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Ubuntu laptop won't turn on without external monitor

vn flag

I have my ubuntu mate set up with an external screen, keyboard, and mouse (total of three, plus an external harddrive occasionally) when working from home, but when we traveled recently I noticed that it was suddenly really reluctant to turn on properly without those external plugins (gave me a big fright).

It would turn on, get stuck in boot-up, and when I try to restart it, go to the safe reboot menu where it would, sometimes, successfully boot up in safe mode (and everything works once it actually manages to turn on). As soon as I got home and plugged all my usual stuff in again, everything worked as it used to.

For monitor settings, I have my laptop monitor set as the primary screen, but they both have individual menus top and bottom. I've tried unplugging everything well before turning off the system itself, but to no avail.

Does anyone have any tips on how I can make my laptop portable again?

ETA: I'm running the Ubuntu Mate 16.04. I've seen and tried to download the updates, but my laptop has no ethernet port and the download always fails because the wifi is too slow.

ChanganAuto avatar
us flag
Please edit the question and add missing information: 1. Ubuntu release/version; 2. Hardware specifications; 3. describe what and how the external devices are connected.
in flag
I've seen this with some *very* early versions of Ubuntu MATE, but the recent releases have been rock solid. Please provide the details that @ChanganAuto is requesting so that it's more likely that someone can offer a solution
Irsu85 avatar
cn flag
Try upgrading your MATE (thats a pun) because 16.04 is not supported anymore. You can do that by USB if upgrading over wifi is not possible
Cypress avatar
vn flag
On a positive note - that seems to have done it! (On a negative note, problem-solving to figure out why I couldn't upgrade my 16.04 [it wasn't the wifi] led to a system crash so I had to do a clean reinstall. But at least I have the 20.04 now!) Thank you!
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