I recently configured my computer to dual-boot between Windows 11 and Lubuntu. During the installation of Lubuntu, I set up the partitions as follows: I created an EFI System Partition (ESP) with a FAT32 filesystem and set its mount point to /boot/efi, marking it as 'boot'. I also set up a swap partition and a root partition with ext4 for Lubuntu, marking the root partition as 'bios-grub'. The dual-boot is working perfectly, but when I installed rEFInd, it went to /boot/efi/EFI/refind instead of /boot/efi/refind. This has me wondering if I made any mistakes with the partition settings, especially regarding the 'bios-grub' flag.
3 Answers
You did it right! Having a structure like /boot/efi/EFI/[OS]/[BootLoader] is normal in UEFI systems. As long as everything works, there's no need to fret about the layout of the directories. You're all set!
You haven't made a mistake in your installation process. Ubuntu's default is to use /boot/efi as the mount point for your EFI partition, which attaches all boot files into the EFI subdirectory. This is standardized behavior, so you’re fine!
The presence of the EFI directory on the ESP is completely expected. However, I noticed you flagged your Lubuntu root partition as 'bios-grub'. That flag is meant for legacy booting setups and isn't needed for UEFI systems like yours. If everything boots fine, there’s no immediate need to change it, but I’d advise against using that flag in the future. Also, for swap, consider zram instead of a separate partition; it can improve speed and reduce wear on SSDs!
Got it! So, I shouldn't have labeled the root partition as 'bios-grub'. I'll keep that in mind for future setups. And yes, I think I read about zram before. Thank you for that tip!
Thanks for confirming that! It's good to know I didn't mess things up with the partition flags.