[syslinux] Creating Syslinux UEFI usb boot

Ady ady-sf at hotmail.com
Mon Apr 18 10:28:35 PDT 2016


> I am looking for guides on how to create syslinux uefi bootable usb.
> A syslinux bootable usb is created already with vesamenu and luascripting.
> Want to set up the same thing to be UEFI compatible.
> 
> In this case I am booting an vmware esxi installer. /EFI/boot on the vmware ISO has the files BOOTX64.EFI and BOOTIA32.EFI that can be used on the usb. But these always go directly to boot.cfg, syslinux.cfg is never read and thus my boot menu is never shown, an I never get to use the lua scripting.
> 
> I guess syslinux has these efi files somewhere, but on Centos7 I have not found them even when I did install the syslinux package.
> 
> The general recipe that I have found is the following:
> - A "EFI/boot" folder for EFI boot, installed manually:
> - Copy all *.c32 objects from "/usr/lib/syslinux/efi64/"
> - Copy "syslinux.efi" to "bootx64.efi" in same folder as above
> - Edit "syslinux.cfg" in "EFI/boot"
> 
> 
> But as stated, can't find syslinux.efi
> Best regards
> 
 
 
Syslinux is not searching for any such "boot.cfg" file. This has to be 
either:
_ something INCLUDEd in your syslinux.cfg, or;
_ something INCLUDEd in your extlinux.conf, or;
_ something specific to Centos packages.

AFAIK, Centos7 uses Syslinux 4.xx, whereas the UEFI variants of 
Syslinux were introduced in v.6.xx.

Please note that the "syslinux.cfg" file for UEFI is not automatically 
related to the "syslinux.cfg" file for BIOS firmware; their locations 
are different.

You could try the built-in binaries already included in 6.04-pre1, 
downloaded from kernel.org. In that case, please remember that mixing 
the bootloader with c32 files from different versions / builds will 
generate problems, so using one (in your USB) means that you also need 
to update the others (in that same device).

Finally, if you are dd'ing an ISO image to your USB drive, it will fail 
to boot with current versions of syslinux.efi; only (V)FAT is currently 
supported (not ISO9660).

You might also be interested in using gptmbr.bin.

Regards,
Ady.
 
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