Lenovo IdeaCentre G5i ..

[Member aryiac5]

“Lenovo IdeaCentre G5i i3 8GB 512GB GTX1650 Gaming PC”

Just got this as a Christmas present. Got an integrated SSD card. Need the following: How to get into the BIOS and how to wipe-out that abomination known as ‘Windows 10’. Any help would be appreciated.

[Member Xecure]

Helpful

Up

0

::

You will need at least antiX with kernel version 5.4 or higher for the intel 10th generation CPU.

If you don’t know what key is used to enter the BIOS (UEFI) you can reach it using any antiX edition (starting from 19.1) in UEFI boot, going in the Boot screen to “Boot Rescue Menus” -> “Reboot into BIOS/UEFI Setup”.

Someone with more experience with newer computers can be better guides.

antiX Live system enthusiast.
General Live Boot Parameters for antiX.

[Member aryiac5]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Thanks for the quick responce.

I’ve tried every combination of keys to get into the BIOS, no luck. So I can’t even boot antiX from the USB. Ideally, I want to resize Windows and install antiX in the remaining space. See attached image for the current disk layout:

Attachments:

1. 

   lenovo.png
   

[Moderator caprea]

Helpful

Up

0

::

The boot might is so fast, it doesn’t recognize the keys.This may helps.
https://support.lenovo.com/nl/en/solutions/ht500217
But as Xecure already mentioned you will need a higher kernel as the default one.

[Member Xecure]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Exploring caprea’s link, you can find another article mentioning different keys (?). I don’t know which applies to your computer, but just in case I will also link it
https://support.lenovo.com/uu/en/solutions/ht104668
F2 is for the BIOS (or Fn+F2), and F12 for the boot menu (or Fn+F12), based on that article

For partitioning, Reduce the Windows partition by 89GBs or more (it depends on what you are going to install on your linux system; I would recommend leaving 200 for Windows and the rest for any and all Linux experiments). For now I wouldn’t wipe out windows, and adjust the partition to something conservative for the future. Don create any other partition and leave the free un-allocated space as is.
Don’t delete the recovery partition (the one at the end). When you get to boot to antiX, use Gparted (Control Centre > Disks > Partition a Drive).
Use the Un-allocated space to create (minimum):
1. (optional) A swap partition with the same amount of space as your total RAM.
2. (required) A ext4 partition with the rest of the free space (or however big you want).
I recently described the process, in case you have some doubts (just do the create new partitions, and not the new table thing).
During installation you need to make sure you install grub to EFI, so that antiX can properly boot on your laptop.

You will probably wont be able to boot to a graphical interface using any of the available official antiX 19.3 ISOs, as they use an older kernel version.
If you don’t mind using an un-official ISO, I recently built one with 5.8.16 kernel version that was confirmed to boot on a computer with 10th gen intel CPU.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/12AFrBt_MnprY_I9wbHHnxHTnRcZw-jmb/view?usp=sharing

antiX Live system enthusiast.
General Live Boot Parameters for antiX.

[Member aryiac5]

Helpful

Up

0

::

@Xecure ..

Interesting, I’ll report back if I’m successful. Might be useful to someone else.

[Member sybok]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Hi,

it is/should be possible to get into BIOS (or any modern equivalent) from Windows, see e.g. this link.
As Xecure has suggested, I would not delete the Windows (including its recovery partition; that could compromise any attempts to fix and even upgrade the Windows later on in the case you decide to use them).

[Member aryiac5]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Going on your link, I tried ‘shutdown /fw /r’ from the CMD prompt, with admin privileges, with no luck. The computer still boots to the Windows logon screen.

[Moderator caprea]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Did you look at this ?
https://support.lenovo.com/nl/en/videos/vid100750

[Member aryiac5]

Helpful

Up

0

::

@caprea: “Did you look at this ?”

Yes, did this ..

“select Recovery to advance to the next step. Choose Restart Now under the Advanced Startup heading to bring up a menu with several options. Select Troubleshoot from the menu, and then click Advanced Options. Click UEFI Firmware Settings, then select Restart.”

And it rebooted back to Windows.

[Moderator caprea]

Helpful

Up

0

::

I don’t know much about windows10, but it looks like you have to disable fast startup in the Settings. It’s option 3 here.
https://support.lenovo.com/nl/en/solutions/ht500222

[Member aryiac5]

Helpful

Up

0

::

> I don’t know much about windows10, but it looks like you have to disable fast startup in the Settings

“Fast Start” is like suspend or hibernate or ‘hybrid sleep’ mode or what ever they’re calling it next year. Only, you can’t use it on dual boot systems. Not that I’ll be using dual-boot once I get that abomination off my computer.

I can’t even get into the BIOS. I read somewhere that UEFI won’t display at certain resolutions. So the monitor won’t activate until windows boots. The monitor has two video-out connectors, the VGA and what I think is a DVI-D connector. On the computer there are a VGA connector and what I believe is a “HDMI 1.4” port. Number 7 in the below link. So presumably, what I need is a cable similar to the attached image.

https://www.lenovo.com/gb/en/desktops-and-all-in-ones/ideacentre/500-series/IdeaCentre-Gaming-5i/p/99IC9G50341

Attachments:

1. 

   Super.HDMI_.1.4.jpg
   

[Member sybok]

Helpful

Up

0

::

A) Certain resolutions…
That’s really odd and I’ve never experienced it (both when connected via VGA or using Net/Note-Books).
Do you have some other device, e.g. a TV you could connect the video-cable to?

B) Boot with entering BIOS available:
I have believed the following is fool-proof:
– disable the fast startup (though I would have assumed that was temporarily done with the shutdown via CLI).
– using the advanced startup, probably combined with pressing (Fn+)F1 or (Fn+)F2 immediately as the screen goes blank/no-signal.
Hoping that the BIOS would appear with some (potentially ugly) fall-back resolution.

You may try to inspect the Lenovo support page: https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/cz/en (‘cz’ is due to enforcing geo-location) or even contact Lenovo support directly.
The support page indicates that there may be other options available, see e.g. https://support.lenovo.com/cz/en/solutions/ht500217 (potentially not applicable to your model).

• This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by sybok. Reason: fix a typo

[Member Xecure]

Helpful

Up

0

::

Maybe what I am about to describe is the worst method possible to try and enter the BIOS setup, but it was the only way I could do so for a small-pc I once worked with.
Boot to windows and, when everything has booted, force a shutdown by holding the power button (or if you have a reboot button on your box, hit it instead). When it poweroff, press it again to power on and spam hit the F1 and F2 keys continually to see if you can enter the BIOS settings.

If that doesn’t work, we will have to look at the manual to see if there is any specifc hotkey for accessing the BIOS setup (the online manual tells nothing).

antiX Live system enthusiast.
General Live Boot Parameters for antiX.

[Member aryiac5]

Helpful

Up

0

::

I tried this, I set a ‘safe boot’ option in ‘Windows 10’ that I assumed was a one-shot and now the computer will only boot to a black screen. no way to change it back. I did read somewhere, that someone had problems accessing UEFI with a particular monitor and it’s certainly true in this case. I’ll have the computer reset back to factory settings and try again. Change the monitor cable etc.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by aryiac5.

[Author]

Posts