syslinux
Download Tails 0.23 March 19, 2014

Prerequisite: Tails with an amd64 kernel (e.g. from current devel branch).

Tested with syslinux 6.02+dfsg-1.

sudo apt-get install syslinux/experimental \
   syslinux-common/experimental isolinux/experimental

# make the system partition an *EFI System Partition* (ESP)
parted "$TAILS_DEVICE" set 1 boot on

mkdir -p "$TAILS_MOUNTPOINT"/EFI/BOOT && \
   cp /usr/lib/SYSLINUX/efi64/syslinux.efi \
      "$TAILS_MOUNTPOINT"/EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi && \
   cp "$TAILS_MOUNTPOINT"/syslinux/* "$TAILS_MOUNTPOINT"/EFI/BOOT/ && \
   /bin/cp -f /usr/lib/syslinux/modules/efi64/* "$TAILS_MOUNTPOINT"/EFI/BOOT/
  • With Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro, the UEFI nightly release does work, while it didn't work previously.
  • boots on ThinkPad X220 (syslinux 6.02+dfsg-1 and 3:6.03~pre1+dfsg-1~bpo60+1) in UEFI mode
  • ThinkPad X230 (syslinux 3:6.03~pre1+dfsg-1~bpo60+1):
    • boots fine in UEFI mode, but displays the syslinux menu very much translated to the top: one can see the two menu entries, but nothing else, so if one must edit the kernel command-line, they have to do it blindly
    • boots fine in Legacy BIOS mode, so at least we have no hardware support regression here
  • boots on ThinkPenguin Royal (syslinux 6.02+dfsg-1 and 6.03~pre1+dfsg-1)
  • boots on MacBook Pro 13-inch Mid 2012 9,2 (EFI 2.9), and MacBook Pro 13-inch Late 2011 8,1 (EFI 2.7), both with and without rEFInd if menu background splash.png is removed from stdmenu.cfg; adding menu resolution 640 480 before menu background makes the menu display "correctly" (only taking 1/4 of the screen, but oh well), but the system does not boot; without rEFInd, one has to press Alt before powering the laptop up, and keep it pressed until a menu appears, and then choose the entry that's called Boot EFI (as every other entry) and looks like a USB stick.
  • on MacBook Pro 13-inch Mid 2012 with rEFInd, one has to choose Fallback boot loader from Tails in rEFInd to boot, as the Boot Linux from Tails entry does nothing at all (syslinux 6.02+dfsg-1 and 6.03~pre1+dfsg-1)
  • The ThinkPenguin Royal does not detect the bootloader if installed as EFI/Tails/syslinux.efi; hence the use of the fallback bootloader path (BOOT/bootx64.efi), which should work on more hardware.
  • tails-i386-feature_uefi-0.23-20131222T0855Z-8acf864.iso boots fine on a Apple MacBook Air 13" mid 2011 (MacBookAir4,2) once installed with Tails Installer
  • MacBook Pro 15-inch Mid 2010 (6,2) boots fine with rEFInd and tails-i386-feature_uefi-0.23-20131222T0855Z-8acf864.iso, if menu background splash.png is removed from stdmenu.cfg; if one adds menu resolution 640 480 before menu background, the system does not boot.
  • Lenovo ThinkPad X130e: tails-i386-feature_uefi-0.23-20140104T0920Z-3305611.iso boots fine.
  • Lenovo E325: tails-i386-feature_uefi-0.23-20140104T0920Z-3305611.iso boots fine.
  • MacBook Air Original (1,1): one has to press Esc twice in rEFInd to have it see the USB stick; then, rEFInd apparently loads syslinux, that fails to display its menu, even after commenting out most menu-related setting that has to do with color or positioning. Finally, Tails does not boot.
  • Fails to boot in VirtualBox (version?) with EFI enabled.
  • ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC. X55VD: boots fine with menu background splash.png removed (both with CSM enabled and disabled); only boots in CSM mode with menu background splash.png kept in place
  • Boots fine on ThinkPad W520 (tails-i386-feature_uefi-1.0-20140324T1026Z-dd350d4.iso).
  • Boots fine on Lenovo ThinkPad E320 (tails-i386-feature_uefi-1.1-20140407T1357Z-02a2adf)
  • Boots fine on Macbook Pro 11,3 (15 Inch Retina-Late 2013)