Switching from GRUB to Systemd-Boot

[Karmek]

Hey there!

I prefer Systemd-Boot over GRUB, so I have deployed it on a new EFI partition on my SSD and copied vmlinuz and initrd. It will save me some headache since I am not really a fan of GRUB and always had issues with it when trying to boot from a ZFS pool.

It works just fine so far but I am wondering about the other files in /boot such as:

• config-4.10.17-3-pve
• System.map-4.10.17-3-pve

What are these used for? Are they related to GRUB only?
Also, is there any downside if I keep using a different bootloader?

Thanks in advance!

 

[t.lamprecht]

Hi,

config-4.10.17-3-pve

This is the config with which the kernel was build, its not needed for booting just useful if you want to see what options or modules where enabled/disabled/unset.

System.map-4.10.17-3-pve

This is a mapping of kernel symbol names to their addresses. Primary debugging but also useful on Kernel Oops, as the program counters can be mapped to a human readable name.

Also, is there any downside if I keep using a different bootloader?

By default we run update-grub after a new kernel gets installed (or and old removed) so that, so this won't update your self managed efi partition.
You would need to run an bootctl update manually thereafter or add hooks which do that for you, search for apt or dpkg postinst hooks as keywords, the apt.conf man page may also help
Also, its less tested with Proxmox VE, if you run into problems you may not get as much help as with grub here.
May not be a problem for you, but noteworthy.