Dell Latitude E6420 stucked on the Dell Logo after installing Solus

kakangocthien109

Hi guys, I've just hand on an old laptop from a family member. It's currently running Windows 7, so I upgraded BIOS to A25 (at that time, W7 UEFI boot fine) and installed Solus Budgie 4.3 this morning. But it cannot reboot! It's just stucked at Dell Logo, although I pressed F12, F2 or F9. Anyone know how to fix this? :

Axios

kakangocthien109 Try booting off iso again to see if its not a bios issue from upgrade my luck with dell they usually play nice with linux. did win7 run before upgrade? Might be one those win issues I usually wipe my drives before i install an os so everything is fresh unless you wanted to dual boot? You can always go dell website and put service tag in and always download os that came with laptop(just info) I havent done any dual booting if thats what you are doing so wouldnt be much help. A25 sounds right on bios.

stalebrim

kakangocthien109 I managed to brick at least two 6220's by force shutting them down when a live environment was running. No clue what causes that, but I guess your situation is similar. It will just stay forever at Dell logo and removing battery or clearing CMOS won't help. Guess it's some very weird BIOS bug in that era Latitudes.

kakangocthien109

Axios Yes, W7 UEFI ran before and after upgrade.
I install Solus in the entire disk, not dual-boot. BTW, Dell e6420 is a certified model with solus!

Katoa

Maybe getting into the bios is just a key-press timing issue...

Searched around for some Dell forum posts about problems getting into bios:
"When you see the same splash screen, hit <F2> key repeatedly to get into the BIOS setup. It is a timing issue."

"I downloaded the manual and it stated that if you press the key too early, it will be ignored. That is what was happening. When the prompt to enter F12 for boot settings was displayed, I pressed it several times quickly and got into the menu where there is a choice to enter BIOS setup. F2 also works directly.'

"Please connect an external keyboard and tap F2 and check if system enters the BIOS page? Also try Fn + F2 to enter the BIOS."

Also... when the bios is set to UEFI, you need to make sure that :

Secure Boot needs to be disabled.
Your disk is required to be GPT formatted.

Source: https://getsol.us/articles/installation/disks/en/

kakangocthien109

Katoa It's not that man, the monitor still display "Entering to one-time boot menu" or "Entering to Setup..."
But then it's still stuck at the Dell Logo >.<

Girtablulu

secure boot etc is deactivated ?

Katoa

As i understand it entering your laptop's BIOS is the main problem. I would try to reset the CMOS/BIOS by removing the CMOS battery connection to the motherboard, leave it disconnected for 10 min before connecting it again, to see if you are able to enter the BIOS...

Or maybe try removing the harddrive first, to see if your are able to enter BIOS without it?

Here are some instructions on how to clear the CMOS/BIOS, but know that you do it at your own risk!:
https://www.parts-people.com/blog/2012/10/16/dell-latitude-e6420-cmos-battery-removal-and-installation/

brent

Katoa As i understand it entering your laptop's BIOS is the main problem. I would try to reset the CMOS/BIOS by removing the CMOS battery connection to the motherboard, leave it disconnected for 10 min before connecting it again, to see if you are able to enter the BIOS...

Or maybe try removing the harddrive first, to see if your are able to enter BIOS without it?

Good tricks to know. Battery removal solves problems like this for sure. But man I have solved more problems in this vein by removing/replacing the pin jumpers or whatever they are called on the mobo. 2 cents.

Axios

https://www.dell.com/support/kbdoc/en-bs/000128700/how-to-use-forced-epsa-to-recover-from-post-or-boot-failure-on-dell-latitude-pcs

https://www.pctechbytes.com/dell/how-to-run-dell-psa-diagnostics/
If that didnt work i would remove hdd and try booting and trying the above.