[Bug 811485] Re: EFI SYSTEM PARTITION should be atleast 100 MiB size and formatted as FAT32, not FAT16

[Allen.McIntosh]

I was bitten by this issue today when I tried to install Ubuntu 11.04.
There were some additional wrinkles that are worth mentioning in the
context of this bug report.  The machine in question is an HP Elite
8200.  It comes with Windows 7 64 bit installed, and uses EFI to boot.
The system disk has an MSDOS partition table.  The EFI partition
contains an NTFS filesystem and has an OS type consistent with that
(type 7)!

If this setup is typical of HP's desktop machines, the Ubuntu install
process is going to need to cope with it whether or not it is standard
conforming.   I don't know how many HP models are affected by this, or
whose firmware is installed on the machine (it's 30 miles away at the
moment).  I could find out if that is useful information.

(If it makes anybody feel any better, Fedora couldn't cope either - but
it refused to continue past the partitioning stage.)

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/811485

Title:
  EFI SYSTEM PARTITION should be atleast 100 MiB size and formatted as
  FAT32, not FAT16

Status in “partman-efi” package in Ubuntu:
  Confirmed

Bug description:
  Create a EFI SYSTEM PARTITION of minimum 100 MiB size (200 MiB
  recomended). Also partman-efi should use FAT32 instead of FAT16 for
  EFI SYSTEM PARTITION as mandated by the UEFI 2.3.1 Spec. FAT16 ESP
  partition is not recognised by Windows 7 UEFI bootloader because of
  this.

  The below quote is copied form the UEFI Specification 2.3.1 - Chapter
  12.3 File System Format.

  [QUOTE]
  EFI encompasses the use of FAT32 for a system partition, and FAT12 or FAT16 for removable media. The FAT32 system partition is identified by an OSType value other than that used to identify previous versions of FAT. This unique partition type distinguishes an EFI defined file system from a normal FAT file system. The file system supported by EFI includes support for long file names.

  FAT defines that all files in a directory must have a unique name, and
  unique is defined as a case insensitive match.

  UEFI does not impose a restriction on the number or location of System Partitions that can exist on a system. System Partitions are discovered when required by UEFI firmware by examining the partition GUID and verifying that the contents of the partition conform to the FAT file system as defined in Section 12.3.1.1. Further, UEFI implementations may allow the use of conforming FAT partitions which do not use the ESP GUID. Partition creators may prevent UEFI firmware from examining and using a specific partition by setting bit 1 of the Partition Attributes (see 5.3.3) which will exclude the partition as a potential ESP.
  [/QUOTE]

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