Attempting to install FreeBSD with a 1GB EFI partition results in a system that cannot boot. I created the following partitions: size type mount label 1GB efi (n/a) boot 20GB swap (n/a) swap 93GB ufs / root Installation appears to succeed, however the machine is incapable of booting. (I was only able to get the system booting by using partly guided partitioning and accepting the 200MB boot partition that wanted to create. https://wiki.freebsd.org/UEFI suggests there may be a limit to the maximum size the EFI partition may have?)
What specifically happens when you try to boot the system with a 1G EFI partition?
> What specifically happens when you try to boot the system with a 1G EFI partition? "Nothing"... I either get bounced back into BIOS setup or the BIOS boot menu, or I get a black screen and have to reboot. I'd guess the EFI partition is not readable by the BIOS.
Are you able to boot other operating systems on that hardware with a 1G EFI partition (created by the other OS's installer)? I wonder if the UEFI implementation just cannot handle large partitions?
That could be, though IIUC, USB sticks are a single EFI partition that is well over 1GB. But USB might be handled differently. Is there any easy way to test without reformatting the OS drive? (I have the system in production now, so I probably can't do disruptive tests, and I don't have a spare HDD/SSD for testing.) FWIW, it's a Gigabyte motherboard. I can look up the exact model, but my guess would be their BIOS is sufficiently homogeneous that any recent Gigabyte board will act the same in this respect.