How can I boot from USB? - Acer Spin 3

6r6w6
6r6w6 Member Posts: 4 New User
edited November 2023 in 2020 Archives
I have a Acer Spin 3. I set a Supervisor password on the Bios and rebooted back to Bios. I am able to enable the option to access the Boot menu with F12 and that works. I am able to boot from some USBs but some I cant. I have tried USBs and CD (trough a USB CD Drive) that work fine on other computers. I think is something with the boot devices run FreeDOS but on the BIOS the option to change it to any other than UEFI is greyed out.

Answers

  • aphanic
    aphanic Member Posts: 959 Seasoned Specialist WiFi Icon
    It depends on what the system expects and what you're trying to boot.

    For example, partitioning-wise UEFI generally expects a GPT disk with a FAT32 partition containing the boot code. It is perfectly possible to boot a disk that is MBR partitioned if the right partitions and code are present, but generally speaking for UEFI you're looking at what I described first.

    Also, under UEFI if Secure Boot is enabled that may not be enough, it requires the boot code to be signed, and signed by a signature that is accepted by the firmware. Microsoft's signature always is, I think it's embedded by default even in systems that ship without Windows preinstalled. But many Linux distributions for example won't have their bootloaders and kernel signed, so you'd need to disable Secure Boot if you're to boot from them.

    From Windows, Rufus is usually capable of creating perfectly bootable drives for UEFI or legacy depending on your needs.
  • 6r6w6
    6r6w6 Member Posts: 4 New User
    aphanic said:
    It depends on what the system expects and what you're trying to boot.

    For example, partitioning-wise UEFI generally expects a GPT disk with a FAT32 partition containing the boot code. It is perfectly possible to boot a disk that is MBR partitioned if the right partitions and code are present, but generally speaking for UEFI you're looking at what I described first.

    Also, under UEFI if Secure Boot is enabled that may not be enough, it requires the boot code to be signed, and signed by a signature that is accepted by the firmware. Microsoft's signature always is, I think it's embedded by default even in systems that ship without Windows preinstalled. But many Linux distributions for example won't have their bootloaders and kernel signed, so you'd need to disable Secure Boot if you're to boot from them.

    From Windows, Rufus is usually capable of creating perfectly bootable drives for UEFI or legacy depending on your needs.

    When I try Rufus with Spinrite it gives me the message:

    "This image is either non-bootable, or it uses a boot or compression method that is not supported by Rufus..."
  • aphanic
    aphanic Member Posts: 959 Seasoned Specialist WiFi Icon
    6r6w6 said:
    When I try Rufus with Spinrite it gives me the message:

    "This image is either non-bootable, or it uses a boot or compression method that is not supported by Rufus..."

    Darn... paid software without trial version, I'm afraid I can't test that.

    There are other utilities that you could try, to create a bootable version of that, but I read from their site that it's based on FreeDOS and that it is capable of creating bootable images on its own, maybe you could try contacting the authors asking how to accomplish that.

    It's been a while, but I think UNetbooting was able to create pure FreeDOS bootable media as well, wouldn't know about Spinrite though.
  • 6r6w6
    6r6w6 Member Posts: 4 New User
    aphanic said:
    6r6w6 said:
    When I try Rufus with Spinrite it gives me the message:

    "This image is either non-bootable, or it uses a boot or compression method that is not supported by Rufus..."

    Darn... paid software without trial version, I'm afraid I can't test that.

    There are other utilities that you could try, to create a bootable version of that, but I read from their site that it's based on FreeDOS and that it is capable of creating bootable images on its own, maybe you could try contacting the authors asking how to accomplish that.

    It's been a while, but I think UNetbooting was able to create pure FreeDOS bootable media as well, wouldn't know about Spinrite though.

    I followed the recommended directions on their website but still can't get it to boot on this laptop. There must be a setting in the BIOS that Im missing because I am able to boot the Spinrite USBs and CDs on other computers. I also have a app on my phone called DriveDroid that lets you mount images to boot and works great with everything except I still cannot get Spinrite to boot using that app. I will give Unetbooting a try
  • aphanic
    aphanic Member Posts: 959 Seasoned Specialist WiFi Icon
    The thing about Spinrite is that there's no free version I could use to try to get a bootable disk out of it, and seeing their site seems to be a program made so long ago that it may not be compatible with devices running UEFI.

    I have never used the program, but the site, the testimonials, ... I don't know, feels like snake oil to me. Not that I wouldn't give it a try to at least see what it does, but I can't dispense that kind of money for a test I'm afraid. There are programs nowadays that probably do the same as Spinrite (can't say for sure because I haven't tried it) and work in modern environments.

    If UEFI is the problem, and you have a machine like mine, in which it is UEFI or else, you may be unable to run the program; but do let me know if you find a way or we could look for an alternative.
  • 6r6w6
    6r6w6 Member Posts: 4 New User
    I've used Spinrite in the past and never let me down. Also I trust Steve Gibson which is who makes the program.
  • billsey
    billsey ACE Posts: 31,436 Trailblazer
    Show us an image of the files on the Spinrite CD. As @aphanic suggests it may just not be set to boot on a UEFI system and Steve may not have updated it recently enough to have a UEFI version.
    Click on "Like" if you find my answer useful or click on "Yes" if it answers your question.