On a Dell Inspiron 3493 laptop with a Windows 10, 64 bit preinstalled, I have tried to test some Linux distributions (Linux Mint 19.3 Cinnamon 32 bit, Linux Lite 64 bit last version). I created bootable usb by RUFUS.
Unfortunately, by pressing F12 at startup, the option for booting from usb is not shown. By pressing F12, two options appear as UeFI boot devices: 1- Windows boot manager, 2- UEFI hard drive, by pressing both option the Windows 10 is started.
I have tested many options in the bios (for example, disabling secure boot) but the usb boot option does not appear
In the bios, it is noted that "the legacy boot option is not supported on this platform". If that matters, the bios exactly looks like the one given in this video
I cannot use the answers given in Booting from USB when BIOS doesn't support it? because the device does not have CD DVD rom drive.
82 Answers
The options are:
- Use an UEFI-bootable Linux image.
UEFI is certainly not incapable of booting from CDs and external disks. However, you're probably aware that it uses a different bootloader format than BIOS did – it doesn't boot from MBR, it wants an .efi file on a FAT partition – and the same applies to USB sticks just as well as it does for internal drives.
So it's generally up to the distro to ensure that their provided USB stick images are UEFI bootable in addition to being BIOS bootable, and even today not all distributions do that! For example, Arch and Ubuntu are UEFI-compatible but Slax is not.
Make sure the USB stick has a file \EFI\Boot\Bootx64.efi, which will be used as the bootloader for removable drives.
If you're building the bootable USB locally (using Rufus), then you must enable UEFI support in Rufus as well. There's a drop-down list where you need to select "Target system: UEFI" or "BIOS and UEFI" – this will make sure the correct filesystem type is used, etc. Again, afterwards make sure the Bootx64.efi file is present at the correct location.
1Legacy is currently still supported on every UEFI system as far as I know, but enabling secure boot will disable legacy support.
Restart your computer and enter the BIOS. Search for an option called Secure Boot, and disable it. Legacy devices will now become available, or alternatively, the option to enable legacy support will no longer be greyed out, so you can enable it in the BIOS.
Do note, as long as secure boot is disabled, you cannot boot into an OS that was installed using Secure Boot. But you can reinstall windows using legacy. Also, make sure you are not running an install from linux, as it will not detect the windows install with secure boot disabled so it will likely think there is no OS installed.
If you are unsure, make backups. Actually, that is always a good idea.
If it is your idea to just test linux distro's, I recommend to install them inside a virtual machine either by using Microsoft Hyper-V, or Oracle VM. Other VM software can also be used, but I only have experience with these two, and know they are really good. My preference actually goes to Oracle VM over Hyper-V.
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