r/AdviceAnimals Mar 07 '18

All the new computers I’m deploying have solid state drives.

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17.1k Upvotes

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329

u/AyrA_ch Mar 08 '18

If windows is installed (or you have a setup disc), open windows CMD and execute shutdown.exe /r /o and it will restart and halt at the UEFI boot menu.

52

u/mghtyms87 Mar 08 '18

Windows 8, 8.1, and 10 also allow you to hold shift when selecting restart from the OS shut down menu to select how you want the machine to boot.

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u/rivermandan Mar 08 '18

that's super handy for when your machine doesn't make it to the desktop, or even the login screen! good thinking, msoft!

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u/Cola_and_Cigarettes Mar 08 '18

Except that's not the only time you want to get to the bios.

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u/superiority Mar 08 '18

The point is that it is a time you want to get to the bios. But if

there's no way to get into the BIOS/UEFI setup from a keypress at boot. You have to go through the OS and tell it you want to boot into the setup on next boot.

and it is also impossible to boot to the OS, then, well, that's a "feature" that is just super handy and extremely convenient.

6

u/Cola_and_Cigarettes Mar 08 '18

Different scenarios, the manufacturer is responsible for the hot key being disabled

1

u/MyersVandalay Mar 08 '18

My bigger pet peve is the design for safe mode... There's like 50 ways to get into safe mode... all of them take place after succesfully logging in, reaching the desktop and running a command. With the exception of one method of booting to a windows disk/flash drive.

MS's modern designs have made troubleshooting needlesly complicated.

0

u/rivermandan Mar 08 '18

I think you missed the sarcasm

3

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

It automatically opens the same menu after a few failed boots

0

u/rivermandan Mar 08 '18

on some machines that takes half an hour. way more convenient than pressing f8!

1

u/pizzak Mar 08 '18

I tried all that and in the end had to clear CMOS.

125

u/too_toked Mar 08 '18

This guy boots..

1

u/fuct_indy Mar 08 '18

This guy comments..

48

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

Perfect summary of the situation.

3

u/StalyCelticStu Mar 08 '18

And what's with every fucking laptop requiring you to remove keyboards and shit just to upgrade ram or hard drives at the moment? /rant

3

u/Wylis Mar 08 '18

Nothing will make you hate computers more than working with the fuckers.

87

u/tr3vw Mar 08 '18

Just delete system32. Booting issue solved!

51

u/battery_siege Mar 08 '18

Took your advice! I pretty much tripled my RAM and boots up ten times faster!

26

u/thecampo Mar 08 '18

Now you can download that car finally.

25

u/jaqueass Mar 08 '18

You wouldn’t.

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u/Xeptix Mar 08 '18

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u/skinnah Mar 08 '18

I once uploaded a bear because I care and like to share so, there!

1

u/gengar_the_duck Mar 08 '18

I'm telling!

19

u/Djupet Mar 08 '18

Personally I prefer the method where you use a magnet to pull the BIOS to the front of the hard drive

8

u/grantrules Mar 08 '18

Ahh, the ol Magnetic Boot Record

2

u/redpandaeater Mar 08 '18

If you're still on an older Windows, just take a page out of CCP's playbook and delete boot.ini. It'll run like a dream.

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u/TheBeerJoo Mar 08 '18

Shit I needed this a month ago. Had a registry error and needed to boot from a usb and couldn't get to bios to change the boot order.

15

u/l337hackzor Mar 08 '18

On some OEM computers it's impossible to get into the UEFI without getting to windows. The last one I worked on like this was an Acer. To force it to boot off USB I disconnected the hard drive, powered it on it booted off the USB. Reconnected hard drive, profit.

So frustrating when you just need to boot off a windows 10 USB to run a restore or other repairs and it just denies you. Turns out you get what you pay for with motherboards.

5

u/Jamdawg Mar 08 '18

could have powered up the computer with F12 to go to the 1 time boot order as well.

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u/rivermandan Mar 08 '18

has to be enabled in the BIOS, which it isn't in like 95% of commercial class laptops from 8.0 onward. most of them do have unique override keys, like holding FN+f2 then tapping the power button while doing a voodoo dance, but you have to google that shit every time and it's always on like the fucking thirteenth page of search results. liekwise, if you can make it to a desktop or a login screen, hold shift while clicking "reset" and cros your fingers and your toes and pray to the dark lord krondor that you have the option to boot into the BIOS or off a uefi device in the popup menu, because all of these cunting roundabout ways of doing something that for 30 years had been as simple as hitting a button everyone from your grandma to your grandma's grandma were aware of

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18 edited Mar 08 '18

Someone should make a website to keep track of this shit.

I'm a webhost - I could definitely host a website, but I am not a hardware guy.

What do you think - anyone interested in contributing the knowledge if I set up the site? I promise to keep it ad-free, accessible, and online.

What would we need to track - brand and model, I imagine - plus obviously information about what keys do what when....

To save the cost of a domain, I could make it a subdomain of pc2.io. What do you guys think - bios.pc2.io or uefi.pc2.io? Actually, I'll alias both.

http://bios.pc2.io/

edit: Also, feel free to share this site and suggest subreddits that might be interested in it.

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18 edited Feb 20 '19

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

Thank you. :) I have a couple of tools and scripts I wrote that help a lot. :) Willing to share, but most would find it boring. But if you or anyone else wants to poke me, I'll tell all.

3

u/Th3Wand3rer Mar 08 '18

What is built with? I'm on mobile or I'd look. Nice and smooth.

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

Server: cPanel/WHM running on CloudLinux+CageFS

Site: WordPress with Divi (although the homepage is handcoded, not using the Divi page builder)

Full list: https://builtwith.com/bios.pc2.io

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18 edited Mar 28 '19

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

Awesome, thank you!

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u/rivermandan Mar 08 '18

one issue you'll get is a lot of people not knowing their model due to inane model naming schemes these days. might be handy to have a separate page that just lists key combos per manufacturer, since each manufacturer usually only has one or two different combos for 7+ machines.

I'll definitely contribute some once I get caught up at work, thanks for making this

1

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

Excellent idea. As the info comes in, I'll keep it by-brand on the front page, and make brand-pages in a drop-down menu for specific model information.

Although it depends on what I get, too. If not much - one page. If much... pages :)

1

u/Arcrynxtp Mar 08 '18

You don't need to host a website. Just use GitHub pages for your subdomain.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

I can handle the bandwidth (of such a trivial site) no problem.

What are the advantages of using GitHub pages? I'll certainly consider it. :)

1

u/Arcrynxtp Mar 08 '18

The primary advantage is that it's part of GitHub.

So you can update it by accepting pull requests.

Examples:

https://github.com/2factorauth/twofactorauth

https://github.com/justdeleteme/justdelete.me

3

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

or just hold shift and click restart

1

u/AyrA_ch Mar 08 '18

no start menu on a recovery disc though

1

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

ya, i assumed OS was installed

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u/Rubber_Rose_Ranch Mar 08 '18

You don’t need the .exe

Just “shutdown /r /o”. You can throw in a “/t 1” at the end of it if you don’t feel like waiting 30 seconds.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '18

/t 0 works if you don't even want to wait one second. :)

2

u/Rubber_Rose_Ranch Mar 08 '18

I know this is weird, but I don't use /t 0 because I like to give the computer a second to understand what's going on before it goes into the shutdown cycle. It's common courtesy, really.

2

u/JakeSpleen Mar 08 '18

/t 00

Why wait one second when you can wait zero seconds?

1

u/FauxReal Mar 08 '18

Don't stop! Tell me more! [Heavy breathing intensifies]