Cannot boot Linux Mint on HP envy m6

M

milkduds38

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I recently found out about dual booting and i wanted to try it myself, but when i boot Linux mint(I properly installed the ISO) it brings me to the advanced repair menu. Is there a way to fix this? And will it corrupt my laptop because i wouldn't really want that to happen.
Model: HP envy m6
 


A quick Google tells me your laptop is running Windows 8 or 8.1, and that you have a UEFI type BIOS. You can correct me if that's not the case. The UEFI system makes booting and installing Linux very difficult sometimes.

Before you do much else, I would highly recommend that you make a set of recovery DVD's. There should be a built-in HP Recovery Manager app that will do this. These DVD's will allow you to get Windows reinstalled if something goes wrong.

I am wrestling with a differrent HP model laptop, and it is extremely difficult to get Linux working on this model. Even though I have been able to get Linux installed, it only boots about half the time, and it freezes on shut down 100% of the time. Your model may be more Linux-friendly than mine... I hope so. Linux used to be very straightforward to install on just about any kind of computer... but it is not always so easy now with UEFI.

Good luck!
 
How is it.....? :) Did you get it.....? :)
Sadly no, I looked into some other websites and apparently my model doesn't support dual booting. It does support booting from a usb but with no other OS installed.
 
I disagree. I think you _CAN_ dual boot if you want to work for it, but it may not be easy. I have had my HP netbook dual booting with Windows 8, but it has taken much trial and error to get it working. I've had to re-install Win8 twice now in the process... so like I said above, if you want to proceed, you should be sure to make a set of recovery DVD's so you can get Win8 back, if you want to keep it. You will almost certainly have to use a UEFI-friendly Linux distro if you want to dual boot, so that narrows down your possibilities also.

Here is a pretty good summary of what may be involved:
http://www.zdnet.com/article/seven-ways-to-set-up-multi-booting-with-windows-8-and-linux/

It's not that I recommend that you keep trying: that is up to you. I have been very frustrated with UEFI too. It would be MUCH EASIER to get an older, cheap laptop with a standard BIOS where Linux would install easily, and everything would probably work correctly. I am still not satisfied with the way HP and Linux get along on my netbook.

Good luck!
 
Sadly no, I looked into some other websites and apparently my model doesn't support dual booting. It does support booting from a usb but with no other OS installed.
Huh..... That's weird if some people are saying that, but definitely NOT True..... :) (Boolean humor there) But as atanere has said, you need to look for UEFI-friendly Linux Distros..... :) (Funny though, as my Asus x205TA Netbook hates Linux for the most part, TOO, though I HAVE been able to [of course] use Linux in Virtualbox under Windows..... :) )
 
You can dual boot with that model. I have seen it in person. You have to disable secure boot. For some reason HP made it difficult to add other secure keys to that particular models UEFI. Try Ubuntu or Fedora. They have official secure boot support.
Or disable secure boot:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn481258.aspx

then install the boot loader to the root partition and set it to default in the UEFI.
 
@ryanvade is right: HP has made UEFI difficult... more difficult than it should be really.

My HP netbook (11-010dx) will not play nice with the latest Fedora or any of the latest *buntu varieties (all hang on boot and shutdown). The best solution in my case, so far, has been the latest openSUSE (13.2). It properly installed in UEFI and has had very few issues. About the only problem I have with it is that I can't make it the default boot. Well, not yet anyway... I'm still working on it. So I have to hit ESC at boot up and use the UEFI boot selection to choose openSUSE, or else it goes into Windows 8.

Strangely, an older verion of Linux Mint (13) installed okay and did not hang on boot and shutdown. But it didn't recognize the wifi adaptor and it took a bit to find and install the driver for it manually.

Fedora and Ubuntu (or Mint, and others) are great distros... but if they don't work for you either, give openSUSE a chance too.

Good luck!
 
That's a very comprehensive article for Ubuntu installs with Win8. Maybe it will help @milkduds38 to get it working. I was able to install Ubuntu (and others) but the hanging at boot and shutdown was too much. I tried about a dozen different workarounds found with Google (mostly changing power settings by editing grub boot commands) but none of them worked for me. The openSUSE distro is the only install that has went well with UEFI.

I also finally got Linux to be the default boot, but it was as difficult as UEFI to work around. This HP netbook is so Windows-centric that it is a fight all the way to do anything with it. Modifying the boot order with efibootmgr in Linux seemed to save my changes, but at boot time it would still go to Windows only. The hack that finally worked was to copy the grubx64.efi bootloader to the /efi/microsoft/boot/ partition and then rename it to the Windows bootloader, bootmgfw.efi -- this is just about a last resort method.

Here is a good source for information and for an independent bootloader option:
http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/

I never got rEFInd to work either, but it looks like it would work for many users. Still, his information was very helpful for anyone struggling to understand UEFI.

Cheers!
 
thank you all for replying but, surprise surprise im building a gaming pc this month so there really isn't any need for this thread anymore XD
 

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