EFIBOOTMGR

Section: (8)
Updated: 11 August 2005
Index Return to Main Contents

 

NAME

efibootmgr - manipulate the EFI Boot Manager  

SYNOPSIS

efibootmgr [ -a ] [ -A ] [ -b XXXX ] [ -B XXXX ] [ -c ] [ -d DISK ] [ -e 1|3|-1 ] [ -E NUM ] [ -g ] [ -H XXXX ] [ -i NAME ] [ -l NAME ] [ -L LABEL ] [ -n XXXX ] [ -N ] [ -o XXXX,YYYY,ZZZZ ... ] [ -O ] [ -p PART ] [ -q ] [ -t seconds ] [ -T ] [ -u ] [ -U XXXX ] [ -v ] [ -V ] [ -w ] [ -@ file ]

 

DESCRIPTION

efibootmgr is a userspace application used to modify the Intel Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) Boot Manager. This application can create and destroy boot entries, change the boot order, change the next running boot option, and more.

Details on the EFI Boot Manager are available from the EFI Specification, v1.02 or later, available from:
 <URL:http://developer.intel.com>

Note: efibootmgr requires that the kernel support access to EFI non-volatile variables (through /proc/efi/vars on 2.4 kernels, /sys/firmware/efi/vars on 2.6 kernels). modprobe efivars should do the trick.
 

OPTIONS

The following is a list of options accepted by efibootmgr:

-a | --active
Sets bootnum active
-A | --inactive
Sets bootnum inactive
-b | --bootnum XXXX
Modify BootXXXX (hex)
-B | --delete-bootnum
Delete bootnum (hex)
-c | --create
Create new variable bootnum and add to bootorder
-d | --disk DISK
The disk containing the loader (defaults to /dev/sda)
-e | --edd 1|3|-1
Force EDD 1.0 or 3.0 creation variables, or guess.
-E | --device NUM
EDD 1.0 device number (defaults to 0x80)
-g | --gpt
Force disk with invalid PMBR to be treated as GPT
-H | --acpi_hid XXXX
set the ACPI HID (used with -i)
-i | --iface NAME
create a netboot entry for the named interface
-l | --loader NAME
Specify a loader (defaults to \\elilo.efi)
-L | --label LABEL
Boot manager display label (defaults to "Linux")
-n | --bootnext XXXX
Set BootNext to XXXX (hex)
-N | --delete-bootnext
Delete BootNext
-o | --bootorder XXXX,YYYY,ZZZZ
Explicitly set BootOrder (hex)
-O | --delete-bootorder
Delete BootOrder
-p | --part PART
Partition number containing the bootloader (defaults to 1)
-q | --quiet
Quiet mode - supresses output.
--test filename
Don't write to NVRAM, write to filename.
-t | --timeout seconds
Boot Manager timeout, in seconds.
-T | --delete-timeout
Delete Timeout variable.
-u | --unicode | --UCS-2
pass extra command line arguments as UCS-2 (default is ASCII)
-U | --acpi_uid XXXX
set the ACPI UID (used with -i)
-v | --verbose
Verbose mode - prints additional information
-V | --version
Just print version string and exit.
-w | --write-signature
write unique signature to the MBR if needed
-@ | --append-binary-args
append extra variable args from file (use - to read from stdin). Data in file is appended as command line arguments to the boot loader command, with no modification to the data, so you can pass any binary or text data necessary.
 

EXAMPLES

1.
 

DISPLAYING THE CURRENT SETTINGS (MUST BE ROOT).

[root@localhost ~]# efibootmgr BootCurrent: 0004 BootNext: 0003 BootOrder: 0004,0000,0001,0002,0003 Timeout: 30 seconds Boot0000* Diskette Drive(device:0) Boot0001* CD-ROM Drive(device:FF) Boot0002* Hard Drive(Device:80)/HD(Part1,Sig00112233) Boot0003* PXE Boot: MAC(00D0B7C15D91) Boot0004* Linux

This shows:

*
BootCurrent - the boot entry used to start the currently running system
*
BootOrder - the boot order as would appear in the boot manager. The boot manager tries to boot the first active entry in this list. If unsuccessful, it tries the next entry, and so on.
*
BootNext - the boot entry which is scheduled to be run on next boot. This supercedes BootOrder for one boot only, and is deleted by the boot manager after first use. This allows you to change the next boot behavior without changing BootOrder.
*
Timeout - the time in seconds between when the boot manager appears on the screen until when it automatically chooses the startup value from BootNext or BootOrder.
*
Five boot entries (0000 - 0004), along with the active/inactive flag (* means active) and the name displayed on the screen.
2.
 

CREATING A NEW BOOT OPTION

An OS installer would call efibootmgr -c. This assumes that /boot/efi is your EFI System Partition, and is mounted at /dev/sda1. This creates a new boot option, called "Linux", and puts it at the top of the boot order list. Options may be passed to modify the default behavior. The default OS Loader is elilo.efi.

3.
 

CHANGING THE BOOT ORDER

Assuming the configuration in Example #1, efibootmgr -o 3,4 could be called to specify PXE boot first, then Linux boot.

4.
 

CHANGING THE BOOT ORDER FOR THE NEXT BOOT ONLY

Assuming the configuration in Example #1, efibootmgr -n 4 could be called to specify that the Linux entry be taken on next boot.

5.
 

DELETING A BOOT OPTION

Assuming the configuration in Example #1, efibootmgr -b 4 -B could be called to delete entry 4 and remove it from the BootOrder.

6.
 

CREATING NETWORK BOOT ENTRIES

A system administrator wants to create a boot option to network boot (PXE). Unfortunately, this requires knowing a little more information about your system than can be easily found by efibootmgr, so you've got to pass additional information - the ACPI HID and UID values. These can generally be found by using the EFI Boot Manager (in the EFI environment) to create a network boot entry, then using efibootmgr to print it verbosely. Here's one example: Boot003* Acpi(PNP0A03,0)/PCI(5|0)/Mac(00D0B7F9F510) \ ACPI(a0341d0,0)PCI(0,5)MAC(00d0b7f9f510,0) In this case, the ACPI HID is "0A0341d0" and the UID is "0". For the zx2000 gigE, the HID is "222F" and the UID is "500". For the rx2000 gigE, the HID is "0002" and the UID is "100". You create the boot entry with: efibootmgr -c -i eth0 -H 222F -U 500 -L netboot  

BUGS

Please direct any bugs, features, patches, etc. to Matt Domsch <Matt_Domsch@dell.com>.  

AUTHOR

This man page was generated by dann frazier <dannf@debian.org> for the Debian GNU/Linux operating system, but may be used by others.  

SEE ALSO

elilo(1)