Failed to open \EFI\com.solus-project - Not Found

BuzzPCSOS

Axios Can't boot Solus as UEFI, can boot Spiral as UEFI so it seems to me that there is a different implementation of UEFI between the two OSs.
Just kicking around ideas as to what that might be.
No changes to BIOS but get different results.
This is not an attempt to dis Solus. To be fair Spiral was the only distro that I tried that would run and install as UEFI on my laptop. My motivation came when I thought wouldn't it be great if Solus could do that too.
The 'failed' message for the live and the installed versions of Solus are on screen for only a moment. Because the operating system does not actually fail to load but enters a compatibility mode where GPT is not supported it could be that many other users have the same issue but just haven't noticed.

Axios

BuzzPCSOS I understand fully
My point was If the live does not boot into efi not sure the installation will be proper
and thats what appears to be happening.

I think if solus was booting proper it all would work.

Thats whats going through my mind about as far as I have got

Got try understand boot sequence better and whats maybe producing that error.

BuzzPCSOS

WetGeek Strange but true. I was pretty blown away by it too especially since the installer identified the install method as UEFI and GPT.
I'm not sure if there is a way to check if the disc is MBR or GPT from KDE Partition Manager which was why I devised the test of mounting a GPT format USB drive to prove Legacy or UEFI system.
When the efi partition was not found the ability to access a GPT drive was taken away meaning that my OS would fail to load. This did not happen. I could boot live and access the root partition from a legacy boot option.

All true, and I am a little confused. Please disregard the path length theory as it is pretty much disproved.

brent

BuzzPCSOS could it be as easy as CSM on or off? I needed it on the get solus on the toshiba from ventoy. but once I gave the bios a password it open up secret settings that weren't there before that I had to activate. I always thought it was strange that some bios come with hidden layers

WetGeek

BuzzPCSOS I was pretty blown away by it too especially since the installer identified the install method as UEFI and GPT.

I'm totally out of ideas. If this were happening to me, we're at the the point where I would install from the Solus .ISO file one more time, being very careful to make every Calameres setting very carefully. I know for sure that your system requires a GPT partition table. Is this older computer one that you can do that?

BuzzPCSOS

brent Thanks for the suggestion.
As far as I can see Compatibility Support Module (CSM) is enabled by default because of the age of the laptop.
I can switch between UEFI and Legacy modes from within the BIOS.

BuzzPCSOS

WetGeek Thanks for your suggestions anyway. They certainly have given me some ideas to try in the near future.
My next plan is to remove my SSD and fit a hard drive.
Run the Solus in UEFI mode and take some screenshots of relevant places during install.
Use GPT formatted USB to test if Solus Live is in UEFI or Legacy
Try to mount the installed partition from within the Live environment.
If the install proves to be MBR then use KDE Partition Manager to wipe the drive, set GPT partition table and build EFI, Root, and Swap partitions to copy layout made by "erase disc" feature used above.
Re-enter the installer and try to use the "Replace a single partition" option to install Solus to Root.
Success to this point will depend on the installer having the same powers as Partition Manager to write to a GPT environment from within an MBR setup.
If everything spans out - Reboot, cross fingers and see what I get.

WetGeek

BuzzPCSOS write to a GPT environment from within an MBR setup.

The part that I'm missing is, "why is this an MBR setup? Does your computer require that for some reason? If your purpose is to install Solus on a computer, what does MBR have to do with it? Solus' requirement is GPT.

BuzzPCSOS

WetGeek I need to make an apology. I thought that I reinstalled from scratch when 4.6 came along but I must have only updated and split one partition into /root and /home. I certainly remembered booting into 4.6 and changing stuff.
A while back when I was on 4.5 I had a UEFI install of Solus. At some point I noticed that I was getting a Failed to open \EFI\com.solus-project - Not Found warning during boot. Everything else worked and updates continued to work so I did not worry too much. However I could no longer mount GPT formatted hard drives from an external USB device which was a nuisance.
Trying to install from Solus 4.6 iso onto a clean disc will only allow me Legacy (BIOS and GPT) and I get GRUB loader when I boot. If I override the installer and force an install onto a hard drive set up for EFI my system is unable to find the boot path when rebooted. My current install boots onto a GPT formatted drive but I still cannot mount any external GPT drives.
For me the original Failed to open \EFI\com.solus-project - Not Found was when I lost the ability to boot as UEFI with Solus. However I can still achieve UEFI boot and install when I use Spiral Linux.

Axios it seems a little pointless to worry about the Solus install at this point
when we know the live isnt booting properly.

You have summed up the whole thing right there. If my BIOS is wrong why does Spiral work the way I want.

Solus - No EFI GPT option

Spiral - With EFI and GPT

Computer boot screen showing option for legacy or UEFI

EDIT: Yes the hard drives in the pictures are different, that was because I had put my SSD back in before I realised that a picture of the Spiral setup screen would be needed.

Axios

BuzzPCSOS
Its not showing Uefi because of the efi/boot error.

Read back some if your using ventoy I would prob just burn iso direct and see what happens.

Why is it showing legacy Hdd you got Solus on it now?
When you have spiral installed does it show under Uefi boot.

brent

Axios Read back some if your using ventoy I would prob just burn iso direct and see what happens.

if he did not do that in this thread (forgot) I would recommend this too since a real usb iso behaves so much different than ventoy. I will remind you all of my track record: Ventoy laucn ISO/install bare metal iso= 50% success. Burned ISO than you can try distro and bare metal distro: 100% success. the mediums could be a variable. solus always successful on ventoy for me so now I am going backwards.

Axios (UEFI firmware fails to perform directory scan) so you get the (efi/boot) error
Why I have no idea at the moment
Note and since it cant find eufi it drops to bios which is what its suppose to do

some distros (arch) call it /boot/efi...who knows what installer is looking for.what is BIOS showing it?

@BuzzPCSOS leave target drive gpt but make no partitions and leave it all unallocated free space? that's worked for me.
when I ran into Satellite trouble I saw many people say make target drive brtfs...I did not.
your 'alongside options look weird. for solus pick NO Swap then make swap later that's the only way I got arch next to solus--don't ask.

the likely problem areas:
solus live
calmares in general
bios
destination drive
installation medium (ventoy or dedicated usb)

why haven't we ruled one of these out yet? if we rule one of these out the answer will fall like dominos methinks
sleepy brain cant move past that🙂 right now

Axios

I think at the moment this is what I think
(UEFI firmware fails to perform directory scan) so you get the (efi/boot) error
Why I have no idea at the moment
Note and since it cant find eufi it drops to bios which is what its suppose to do.

Seem like I went full circle..lol But after research understand better
Note am just talking about solus live.

BuzzPCSOS

@Axios and @brent Thank you for all your replies here. Your help and patience have been much appreciated.
To clarify I only want to install Solus, my reference to Spiral is because it still manages a UEFI boot.
My most recent install of Solus was from a DVD to rule out any USB issues. Install was ssllowww.

brent leave target drive gpt but make no partitions and leave it all unallocated free space? that's worked for me.

Then what? do I use the Erase Disc option, that should format the drive anyhow.
Currently running Legacy with a GPT hard drive. This is the default Solus install for Legacy systems because 'most' Legacy systems can use GPT. This is what caused my Tosh Satellite to fail install as it needed MBR and therefore a manual setup.

Sebastian

BuzzPCSOS So, I haven't been following this thread closely, but your reply about Install issues reminds me about my own situation. I have been testing Solus 4.6 ISO before release and also run into Installation issues. I have documented them in this issue

Bottom line is I also have an quite old HP Elite book, that only has experimental EFI support and installation fails in most cases.
Calamares installer recognizes it as BIOS and proceeds Installation with GPT partition, then fails to boot.
Calamares seems to be set up wrongly for old legacy BIOS systems.

I am on my phone, so writing sucks, but check out the issue I have linked.

Axios

I know but we using spiral as a trouble shooting aid
I am going to have to burn a spiral usb and look at it because I am at that point
I understand whats happening but have no clue to why at this point.

But like you say from some of the past posts in the forum the result from this may help
everyone.
Not sure what spiral is doing to work is common place because of the other distros you didnt get to work either.

I am in the USA am tired from last nite so got catch up sometime busy day today so may be awhile but will
give me time to think

Like I said when Solus does not boot to Eufi the boot shim is booting bios which at least that is working.
and you are installing to bios because its not seeing Eufi. (or something 1/2 ass.)

Mumbles but why!
ENQUIRING MINDS WANT TO KNOW!

brent

Axios I am in the USA am tired from last nite so got catch up sometime busy day today so may be awhile but will
give me time to think

yep--I'm one of those people that stay up with a calculator and explore the variables. It's sport to me every 4 years. But exhausting. My 55 political texts a day should stop now🙂

BuzzPCSOS

Although Spiral achieved UEFI boot there were errors that very briefly flashed up on the screen on the way.
When I get a moment I will try and get some footage of the process. It might shed light on what I should be looking at next.
Other than that I don't know how much of the initial boot from the iso is controlled by Calamares. I think the fault is more likely on my laptop than with Solus, maybe it is just a little more stringent about all the boxes being ticked than Spiral.

Axios

As always with weird issues I recommend bios update.
Got this from the thread if its your machine.
https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=g1npc&oscode=wlh&productcode=latitude-e5410
But its up to you.
Some the reason behind the above read online some issues being solved by a bios reset to defaults and
even extreme removing cmos bat.

2nd part
When you get the boot screen showing legacy and eufi does Solus show up under eufi?
If it dont show up under eufi you got add it manually.

(Just info)

Axios

This is interesting need further investigation
Forgot about my dell media laptop it runs librelec (Dell inspiron 15) Prob close same vintage
Soooooooooo I put my old Solus mate in usb and it booted fine.
Soooooooooo I put my 4.5 Budgie in usb and it failed and restarted
I tested it on my lenovo t420 and budgie booted fine.

Not sure if I want mess with stuff as its working will look at bios settings tho

Welp that was crash and burn got it to boot to legacy by toggling legacy/eufi and saving reboot
but Eufi it wont boot says (bad image) (Budgie 4.5)
I know this usb is good boot it all the time on other machines.

My librelec doesnt care boots from hdd either way. (legacy/Eufi)

NOTE: I just fixed this issue used gnome-disks and wrote the image and it booted just fine to Efi.
I Prob used Rufus to write it before in win7 it never really fails me until now.
Disks was so easy and painless not going say it works for everything but this it did.
(Dell is still set to legacy)

BuzzPCSOS

Axios Some good ideas here, thanks.
BIOS is allready A16, it's been there for a while.
New developments - Spiral is not the only distro that can boot and install UEFI. Solus 4.5 also does it out of the box. Updating to 4.6 breaks UEFI.
My original fail happened around March 2024 so I guess something in one of those updates is the culprit. They all arrive in the one update now so need to do a bit more digging to get an idea of what the culprit is.
At least I don't need to keep comparing Solus with Spiral. Now I can compare Solus with Solus!

BuzzPCSOS

This was the error message that flashed up for a moment when booting the Spiral iso.
Could not create MOKListXRT: Out of Resources Importing MOK states has failed. Import_mok_state () has failed: Out of Resources Continuing boot since secure mode is disabled
Which is interesting as secure boot is not featured in my BIOS. Is Solus UEFI boot being tripped up by an old fashioned instruction-set that does not support MOK in my BIOS?
If I do an internet search there are lots of information relating to this error message with fixes of varying levels of complexity. I do know that historically UEFI worked for Solus so I suppose the next simple step would be to try UEFI boot using older versions of Solus.
Edit:
Just booted into Solus Plasma 4.5 UEFI and installed from the iso.
No "Failed to load" messages and I have a UEFI install. During install Calamares showed EFI and GPT as the install method. I can mount external disks with GPT format.
Something has definitely changed between 4.5 and 4.6. It might just be that the UEFI BIOS on my old laptop is no longer supported. Is there a work round so that I can continue to use UEFI with 4.6 and beyond?

Edit 2:
After performing updates the Failed to open \EFI\com.solus-project - Not Found message was back.

Axios

BuzzPCSOS Well I would say thats a good Development tho it might not seem
like.
Man over the years process of elimination has always been one my best tools
otherwise one can end up chasing ones tail all the time.
Guess thats why I keep stuff to when I have problems with other stuff...lol

Note: Maybe if some dev watching may have some input more now that you have nailed it
at least to Solus.

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