I have a working linux system on a disk (mbr) with syslinux as its bootloader.
Now I have a new motherboard that boots uefi only, otherwise the
graphics-card (built in an amd cpu) does not work.
So no graphics output in csm compatibility mode.
Can I use refind (installed to an usb-flashdrive) to boot this disk/linux-system from of
the new motherboard?
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Yes, with a few caveats. In some cases, the USB image that I provide should do the trick as-is. In some cases, though, you may need to create a /boot/refind_linux.conf file (see the information on this topic late in this page) to hold custom kernel options. If the installation is very old or if you've built a custom kernel that omits key EFI functionality (like support for GPT disks or explicit EFI support), then some things might not work optimally, but a distribution installed on an MBR disk should still work under EFI.
In the long run, you'd be best served to create an EFI System Partition (ESP) on the hard disk and install Linux there. You can do this even without converting from MBR to GPT, although that is possible. You'll probably need to clear some space on the hard disk by shrinking a partition to make about 550 MiB available. I recommend shrinking from the end of a partition; this will be safer and faster than shrinking from the start.
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I have a working linux system on a disk (mbr) with syslinux as its bootloader.
Now I have a new motherboard that boots uefi only, otherwise the
graphics-card (built in an amd cpu) does not work.
So no graphics output in csm compatibility mode.
Can I use refind (installed to an usb-flashdrive) to boot this disk/linux-system from of
the new motherboard?
Yes, with a few caveats. In some cases, the USB image that I provide should do the trick as-is. In some cases, though, you may need to create a
/boot/refind_linux.conf
file (see the information on this topic late in this page) to hold custom kernel options. If the installation is very old or if you've built a custom kernel that omits key EFI functionality (like support for GPT disks or explicit EFI support), then some things might not work optimally, but a distribution installed on an MBR disk should still work under EFI.In the long run, you'd be best served to create an EFI System Partition (ESP) on the hard disk and install Linux there. You can do this even without converting from MBR to GPT, although that is possible. You'll probably need to clear some space on the hard disk by shrinking a partition to make about 550 MiB available. I recommend shrinking from the end of a partition; this will be safer and faster than shrinking from the start.