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Ubuntu

How did my 20.04 LTS install to an external SSD go so .....wrong?

david371

10/29/23, 7:37 PM

The Objective: A Live/LTS/Persistent Memory, 20.04 install on an external SSD to use on my Windows 11 devices.

I'm using a Lenovo ThinkPad, and a San Disk Extreme Portable SSD as the target and a Lexar 3.1, 32mb for the Rufus ISO. ** Both were new. The Rufus flash was partitioned with GPT and 20mb.

The boot order was: USB-HDD, USB-FDD, USB-CDROM - Everything else (the internal SDD, Windows Boot Manager and PCI-LAN) had been "excluded" from the boot start-up completely, or so I thought. It was under the subheading "Excluded from Start Up" in the BIOS, but it doesn't seem to have been excluded from anything.

Both "secure boot" and "fast boot" had been disabled

The laptop booted from the ISO and was loaded in about 20 minutes, (both the ISO and SSD were connected to their respective ports directly (no adaptors or hubs)

When the Ubuntu homepage came up, I connected the target external SSD and before launching the installation, used GPart to create one partition on the SSD, which was recognized.

However, also listed was the internal SSD which I thought was a little alarming since I thought it wouldn't show up, but was scrupulous about making sure that any and all actions were carried out with the intended drive, as well as the destination for the bootloader.

The install took 15 minutes, tops, and opened on the set up page, I registered the account, set up the wi-fi, synced with Firefox, etc. I unplugged the ISO and restarted, and it booted from the external SSD and had saved the changes.

I unplugged the SSD and wanted to boot into Windows. (In the previous unsuccessful attempts at installing, 2 or 3 or 7, who remembers,) when the USB drives were empty, the laptop booted into Windows. That didn't happen this time.

This time on restart - USB drives empty - all I got was a black screen with some text at the top that was so small even with a hand magnifier the only word I could make out was TAB. I assume this was the grub menu but there didn't seem to be any options. After a few minutes the text vanished and just the black screen was left.

I restarted with the SSD plugged in and got the same thing except that Ubuntu came up after a minute or so.

I tried re-setting the start up defaults in the BIOS, same result.

Okay, this the exact outcome I've spent the last week trying NOT to get, which is why it's taken a week I've been so manic about not overwriting the internal ssd which, I don't see how I could have, nothing, no command or partitioning or anything involved the hard drive and inner workings of the laptop. What-Where-How in the "eff" did this happen and what can I do to fix it?

Sorry for the length but I wanted to include all the details to cut down on the back and forth and want to thank anyone who has a suggestion(s) in advance.

221

0 + 7

partitioning

grub2

ssd

persistence

ChanganAuto

10/29/23, 7:46 PM

1. There's no "Ubuntu 20.24"; 2. Excluding devices from the boot order does not and should not exclude then from the available storage where to install an OS; 3. You need to understand the UEFI boot process and the need for an ESP (EFI System Partition). There's nothing wrong in using the preexisting ESP (internal drive, the same where Windows bootloader is) but then your Ubuntu will only boot in the machine it was installed and 4. Each time you wan to boot Windows *without* the external drive you MUST change the boot order back to Windows in UEFI settings > Boot menu and, conversely (...)

ChanganAuto

10/29/23, 7:49 PM

(...) when later you want to boot Ubuntu you MUST again change the boot order to Ubuntu. Furthermore there's a method to produce a full Ubuntu installation in am external drive that's portable between UEFI systems (beginner level) and one that also boots in old BIOS machines (advanced level). In a nutshell, when you know what you're doing things go as expected. When not, thing go wrong.

ChanganAuto

10/29/23, 8:17 PM

BIOS and UEFI boot processes are very different and Windows alone have different requirements. Your previous knowledge of Windows BIOS installations isn't applicable to UEFI machines and, again, creating a "multi-boot" with Ubuntu intended to be also portable has several additional requirements. Blindly following tutorials without the correct understanding of the principles involved and the adaptations required for a specific firmware and hardware, partitioning -and- partitioning TYPE requirements, etc. never ends well.

Paul Benson

10/29/23, 8:37 PM

First, need to see the output of *sudo parted -l*.

Nmath

10/29/23, 8:40 PM

Be aware that UEFI systems are designed to have one single UEFI partition for the entire system, which serves to home all of the boot instructions for every operating system installed to that device. So if you install Ubuntu, even to an external disk, this will create boot entries in your UEFI partition. This is how UEFI is designed to work. However, installing Ubuntu will not affect any other partitions other than the UEFI and the one where you chose to install Ubuntu. So any other operating systems are still there, but you may need to change boot priority in your motherboard UEFI settings.

Hi-Angel

10/29/23, 9:12 PM

To add to what Paul said: please post the `sudo parted -l` with both internal and external SSDs plugged in.

oldfred

10/30/23, 2:38 AM

See this bug which has multiple work arounds for external drives or really any second drive where user does not want Ubuntu/grub installed into Windows's ESP. https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubiquity/+bug/1396379 You need to add an ESP to external drive, reinstall grub to external drive either from inside install specifying external drive's ESP or using Boot-Repair. And then remove Ubuntu boot entry in Windows ESP if you do not want that as an UEFI entry. You should just be able to change UEFI boot order to have Windows first, also.

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