Biosboot partition not recognized during installation

taren · April 19, 2023, 4:01am

When I try to install Rocky Linux 9.1 (from a USB device), the hard disk configuration process doesn’t recognize the pre-existing 1M (1024K) biosboot partition. This is preventing my being able to complete the installation process.

Here is the current layout of my primary drive:

Disk /dev/sdb: 3.64 TiB, 4000787030016 bytes, 7814037168 sectors
Disk model: ST4000NM0033-9ZM
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: A6127104-5631-C641-8605-A20E0F7B8F21

Device Start End Sectors Size Type
/dev/sdb1 2048 31250431 31248384 14.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb2 31250432 39063551 7813120 3.7G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb3 39063552 539064319 500000768 238.4G Linux swap
/dev/sdb4 539064320 1039065087 500000768 238.4G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb5 1039065088 1164064767 124999680 59.6G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb6 1164064768 1289064447 124999680 59.6G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb7 1289064448 1539063807 249999360 119.2G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb8 1539063808 1664063487 124999680 59.6G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb9 1664063488 6546876415 4882812928 2.3T Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb10 6546876416 7180425215 633548800 302.1G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb11 7180425216 7813974015 633548800 302.1G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb12 7813974016 7814035086 61071 29.8M EFI System
/dev/sdb13 7814035087 7814037134 2048 1M BIOS boot

Any help or advice on how to get past this would be greatly appreciated.

Taren

jbkt23 · April 19, 2023, 11:53am

The prerequisites are setting your board firmware to CSM only and the bios boot partition has to have the correct flag set which I have not been successful in setting with the tools I used. Others have been successful so it is just me. Disk sdb 12 is identified as EFI, is that just a fat 32 partition? Also it may be that the bios boot partition is too far back. I don’t think it needs to be the first but you are telling the system to use bios boot rules which does have limitations on the boot sector location.

taren · April 26, 2023, 10:36pm

I think that it’s being caused by the Rocky Linux distribution (or maybe Red Hat?), as I have no problem installing either Debian or Fedora with the biosboot partition where it is.

Xino · April 27, 2023, 8:10am

I, on the other hand, think you need use the canonical definition of MBR with BIOS boot.
MBR cannot work with disks that exceed 2 TB.
You use Disklabel type: gpt
UEFI will require a GPT formatted disk.
MBR read and located on first 512 bytes.
Bios boot search boot flag in to first primary partition.
MBR formatted disk “dos” only have up to four primary partitions.
Your partition /dev/sdb13 is at the end of the disk.

taren · May 1, 2023, 3:35pm

My point is that it’s only with Rocky Linux that I have installation problems. I’ve installed both Debian 11.7 and Fedora 38 within the last several days, with no problem.

taren · May 1, 2023, 3:50pm

I’ve also reconfigured my disk layout and put biosboot on the first partition, but still am unable to install Rocky Linux:

Disk /dev/sda: 3.64 TiB, 4000787030016 bytes, 7814037168 sectors
Disk model: ST4000NM0033-9ZM
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: A6127104-5631-C641-8605-A20E0F7B8F21

Device Start End Sectors Size Type
/dev/sda1 2048 4095 2048 1M BIOS boot
/dev/sda2 4096 20479 16384 8M EFI System
/dev/sda3 20480 29317119 29296640 14G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda4 29317120 37130239 7813120 3.7G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda5 37130240 84004863 46874624 22.4G Linux swap
/dev/sda6 84004864 552755199 468750336 223.5G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda7 552755200 611348479 58593280 27.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda8 611348480 669941759 58593280 27.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda9 669941760 699238399 29296640 14G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda10 699238400 933613567 234375168 111.8G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda11 933613568 5621112831 4687499264 2.2T Linux filesystem
/dev/sda12 5621112832 6717573119 1096460288 522.8G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda13 6717573120 7814035455 1096462336 522.8G Linux filesystem

As I’m using 4T disks, and am unwilling to lose about 2T of disk space, switching to using MBR is not an option.

jbkt23 · May 1, 2023, 9:51pm

So, why do you have an 8 MB EFI partition, sda2 in the list, if you are not using the UEFI capability of the computer?

Xino · May 2, 2023, 11:07am

Who, when and where said not to use the full volume of the disk?

taren please read => Red Hat Enterprise Linux Technology Capabilities and Limits - Red Hat Customer Portal

taren · May 10, 2023, 5:06am

I did… my system is not a production server; this is the way I prefer to set it up.

Irrespective of how my hard disk is partitioned, the fact remains that - with Rocky Linux - I am unable to get the installation process to recognize the biosboot (1024K) partition to be recognized, no matter where I place it in the partition list.

I have reinstalled both Debian 11.7 and Fedora 38; Debian does not require a biosboot partition, but Fedora does. There was no problem with my Fedora installation.

Again, the problem I’m having is that the Rocky Linux installation procedure does not recognize the biosboot partition which I have set up. Consequentially, I am unable to install Rocky Linux on my system.

iwalker · May 10, 2023, 7:01am

How have you created the biosboot partition? Could you not just let the Rocky installer create the biosboot partition instead of doing it prior to the installation of Rocky?

taren · May 10, 2023, 7:38am

There are multiple partitions which have data that I don’t want to lose, so the partitioning scheme is already set.

What’s actually occurring is that, although the biosboot partition is detected during file system allocation and setup, when I’m finished, the system always indicates that a biosboot partition of 1M needs to be created for booting, and I get an error condition which prevents me from continuing with the OS installation. I’ve tried setting the format flag for that specific partition as biosboot, but that hasn’t helped. The partition ‘disappears’ from the list of partitions, and I still have that error condition which prevents me from continuing with installation. If I discard all of my configuration, the biosboot partition reappears and I’m back to square one.

iwalker · May 10, 2023, 1:56pm

I’m having difficulty replicating this on a VM. First I set up the VM as a clean install with a 1MiB BIOS Boot partition, and a single / partition for the installation (it’s only a test), and it booted fine.

See the disk partitioning below:

[root@localhost ~]# fdisk -l
Disk /dev/vda: 40 GiB, 42949672960 bytes, 83886080 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: 0E3E8FA4-744F-439F-8E4A-A23D8A109A59

Device     Start      End  Sectors Size Type
/dev/vda1   2048     4095     2048   1M BIOS boot
/dev/vda2   4096 83884031 83879936  40G Linux filesystem

and gdisk:

[root@localhost ~]# gdisk -l /dev/vda
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 1.0.7

Partition table scan:
  MBR: protective
  BSD: not present
  APM: not present
  GPT: present

Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT.
Disk /dev/vda: 83886080 sectors, 40.0 GiB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512/512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): 0E3E8FA4-744F-439F-8E4A-A23D8A109A59
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
Main partition table begins at sector 2 and ends at sector 33
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 83886046
Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries
Total free space is 4029 sectors (2.0 MiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1            2048            4095   1024.0 KiB  EF02  
   2            4096        83884031   40.0 GiB    8300

I’ve then tried going into rescue mode from booting from the Rocky 9 ISO image, deleted everything, then created both the BIOS Boot and / partition manually. Now, rebooted again into the installation process to utilise the existing partitions. The BIOS Boot shows under Unknown, but I tick the box for reformatting it and then update the settings. It goes under the section for New Rocky 9.1 installation. I do the same for /dev/vda2 which is the / partition. I choose the mount point, and reformat.

Again, the system continued through the installation perfectly fine.

The options chosen with gdisk:

gdisk /dev/vda
n
1
Default Start Sector
+1024K
EF02
n
2
Default Start Sector
Default End Sector (to use remainder of disk)
8300
w

So something is definitely weird with your machine. A 1024K BIOS Boot partition can work perfectly fine.

The only time I do not see BIOS Boot as an option in the installer, is when the system is configured for UEFI instead of MBR. Your partition lists above do seem to show an EFI partition (as @jbkt23 mentioned before also), so perhaps the problem is your machine is running in UEFI mode instead of MBR? Usually you have either BIOS Boot (MBR), or UEFI (EFI), not both.

taren · May 11, 2023, 3:46am

Here is the output from both ‘fdisk -l’ and ‘gdisk -l’ for my primary hard drive (other than the number of partitions and the disk size, I don’t see any real difference between what I have and what Ian Walker posted):

I deleted the EFI partition prior to the latest installation of both Debian 11.7 and Fedora 38 (which recognized and used my biosboot partition), and it’s made no difference: I still have the same issue, where the installation program indicates that there is an error related to biosboot not being detected when I try installing Rocky 9.1.

root@jini:~# fdisk -l /dev/sdc
Disk /dev/sdc: 3.64 TiB, 4000787030016 bytes, 7814037168 sectors
Disk model: ST4000NM0033-9ZM
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: A6127104-5631-C641-8605-A20E0F7B8F21

Device Start End Sectors Size Type
/dev/sdc1 2048 4095 2048 1M BIOS boot
/dev/sdc2 4096 29300735 29296640 14G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc3 29300736 37113855 7813120 3.7G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc4 37113856 83988479 46874624 22.4G Linux swap
/dev/sdc5 83988480 552738815 468750336 223.5G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc6 552738816 611332095 58593280 27.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc7 611332096 669925375 58593280 27.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc8 669925376 699222015 29296640 14G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc9 699222016 933597183 234375168 111.8G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc10 933597184 6792972287 5859375104 2.7T Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc11 6792972288 7303503871 510531584 243.4G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdc12 7303503872 7814035455 510531584 243.4G Linux filesystem
root@jini:~# gdisk -l /dev/sdc
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 1.0.6

Partition table scan:
MBR: protective
BSD: not present
APM: not present
GPT: present

Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT.
Disk /dev/sdc: 7814037168 sectors, 3.6 TiB
Model: ST4000NM0033-9ZM
Sector size (logical/physical): 512/512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): A6127104-5631-C641-8605-A20E0F7B8F21
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
Main partition table begins at sector 2 and ends at sector 33
First usable sector is 2048, last usable sector is 7814037134
Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries
Total free space is 1679 sectors (839.5 KiB)

Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name
1 2048 4095 1024.0 KiB EF02
2 4096 29300735 14.0 GiB 8300
3 29300736 37113855 3.7 GiB 8300
4 37113856 83988479 22.4 GiB 8200
5 83988480 552738815 223.5 GiB 8300
6 552738816 611332095 27.9 GiB 8300
7 611332096 669925375 27.9 GiB 8300
8 669925376 699222015 14.0 GiB 8300
9 699222016 933597183 111.8 GiB 8300
10 933597184 6792972287 2.7 TiB 8300
11 6792972288 7303503871 243.4 GiB 8300
12 7303503872 7814035455 243.4 GiB 8300

taren · May 11, 2023, 4:18am

I just tried (for the 5th or 6 time) to install Rocky Linux 9.1, with no success. here are a couple of screen shots, showing my partition layout and the error message I’m getting.

taren · May 11, 2023, 4:26am

Here is a screen shot showing the partition layout without the error message (note that there is a biosboot partition in the layout):