Unable to enter bios and secure boot fail on startup. Acer Swift SF-114-32-P2Pk

Memyfofum
Memyfofum Member Posts: 4 New User
My laptop gives me a secure boot failure with a lock icon on startup, and every time i try to enter the bios i just get a white dash in the top left corner. I’ve used the battery reset button as well as opening it and physically unplugging both the cmos and main battery.

Answers

  • billsey
    billsey ACE Posts: 34,932 Trailblazer
    Have you installed a different OS? We typically see those symptoms after a Linux install, due to the EFI partition being rewritten. In any case, the EFI data is no longer correct, which is what the Secure Boot failure is saying. Can you boot to a Windows install flash drive?
    Click on "Like" if you find my answer useful or click on "Yes" if it answers your question.
  • Memyfofum
    Memyfofum Member Posts: 4 New User
    billsey said:
    Have you installed a different OS? We typically see those symptoms after a Linux install, due to the EFI partition being rewritten. In any case, the EFI data is no longer correct, which is what the Secure Boot failure is saying. Can you boot to a Windows install flash drive?
    Yes I installed linux. I cannot  boot to a windows usb, I continue to get the secure boot failure.
  • billsey
    billsey ACE Posts: 34,932 Trailblazer
    That's going to be tough then. I assume that Linux live images also aren't loading? We're really going to need to get it booted enough to fix the issues. Do you have an external drive case? If you aren't one of the models with an eMMC drive you could pull the SSD out and rewrite the EFI partition on another machine. That would allow you to get it to boot on an install image so that the EFI partition can be rebuilt.
    Click on "Like" if you find my answer useful or click on "Yes" if it answers your question.
  • Memyfofum
    Memyfofum Member Posts: 4 New User
    billsey said:
    That's going to be tough then. I assume that Linux live images also aren't loading? We're really going to need to get it booted enough to fix the issues. Do you have an external drive case? If you aren't one of the models with an eMMC drive you could pull the SSD out and rewrite the EFI partition on another machine. That would allow you to get it to boot on an install image so that the EFI partition can be rebuilt.
    The internal memory is soldered to the board so i cant flash it externally. I can try to boot with a Windows-To-Go install
  • billsey
    billsey ACE Posts: 34,932 Trailblazer
    edited September 2020
    Yeah, give it a try. Often when Linux does it's install it wipes the EFI partition in such a way there's almost no time allotted for the F2 BIOS launch. If nothing else works just try over and over to get the F2 smashed at just the right instant. Once in the BIOS you can disable Secure Boot and enable the F12 boot menu which should allow you to boot on an install image.
    Click on "Like" if you find my answer useful or click on "Yes" if it answers your question.
  • Memyfofum
    Memyfofum Member Posts: 4 New User
    billsey said:
    Yeah, give it a try. Often when Linux does it's install it wipes the EFI partition in such a way there's almost no time allotted for the F2 BIOS launch. If nothing else works just try over and over to get the F2 smashed at just the right instant. Once in the BIOS you can disable Secure Boot and enable the F12 boot menu which should allow you to boot on an install image.
    The windows to go install didnt work, and i can press f2 to go to bios but it gets stuck with a white dash in the top left corner.
  • billsey
    billsey ACE Posts: 34,932 Trailblazer
    Yeah, the white dash in the corner means it didn't go into the BIOS, it started Grub, but Grub doesn't know what to do so it's just sitting there. Booting from anything other than the main drive is going to require getting into the BIOS to disable secure boot and enable F12.
    Click on "Like" if you find my answer useful or click on "Yes" if it answers your question.
  • mednasr87
    mednasr87 Member Posts: 1 New User

    hi everyone,

    i have a similar problem with acer Aspir V5, my HDD is broken and can't boot on any USB driver to install a new Operating system on a new HDD, secure boot is enabled and can't access to bios setup via F2, DELL, F12, Insertn ESC …etc.

    i tried everything and finally find a trick to boot on USB/access bios setup and disable secure boot. i would like to share the process to help if anyone have the same problem in the future.

    1. I used Ventoy ( https://www.ventoy.net/en/download.html ) to create a bootable USB drive with Linux Ubuntu and Windows on it.
    2. Wen booting on this USB drive, the ACER laptop asked me to enroll a secure boot key from the USB drive
    3. I selected the cert file from the USB drive and accept.
    4. After enroll & reboot, Ventoy started correctly and asked me to boot on my Ubuntu/Windows iso.
    5. Booting on Ubuntu shows grub options, one of them is "firmware setup", this option reboot the laptop and enter bios setup immediately without pressing any key.
    6. You can now disable secure boot if needed.
    7. Otherwise, From step 4 you can install windows/Linux without any problem

    i hope that this trick helps.

  • billsey
    billsey ACE Posts: 34,932 Trailblazer

    Which Aspire do you have? There have been literally hundreds of different models over the years. Your full model number is usually on the same sticker as your serial number, it should look something like Axxxx-xxx-xxxx. Normally with most Acer models you use the F2 to enter the BIOS. Some use DEL though. You typically have to enable to boot menu in the BIOS before you can use the F12 to get a boot list.

    Click on "Like" if you find my answer useful or click on "Yes" if it answers your question.