Unable to detect NVMe drive when booting Clonezilla in UEFI mode
A partition and disk imaging/cloning program
Brought to you by:
steven_shiau
Menu
▾
▴
#289 Unable to detect NVMe drive when booting Clonezilla in UEFI mode
So, I'm trying to image some Dell Optiplex 7040 desktops. They have NVMe Toshiba solid state drives on Intel Q170 chipsets.
Booting in UEFI mode, using both the "stable - 2.5.2-31" AND the "alternative stable - 20170905-zesty" Clonezilla builds, I was unable to detect the Toshiba NVMe drives. Once I turned off Secure Boot, and started booting in regular BIOS mode, I was able to detect the drives and image them... but then Windows fails to boot off of them.
I'm suspicious that I might need to perform the entire imaging process under UEFI mode for it to work, and I can't - for the life of me - figure out why it'd be able to detect an NVMe SSD in BIOS mode, but NOT in UEFI mode.
Did you try the latest testing Clonezilla live, like 2.5.5-19 or 20180102-*?
http://clonezilla.org/downloads.php
They come with newer Linux kernel so it might support your hardware better.
Steven
As I understand it, the main branch of Clonezilla does not work in UEFI mode. The I tried 20180102-bionic, and during the "ocs-scan-disk" part, it was still unable to detect the NVMe drive.
"As I understand it, the main branch of Clonezilla does not work in UEFI mode. " -> No, it does work for uEFI mode, just does NOT support secure boot. Hence if you want to use it, disable secure boot in your uEFI setting.
Steven
Can confirm this is still an issue with the most recent version alternative-stable-20190420-disco. The workaround is to use legacy BIOS boot. Another is to swap to ACHI instead of RAID/IntelRST in the UEFI bios. Even if the drive is not configured as RAID this option makes the drive invisible with a normal UEFI boot. This is also true for the complete Ubuntu distro, not just clonezilla. The difference in raid support between them (dmraid vs mdraid) does not affect things.
Please give testing Clonezilla live >= 2.6.2-10 or 20190628-eoan-* a try:
https://clonezilla.org/downloads.php
Steven
Hi Steven,
I just tested 2.6.2-10 with a Dell Precision and NVMe. The drive was still invisible to Clonezilla. Used the AHCI work around I've been using.
Have you tried 20190707-eoan amd64? It uses Linux kernel 5.x so maybe it supports your hardware:
https://clonezilla.org/downloads.php
Steven
Last edit: Steven Shiau 2019-07-14
I tried both 20190707-disco and eoan, there is no change in behaviour. I think in my case this is to do with the treatment of the RAID flag in UEFI boot, when RAID is not actually set up.
So do you know any version of GNU/Linux which can detect your NVMe device? If so, please tell us, and also let us know the Linux kernel version, and the RAID configuration.
Thanks.
Steven
Hi,
try changing the BIOS setting as folows:
1. cheeck that your SATA setings ar on "AHCI".
2. UEFI Boot Path Security set to "Never".
3. Secure Boot Enable set to “Disabled”
worked for me on a dell computer.
source:
https://jasoncoltrin.com/2018/02/09/how-to-clone-a-dell-optiplex-7050-m-2-nvme-hard-drive-with-clonezilla-and-an-external-usb-hdd/
@Guy,
Thank you for sharing your solution.
Steven
In the bios, I changed sata settings to AHCI (instead of Raid).
It also worked for me !
Thank you !
As I learned here, changing from RAID to AHCI allowed Clonezilla to recognize the SSD on a Dell OptiPlex 3090 even with Secure Boot enabled. Thank you! After imaging, I will change back to RAID so that the computer will boot. I don't have spare hardware to test the saved image. Does the SATA Operation setting (AHCI or RAID) affect the saved image?
"Does the SATA Operation setting (AHCI or RAID) affect the saved image?" -> Normally it should be OK if you keep the saving and restoring in the same mode.
Steven