I think it’s a pre-GRUB shim that has been signed by Microsoft.
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Purism fuses its CPUs to not require a signed bootloader.
Unlike Windows, Linux has no problem booting from logical partitions and there is no limit on those. Is there some reason in particular that you want primary partitions?
Perhaps, I don’t properly understand how logical partitions work, or I ran into some other limitation, when I originally researched them. In other words, "I don’t know."
So far the suggestions I’ve received sound like running VMs. I’ve done this before and it’s slow and IMHO kind of lame. Is that not what’s being suggested? As a thought experiment, let’s assume I want to add six “different” linux distros in addition to pureOS on SDA. Is that possible? What would that look like?
One other thought.
Clearly, I’m thinking of GPT not EFI. I fat-fingered it, sorry.
*That being said, what level of effort would be required to offer “coreboot-GPT,” as an “option,” with the buyer’s understanding, that the unit will not be as secure as the “coreboot-seabios” units?
Also, is it possible to take a poll, to see who might be interested, in such an option? That way no resourses need be reserved or effort expended, if there’s no reasonable interest.
I suspect that there will be no real downside to this since, having made no promises to the buyer, you can take your time to perfect the security of the GPT implementation.
This seems like a possible, if not ideal scenario.
I don’t speak for Purism but I think the direction that they are going in is to support EFI. I expect that that would mean that GPT would be supported too (although that is not a requirement of the UEFI spec). I have no idea on the “when and if”.
I don’t see any need to compromise e.g. on security as far as Coreboot-GPT goes. If it works at all (a big if unless code is written for it), I would expect it to be as secure as Coreboot-MBR (for want of a better term).
You can create a poll yourself?
You could consider containers if your OSs can use the same kernel, they are lightweight in comparison to virtual machines, for ex. Docker:
If you use Coreboot, yes it still uses Seabios, Pureboot uses Heads
You could choose a mixed solution: containers for OSs that can share the same kernel, different partitions or VMs when OSs need a different kernel.
It depends from how often you use one OS or another too, so you reduce your partitions and used storage.
I think you would love to run Qubes OS, which is fully supported on all Librem desktops and laptops currently. You wouldn’t need to reboot to a bunch of different distros to get all the functionality that you are using. Check it out!
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coreboot/SeaBIOS on Librem laptops isn’t “complete open source” as there are binary blobs in coreboot. Switching to Tianocore for UEFI support from SeaBIOS would not add any additional non-open source code.
Unofficial coreboot/Tianocore builds for Librem laptops have been available from my website for some time now.
You don’t say? EFI/GPT compatibility?
that’s implied, yes.
run my Firmware Utility script, flash the UEFI firmware, reboot, install UEFI OS.
Only caveat is that they are not supported by Purism, and I haven’t gotten around to updating them to 4.12 yet, and so the Mini isn’t yet supported. I’ll try to do that this weekend.
One can use my UEFI firmware and revert to the official coreboot/PureBoot firmware at any time by using the official Purism coreboot utility script. As I’m the author of both, the latter borrows from the former 
edit: apparently my memory was a bit faulty last night, the UEFI firmware images for Librem laptops provided by my script are indeed up to date/based on coreboot 4.12
edit 2: just added support for the Mini
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So, I can revert back if needed?
*I have flashed ROMs before; but, I have to ask.
What’s the likelihood of bricking the mobo? I assume it’s not high; but, if I do, can it be recovered and by whom?
I assume, I’ll be voiding the warranty?
Just kma, Thanks
You da dog homie. I’m honored.
Quite unlikely
No it does not affect the warranty.
Very, very, cool.
Anyone have information about when Librem 14 shipping is going to start?
I was so excited to see a 14 inch laptop with dual channel DDR4 supporting upto 64GB. I was seriously considering system76 lemur pro but it only supports max 40GB. I already placed an order.
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The announcement for the Librem 14 mentions Q4, so sometime between October 1 and December 31.
there’s always a non-zero risk when flashing firmware, but it’s probably under 0.1% based on what I’ve seen with ChromeOS devices over the years.
If one’s device were to brick, recovery is fairly easy using a ~$10 Ch341A USB programmer and a chip-clip. I’ve written up an unbricking guide for ChromeOS devices, but haven’t gotten around to putting something similar together for Purism devices
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In every page for L14 they state:
early Q4, 2020.
So it should be October 2020.
It is also the same time frame needed by Librem Mini from announcement till shipment.
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