rEFInd Bootloader doesn't show up in UEFI after cashyOS install

Issues & Assistance
1

Hi there,

I’m a newbie to CashyOS and Arch Linux but I’m happy to finally change from windows to Linux gaming. Still Windows needs to be installed alongside with CashyOS. So, I opted for a separate NVME just for Cashy. I installed it with rEFInd restarted but ran into the issue that I can’t find a bootable drive in my UEFI menu.

These are the steps I already did:

  1. checked efibootmgr after install but before restart: Boot0003* rEFInd Boot Manager was there as expected

  2. checked efibootmgr after restart: Boot0003 rEFInd was gone

  3. refind-install:

    image
    image1732×1304 393 KB

    Boot0003 came back.

  4. restarted: can’t find the device in UEFI, starts into Windows

Little hardware info: I’m using a msi z490 gaming plus board.

I’m about to install CashyOS with systemd-boot but my goal is to get it running with rEFInd.

Do you have any tips?

Thanks in advance,

ad0R

2

wiki.cachyos: rEFInd

> Incompatible with some MSI boards (due to UEFI spec violations).

3

I saw that, it’s also mentioning:
”Can have issues (workarounds required)”

and

“Fixable with a workaround, but requires extra steps.”

I’m wondering what is the workaround.

4

don’t know cause never used a MSI board
the workaround would be specific to that…

5

If rEFInd does not appear in the UEFI boot menu after installation, you may need to manually create a boot entry using efibootmgr .

For an example only, if the ESP is on /dev/sda1 , run: efibootmgr --create --disk /dev/sda --part 1 --loader /EFI/refind/refind_x64.efi --label "rEFInd Boot Manager" --unicode .

If rEFInd is installed in the default fallback path, copying the refind_x64.efi file to /EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi on the ESP

But wouldn’t it be easier to install rEFInd on a small USB Thumb drive and boot from that. (More on that if your interested)