I hope I'm not posting this in the wrong place (and if I am, please direct me to where you think would be a better place to post it) as this doesn't relate entirely to Linux and is really more to do with Boot.
For background info, the machine is an Asus F-551-M which came with Windows 8 pre-installed (I then added Ubuntu later, which worked reasonably happily for a short time before problems started - it didn't bother me too much at the time though because I never used Windows).
I've had problems with Windows 8 dual-booting with Ubuntu for a while so I tried starting again from scratch. I removed (using OS-Uninstaller) my Windows partition and completely reinstalled. Everything was OK and I was able to access Windows, but not Ubuntu (even by the long route you should be able to when Windows hogs the boot). I then used the Boot Repair tool within Ubuntu Live to fix this, which returned Grub and I was momentarily pretty happy.
However, I now have similar problems to those I had previously and am hoping there's something fairly simple I can do to sort it out.
Now when I get to the Grub menu, I have the following boot options (numbered for easy reference):
- Ubuntu
- Advanced Options for Ubuntu
- Windows UEFI bootmgfw.efi
- Windows Boot UEFI loader
- EFI/Ubuntu/MokManager.efi
- Windows Boot Manager (on dev/sda2)
- System Setup
The Ubuntu boot works without a problem. I haven't tried 2 as it's presumably irrelevant to determining the problem.
- 3 goes into "preparing automatic repair" then "Automatic Repair couldn't repair your PC"
- 4 leaves me with a black background and the blue window silhouette under which dots eternally circle
- 5 leads to "SHIM KEY MANAGEMENT" "Press any key to continue", after which I get three options "Continue Boot", "Enroll key from disk" and "Enroll hash from disk".
- 6 continues to "preparing automatic repair" then "Diagnosing your PC" then "checking disk for errors - this might take over an hour" then "AUTOMATIC REPAIR" then leaves me a message "Logfile: C:\Windows\System32\Logfiles\Srt\SrtTrail.txt" before giving me the options "Shut Down" or "Advanced Options" (which include all the standard options "Continue" (which goes back to grub), "Use a device", "Troubleshoot" and "Turn off").
- 7 Leads to my BIOS
I went in with GParted (within Ubuntu Live USB) again to check the partitions and they are as follows:
- SDA1 Fat32 boot
- SDA2 ext4
- unallocated
- SDA4 unknown msftres
- SDA5 ntfs msftdata
- SDA6 linux-swap
- unallocated
- SDB1 fat43 /cdrom boot/lba (the Ubuntu live USB presumably)
In addition, I noted the Boot Repair log when I made the adjustments just before the Windows boot problem:
Any help you could give would be much appreciated as I will need Windows for work soon. Thanks in advance.