I have a request from a customer to install CentOS 7.9 on a customer-provided Lenovo ThinkPad P17. I've not had success with it. I tried the distro DVD from an external optical drive, I got the boot menu, and after selecting the optical drive, it thought about it for a few seconds and came back with the menu again. The same thing happened with the distro on an external hard drive. Here's what I found out: this model has no legacy BIOS boot mode, just UEFI only.
I took the unit home and tried a flash drive. (Flash drives are prohibited at my workplace.) I got the install menu, but then got a boatload of dracut errors.
I even wiped the on-board SSD drive (since it came with Windows pre-installed). The same things happened.
Has anyone else had success with this model? Or is this one of those "You can't get there from here" situations?
Installing CentOS on an Lenovo Thinkpad P17
Re: Installing CentOS on an Lenovo Thinkpad P17
According to https://access.redhat.com/ecosystem/hardware/5585471 the P17 is certified for RHEL 8.3+.
Re: Installing CentOS on an Lenovo Thinkpad P17
That's good to know. Unfortunately, CentOS 8 is not an option for us. While DISA has released a STIG for RHEL 8 (which we would also use for CentOS 8), I don't have a script in place to perform all the compliance checks. And with CentOS 8 EOL'ing at the end of the year, I'm keeping nearly all of my users at CentOS 7.x.