0

Goal: Boot into Tails from an SD card on a Macbook Air running El Capitan.

Specs: Macbook Air, 8Gb RAM, i5, Running OSX 10.11 "El Capitan".

Solutions tried and problems with each:

  1. Follow Tails instructions for Mac OSX

    • Problem: After everything is done, reboot, only the Mac HD shows up

  2. Use rEFInd (v0.9.2):

    • Created two partitions on the SD card, with a GUID Partition Table (GTP). Both Journaled (HFS+).

      • /dev/disk2s2 - Tails (dd'd following the instructions from 1.)
      • /dev/disk2s3 - rEFInd: ./install.sh --alldrivers --ownhfs /dev/disk2s3 (Also tried without the --alldrivers flag)

    • Problem: rEFInd option shows up when rebooting. After selecting it I get three options: Boot Mac OSX, boot Tails (has the Tails logo), or boot legacy BIOS Tails (just shows a windows-like logo in grey).

      • If I select the one with the Tails logo, it goes to a new screen that says:

        rEFInd - Booting OS

Starting bootx64.efi
Using load options ''
Failed to read blocks: 0x2

        I have already tried erasing the Tails partition and redoing it a couple of times, with the same output.

      • If I select the one that says legacy BIOS Tails... I get a black screen that says the usual No bootable devices found... Insert one and press any key to continue.

Let me know if there is anything missing that could help debug this problem.

aurbano
  • 207
  • 5
  • 10

2 Answers2

1

I'm just guessing here, but a conversation on Mac rumors recomends not using units on the dd bs parameter, so try the guide again using bs=16000000 instead of bs=16m.

SilentVoid
  • 257
  • 1
  • 7
  • Just tried, but got the same error: `Faile to read blocks: 0x2`... I think I'll try with a different distro to make sure it's not the tails image. And possibly with a usb stick instead of an sd card – aurbano Oct 15 '15 at 11:29
  • Have you checked the checksums on the image? Even if it checks out, you may want to re-download the iso, preferably over a wired connection. – SilentVoid Oct 15 '15 at 12:13
  • Sorry forgot to mention I had checked that, I eventually found the problem, posting as an answer now, thanks for the help though! – aurbano Oct 15 '15 at 14:00
1

I eventually found the issue, I had formatted the partition where I put Tails as an ExFAT partition, which doesn't work even though it shows up on the boot menu.

Formatting it as FAT fixed it.

aurbano
  • 207
  • 5
  • 10