory, EFI implementations should provide boot
> managers. Unfortunately, in practice these boot managers are often so
> poor as to be useless. The worst I've personally encountered is on
> Gigabyte's Hybrid EFI, which provides you with no boot options
> whatsoever, beyond choosing the boot device (hard disk vs. optical disc,
> for instance). I've heard of others that are just as bad. For this
> reason, a good EFI boot manager—either standalone or as part of a boot
> loader—is a practical necessity for multi-booting on an EFI
> computer. That's where rEFInd comes into play.
>   - https://rodsbooks.com/refind/

I've stopped using GRUB and have been using the UEFI firmware to boot directly 
Gentoo for more than 10 years now.  Given I have also flashed some of the 
MoBos' chipset with new UEFI firmware a dozen times or more, I have not 
experienced any MoBo failures as yet.  Also, the ESP partition formatted with 
FAT32 has remained quite resilient too.  No loss of data or fs corruption yet 
(keeps fingers crossed and checks backups).

My particular systems setup and use case suits this approach, but I appreciate 
people who multiboot daily/frequently, or need to boot LiveISOs off the disk 
may find GRUB and friends to be a more suitable solution.



[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread]