Boot Failure: Dell Latitdue 5491

[jake-...@uptimecomputing.com]

I have been trying to get Qubes installed again and have not been successful.  First I tried on a Precision 5530 but nvidia can't be disabled and nothing seemed to be working right.  I purchased a Dell Latitude 5491 specifically for Qubes and seem to be having all the same problems.  I'm able to enable legacy boot mode and run through the installer that way, but then I get a drive that has no bootable partition.  I'm not finding anything in the documentation other than run the installer and go from there.  Are there any special steps that need to be performed to get a recent model laptop to boot Qubes after installing in legacy boot mode?

[jake-...@uptimecomputing.com]

I have tried the troubleshooting steps "Installation finished but “Qubes” boot option is missing and xen.cfg is empty" but I get the error when trying to create efi boot entry "EFI variables are not support on this system."  Seems it's safe to assume this is yet another unsupported laptop.  I've yet to run Qubes on hardware that's less than 5 years old.

[awokd]

jake-...@uptimecomputing.com:

If you're doing a legacy boot, EFI is effectively turned off so you
won't see a xen.cfg etc. You might need to add the hard drive in your
BIOS settings boot order in legacy mode, even if it's already in there
in UEFI mode. Also, what happened when you first tried to install Qubes
in EFI (non-legacy) mode?

[Jake Knobloch]

Thank you for the suggestions.  First, the installer would not finish
booting in EFI mode.  With EFI and secure boot turned on, I get the
message saying "Operating System Loader failed signature verification." 
With mode EFI and secure boot off I see 4 lines of output, something
about xen, something about bootx64.cfg, then vmlinuz, and last line is
initrd.  After that the screen goes blank and ctrl-alt-del does not
work, box is locked up.  One press of the power button and it shuts
right off.

I have looked in the bios and I am not able to add the hard drive to
legacy boot mode.  The Dell Latitude 5491 bios has the message saying
"Legacy External Devices boot mode does not support OS boot on internal
storage[...]"

[awokd]

Jake Knobloch:

Try the steps in this section:
https://www.qubes-os.org/doc/uefi-troubleshooting/#installation-freezes-before-getting-to-anaconda-qubes-40,
then attempt a reinstall in UEFI mode. Adding that nouveau.modeset=0
line could also permit your install image to work on the 5530. If you
still have no joy getting it installed on the 5491, try the section
after about disabling runtime services. That's really a last resort
though, because it makes every Xen update a pain.

[Jake Knobloch]

Success on the Latitude!  Thanks for the suggestion.  I was able to
install and configure Qubes using the above troubleshooting.

I did try the nouveau setting on the Precision 5530 just now, along with
the other 2 settings.  Same result, I see the 4 lines of output, plus 2
more that look like memory addresses, then blank screen for about 10
seconds, then it reboots.  I no longer need to run Qubes on the
Precision, but am happy to try further testing if there are any suggestions.

[awokd]

Jake Knobloch:

>> Try the steps in this section:
>> https://www.qubes-os.org/doc/uefi-troubleshooting/#installation-freezes-before-getting-to-anaconda-qubes-40,
>>
>> then attempt a reinstall in UEFI mode. Adding that nouveau.modeset=0
>> line could also permit your install image to work on the 5530. If you
>> still have no joy getting it installed on the 5491, try the section
>> after about disabling runtime services. That's really a last resort
>> though, because it makes every Xen update a pain.
>>
> Success on the Latitude!  Thanks for the suggestion.  I was able to
> install and configure Qubes using the above troubleshooting.
>
> I did try the nouveau setting on the Precision 5530 just now, along with
> the other 2 settings.  Same result, I see the 4 lines of output, plus 2
> more that look like memory addresses, then blank screen for about 10
> seconds, then it reboots.  I no longer need to run Qubes on the
> Precision, but am happy to try further testing if there are any
> suggestions.
>

That's about the only nvidia trick I know; I don't use them myself. Glad
it's working on the Latitude, though.