Originally written: 3/14/2012; last Web page update: -12/8/2014, referencing rEFInd 0.8.4
+3/1/2015, referencing rEFInd 0.8.7This Web page is provided free of charge and with no annoying outside ads; however, I did take time to prepare it, and Web hosting does cost money. If you find this Web page useful, please consider making a small donation to help keep this site up and running. Thanks!
@@ -186,14 +186,18 @@ href="mailto:rodsmith@rodsbooks.com">rodsmith@rodsbooks.comI provide RPM and Debian package files for rEFInd; and starting with version 0.8.4, I'm maintaining an Ubuntu PPA for rEFInd. If you have a working RPM-based or Debian-based Linux installation that boots in EFI mode, using one of these files is likely to be the easiest way to install rEFInd: You need only download the file and issue an appropriate installation command. In some cases, double-clicking the package in your file manager will install it. If that doesn't work, a command like the following will install the RPM on an RPM-based system:
+I provide RPM and Debian package files for rEFInd; and starting with version 0.8.1, I'm maintaining an Ubuntu PPA for rEFInd. If you have a working RPM-based or Debian-based Linux installation that boots in EFI mode, using one of these files is likely to be the easiest way to install rEFInd: You need only download the file and issue an appropriate installation command. In some cases, double-clicking the package in your file manager will install it. If that doesn't work, a command like the following will install the RPM on an RPM-based system:
-# rpm -Uvh refind-0.8.4-1.x86_64.rpm+
# rpm -Uvh refind-0.8.7-1.x86_64.rpm
On a Debian-based system, the equivalent command is:
-# dpkg -i refind_0.8.4-1_amd64.deb+
# dpkg -i refind_0.8.7-1_amd64.deb
Either command produces output similar to that described for using the install.sh script, so you can check it for error messages and other signs of trouble. The package file installs rEFInd and registers it with the EFI to be the default boot loader. The script that runs as part of the installation process tries to determine if you're using Secure Boot, and if so it will try to configure rEFInd to launch using shim; however, this won't work correctly on all systems. Ubuntu 12.10 users who are booting with Secure Boot active should be wary, since the resulting installation will probably try to use Ubuntu's version of shim, which won't work correctly with rEFInd. The shim program provided with more recent versions of Ubuntu should work correctly.
@@ -256,7 +260,7 @@ $ sudo apt-get install refindUnder Linux, install.sh will be most reliable if your ESP is already mounted at /boot or /boot/efi, as described in more detail in the Installing rEFInd Manually Using Linux section. (If you installed Linux in EFI mode, chances are your ESP is properly mounted.) If your ESP is not so mounted, install.sh will attempt to locate and mount an ESP, but this action is not guaranteed to work correctly. If you run install.sh from a BIOS/legacy-mode boot, particularly on a computer that also runs Windows, you should be aware that the tricks the script uses to install itself from BIOS mode are rather delicate. You can convert to a more conventional configuration using the mvrefind.sh script after you've booted in EFI mode.
-Prior to version 0.8.4, install.sh installed rEFInd to the OS X root partition by default. I changed this because the default configuration for OS X 10.10 ("Yosemite") makes this placement unusable. Instead, install.sh now installs to the ESP under OS X, just as it does under Linux; however, the default installation location under OS X is EFI/BOOT/ rather than EFI/refind/. This difference accommodates a quirk of Apple's EFI, which sometimes imposes a 30-second delay when using anything but the EFI/BOOT location. If you're upgrading a working install of rEFInd to the OS X root partition, it's best to pass the --notesp option to install.sh. This option is described in more detail shortly.
+Prior to version 0.8.4, install.sh installed rEFInd to the OS X root partition by default. I changed this because the default configuration for OS X 10.10 ("Yosemite") makes this placement unusable. Instead, install.sh now installs to the ESP under OS X, just as it does under Linux. If you're upgrading a working install of rEFInd to the OS X root partition, it's best to pass the --notesp option to install.sh. This option is described in more detail shortly.
A sample run under Linux looks something like this:
@@ -470,7 +474,7 @@ Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on /dev/sda1 191284 16604 174681 9% /boot/efi - +This example shows that /dev/sda1 is mounted at /boot/efi, which is a typical configuration. (The ESP can be on another disk or partition, but /dev/sda1 is the most common place for an ESP.) If your output shows /boot or / under the Mounted on column, then your ESP isn't mounted. (An exception is if you're mounting the ESP at /boot. This is an unusual configuration. If you're using it, you can proceed, making suitable adjustments to subsequent commands.) If you get a df: `/boot/efi': No such file or directory error message, then the /boot/efi directory doesn't even exist. In such cases, you may need to jump through some extra hoops, as described on my EFI Boot Loader Installation page.
@@ -572,8 +576,8 @@ $ ioreg -l -p IODeviceTree | grep firmware-abiI've received a few reports of a sluggish boot process (a delay of about 30 seconds before starting rEFInd) on some Macs after installing rEFInd, as well as some other Mac-specific peculiarities. I've been unable to replicate thess problems myself, and their true causes remains mysterious to me. I have found several possible solutions, though: using the fallback filename, moving rEFInd to an HFS+ volume, clearing NVRAM entries, and fixing wake problems.
+I've received a few reports of a sluggish boot process (a delay of about 30 seconds before starting rEFInd) on some Macs after installing rEFInd, as well as some other Mac-specific peculiarities. I've been unable to replicate thess problems myself, and their true causes remains mysterious to me. I have found several possible solutions, though: Using the --shortform option, using the fallback filename, moving rEFInd to an HFS+ volume, clearing NVRAM entries, fixing wake problems, and fixing a failure to find Linux.
+ + +Prior to version 0.8.5, these instructions and the install.sh script omitted the --shortform option from the bless command when installing rEFInd to the ESP. An rEFInd user, however, discovered that using the option eliminated the 30-second delay, so it is now the default with 0.8.5's install.sh, and is specified in the instructions. If you installed rEFInd 0.8.4 or earlier, you may want to re-install or re-bless rEFInd using this option.
+ +There is one caveat, though: The man page for bless notes that --shortform notes that its use can come "at the expense of boot time performance." Thus, it's not clear to me that this option might not actually create problems on some computers. (It's eliminated the boot delay on my 2014 MacBook Air and has no detrimental effect on an old 32-bit Mac Mini that's never had a boot delay problem, though.) Thus, if you have problems with rEFInd 0.8.5 or later, you might try running bless, as described in Installing rEFInd Manually Using OS X's step 8, but omit the --shortform option.
I've received a few reports that installing rEFInd to the ESP using the fallback filename (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi on most systems, or EFI/BOOT/bootia32.efi on very old Macs) can work around a sluggish boot problem. In fact, since version 0.8.4, the install.sh script copies the rEFInd binary to this name when run under OS X. If you installed manually to another name, though, renaming (and re-blessing) the installation is worth trying.
+I've received a few reports that installing rEFInd to the ESP using the fallback filename (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi on most systems, or EFI/BOOT/bootia32.efi on very old Macs) can work around a sluggish boot problem. In fact, version 0.8.4's install.sh script copied the rEFInd binary to this name when run under OS X. (Version 0.8.5 switches to using --shortform with the more conventional EFI/refind/refind_x64.efi or EFI/refind/refind_ia32.efi name, as just noted.) If you installed to a name other than EFI/BOOT/BOOT{ARCH}, either manually or by using the 0.8.5 or later install.sh, renaming (and re-blessing) the installation is worth trying.
Unfortunately, I lack a recent Mac and so can't investigate these issues myself, so I'm dependent upon others (mostly non-programmers) to offer workarounds. This is the type of problem that really requires hands-on interactive debugging sessions with the code to stand any chance of finding a better solution.
+I've recently acquired a 2014 MacBook Air, but I haven't yet had the chance to try to reproduce this problem and find a workaround. It's on my to-do list, though.
+ + +Some users report that rEFInd doesn't detect Linux, or won't boot it when it is found. Broadly speaking, there are two common causes of this problem:
+ +If you suspect that your hybrid MBR is damaged, you can try re-creating it with my GPT fdisk (gdisk) program. The GPT fdisk hybrid MBR documentation covers this procedure in detail. You can run gdisk from either OS X or Linux, although you may need to install it, particularly in OS X.
+ +If you suspect driver problems, you'll need to mount your ESP (as described in the manual OS X installation instructions), locate the rEFInd drivers_x64 directory, and adjust its contents. Make sure you have a driver for the filesystem that holds your Linux kernel. If you don't know what filesystem this is, it's probably ext4fs. rEFInd ships with several filesystem drivers, including one for ext4fs. You should also remove unnecessary filesystem drivers. I've seen several reports of one driver interfering with others' operation. The biggest culprit seems to be the HFS+ driver when used on Macs.
+ +