REFIND as boot manager

Windows Tablets Hi12
1

HI12 has a fixed boot order prgrammed in BIOS / EFI settings. Therefor the tablet always starts Windows 10 even if e.g. Linux Mint is installed besides Windows as installation option.
After installing REFIND boot manager it created another line in the boot order list shown on BIOS boot page. It is also possible to change REFIND as number 1 in the boot order but after restarting the tablet windows boot manager returns in first position and starts Windows.
Does anybody know how to set REFIND as boot manager instead of the windows boot manager in the BIOS boot order?

2

I just replied your previous post without knowing that you already have refind installed. The trick here is that Chuwi Hi12 has two hardoded paths for booting: one for windows and another one for Android. Those two options can be set as default and disable the boot selector but those are the onlly two possible options. It will ignore what you set as default on the BIOS settings.
If you want to boot refind by default you will have to do two things:

  1. Move refind to the default Android bootloader path (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi). You will probably have it installed now at EFI/refind/refind_x64.efi instead).
  2. Change the efi variables so that the default option is now Android and not Windows (I understand by your previous post that you have Windows as default now).

In any case, refind will give you some added benefits but if you only need to be able to choose from Windows and Linux, you could use the default bootloader for that. Linux grub is usually already installed at EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi. The only change needed will be the efi variable as described in my other post here: Linux Mint 20 Cinnamon - working perfectly on Hi12 - #9 by rodriguezst

By the way, I am currently dualbooting ChromeOS on my Hi12 and I’m really happy with it. It is better designed for touchscreen devices than Linux desktops and even Android apps run well on it. I used Brunch to install it.

3

That sounds very interesting! I just installed LINUX in order to force my HI12 a little bit. So if ChromeOS runs well on it: why not? I will check your link to Brunch and surely return with some questions… :wink: :+1: