Score:-1

Why does verified bootable USB stick for installing Ubuntu take me to GRUB rather than installing?

ru flag

I have a new laptop to which I want to install Ubuntu. (I don't want live sessions or a duel partition, my goal is to have only Ubuntu installed on the new laptop.)

  1. I downloaded ubuntu-20.04.3 on my old laptop, from ubuntu.com .
  2. I successfully changed the boot order on the new laptop (which has the default windows). It has Uefi and 0 seconds or whatever so that the usual method of pressing F12 didn't work, but I resolved that.
  3. I initially tried turning a USB 3.0 with plenty of gb to spare into a bootable stick using command lines in the terminal, but the resulting stick did not work, and after a short pause, Windows loaded when I turned on the new laptop.
  4. I made the bootable USB stick using Ubuntu's Startup Disk Creator. The program informed me I had successfully completed the operation.
  5. On using that stick, I successfully got to the boot menu and selected to have the computer boot from the usb device, but then a black screen came up with the text "GNU GRUB version 2.04. Minimal BASH-like line editing is supported." instructions on how to see the list of available commands (TAB), and the prompt: "grub>"
  6. On Askubuntu.com I was given the unhelpful comment that I had done something wrong, which is highly improbable, seeing as how Startup Disk Creator is an automatic program and the user doesn't have many opportunities to do anything, much less do something wrong. Perhaps the commenter thought I had plugged the USB stick in the wrong way?
  7. On the advice of Unhelpful Commenter, I downloaded balenaEtcher and I referred to the following tutorial, https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/install-ubuntu-desktop#3-create-a-bootable-usb-stick which I must say was almost identical to the tutorial I had already been using, although with better layout.
  8. I also downloaded Ubuntu a second time (after deleting the first version) from the official Ubuntu website.
  9. I made a bootable USB stick using Etcher, which verified the flash.
  10. I booted up the new laptop with the USB stick and got the exact same results: the grub screen.

What is wrong?

oldfred avatar
cn flag
What brand/model system? What video card/chip? Some need extra settings. Do you have latest UEFI firmware & if SSD latest SSD firmware. How new? Very new hardware requires newest kernel & newest drivers. You may need 21.10 or even 22.04 when released in April. Or update kernels using ppa to have the newest. Are you booting in UEFI boot mode? Many very new systems are now UEFI only, no old BIOS or CSM mode.
ru flag
Hi, thanks for this oldfred! It's a Lenovo Thinkbook 14-IIL, Intel i5. Someone managed to get this for me, I guess it's quite new. I think I have the UEFI thing figured out: initially, F12 didn't work to get to BIOS so I made some changes following a tutorial, and after that fn+F12 did work to stop Windows from loading and choose to boot from the USB. So I would guess that the problem is I need the newest kernel (I've been using secondhand laptops my whole life so the problem of having something that is too new is kind of blowing my mind).
ru flag
My follow-up question would be: 21.10 isn't listed as having LTS yet. As you can tell I'm no Linux wizard; is a version that does not yet have LTS going to be less user friendly? Why is there a gap between an Ubuntu versions being released and those versions getting LTS? Thanks so much for your time.
oldfred avatar
cn flag
The long term support versions are only released every 2 years or next one will be 22.04. The interim verions are testing or for very new systems that need latest kernel or drivers. But even then hardware comes out, but kernel may need update and then that kernel must be included into a distribution. Testing before inclusion means it can be a bit before newest hardware fully or easily supported in a distribution.
ru flag
Thanks so much!
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