Ubuntu Installation :: Cannot Boot Without External HDD Connected
Feb 28, 2010
I just recently installed ubuntu. I had always used windows before, and I wanted to try something different. My laptop's internal HDD is pretty full so I decided to install ubuntu on my 500gb external HDD. It is connected via USB A to USB B. So I run through the installation no problems at all. I partitioned 200gb of the external HDD for ubuntu. After install I could run ubuntu just fine and I really like it.
However now it boots through GRUB. I am not really sure what GRUB is but it says GRUB loading every time I boot up and then lets me choose what os to boot, but if I do not have my external HDD plugged in then GRUB fails to start and I cannot boot at all from my laptop. Is there a way that I can get it to boot windows from the internal HDD without having the external HDD?
Have a Dell Studio XPS with 64 bit Meerkat on it. Whenever I connect my Samsung external monitor by displayport/dvi ubuntu no longer boots. Machine unresponsive and have to cut power and disconnect it. :/
Sounds exactly like this bug, no? [URL] Except for the fact I have ATI video card and the restricted drivers (with Catalyst control center, although it is useless).
Code: 02:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Madison [Mobility Radeon HD 5000 Series] Win7 install works fine.
I have installed "open-SUSE 11.4" on a "500GB Free Agent External Hard Drive". I didn't have any problem in booting since last week that I booted it from my laptop. Also I did it before several times from then when I try to boot it e.g. from an "Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q9400 @ 2.66GHz" PC the time between loading INITRD and starting boot sequence messages lasts nearly 30 minutes!(i didn't actually measure it but it take a long time in the same order). after starting boot sequence which is showed on monitor everything looks normal. e.g copy of files would be done by speeds between 2MB/s to 30 MB/s depending on the targets.I used to use the external hard derive to boot from different laptops and PC's from start but I didn't have such a problem anytime.
I have an HP Pavilion that was/still is running Vista. I recently decided to dual-boot to Ubuntu from an external hard drive. Both systems will boot up fine its just that for some reason it won't boot to the internal drive (with vista) unless the external is connected. I just put the HD in another laptop only to have the same problem.
After installing ubuntu 9.10 on external HDD I cannot boot vista if external usb is unplugged(where ubuntu is installed). it says grub loading and after that recover grub ( i think that is what is says ... not certain in this moment ) anyway hope you get my dilemma. If you need more information I'll be glad to provide it.
I'm trying to install ubuntu on a wd15ears hdd. Booting from the CD works fine when I don't have any drives connected, or some other drives connected, but if my new wd15ears 1.5TB hdd is connected, after the boot menu the pulsating ubuntu logo will pulsate for a while, and then I'll only see the blinking cursor in the top left corner of my screen. The hdd light is constantly on and nothing happens. Can anyone help me please? Is there a way to put the boot in verbose mode so I can see what fails, instead of seeing the ubuntu logo?
1. I install Desktop 10.4 or server 10.10 on my 250GB IDE drive using guided partition structure.
2. I add SATA Drives (of varying types and sizes to test) to the system and create a raid.
3. When I restart grub won't initialize with the SATA's plugged in.
4. I have tried this in various ways, installing with the SATAs already connected, making the raid in the install process etc.
I have tried re-installing formatting the drives in windows, deleting partitions, making new ones, low level formatting. It appears to be related to an issue with GRUB re-ordering drives so it is trying to boot off the wrong drive - I would edit grub but it doesn't get that far into the boot. Just rudely flashes it''s cursor at me. Is this really so uncommon that there isn't a straight simple answer?
What makes me think it has to do with partitions and formatting is that when I first added new drives they worked on the boot. I even made the raid in Desktop mode in Server - Rebooted- Rude flashing cursor.
Can Ubuntu install and boot from external HD while still booting windows off internal HD?In an attempt to spread Ubuntu my friend wants to use ubuntu off an external HD and still have windows fully operational on the internal HD. Questions:1) Can Ubuntu install on external HD without tricky mounting methods and if so how doabout it?2) The bois have the capability to boot from usb, will grub work?
I am new to linux and I am attempting to establish a dual boot with Windows Vista 32 Bit and Linux Debian 503 i386-netinst. When I place the install cd into the cd drive and boot from the cd a problem occurs at "Booting the kernel."
A message appears: [0.116007] ..MP-BIOS bug: 8524 timer not connected to IO-APIC Then the installation just "stalls" and never moves past this point.
How can I detect when an external monitor is connected in linux? I need to run various scripts to set up my workspace. Is there some clever way to kick off a script when the monitor state has changed? I'm using the Nvidia display driver.
I have proftpd setup on my Aspire Revo (which I'm using as an HTPC) so that I can download files to my mac when I feel like watching in bed or whatever. I recently purchased a 1TB WD Elements to store my media. I have proftpd setup so that I can access every file on the computer. However, when I try to gain access to the Elements HD, I get an FTP error from Cyberduck that says:
/media/Elements: no such file or directory
Note that I have not formatted the drive or anything - just set it up straight out of the box. My media is loaded on to it, and XBMC reads the files fine. Is there a way I can enable the hard drive (or the OS) to share these files over FTP, or is this not possible?
So, what I am asking is, is there a way to ignore/over-ride compiz's texture size check, a different way to query xrandr, or is there a completely different method I can go about checking if an external monitor is connected?
Hard drive is connected to my Inspiron 1525 via USB, plugged in and I'm not seeing the new drive mounted. Restart doesn't fix things and manually trying to mount /dev/sdb1 doesn't work either. The drive I got is preformatted as NTFS and I've been using a logical partition formatted as NTFS as a sort of share drive between my Windows partition and Ubuntu partition, so I know I have NTFS set up properly. This is the hard drive I'm working with for reference.
I have properly ejected a USB memory stick and removed it from the port, but it remains in my 'Places', on the side pane of Nautilus. The /media directory is empty.
Im using Ubuntu 9.04 in my acer aspire 6930 laptop. Inbuilt speakers in my laptop is working, however the external or surround speaker system say 2.1 connected to my laptop is not working.. i just want to know possible solutions for this challenge..
I've got Vista installed on my notebook and I've bought an external drive (1,5 TB, but its size shouldn't matter in this case) and after formatting it I left 10 gigs for future purpose. Now, I decided to install 64bit debian on the unallocated 10 gigs. And so I did. To be precise: I have SATA drive inside my lap and hard drive (it's also SATA inside the cover) connected to my lap through USB. Boot sequence was 1)CD/DVD 2)hard drive 3)removable drive. During the installation the installer detected my internal drive as /dev/sda and my external drive as /dev/sdb. I decided to install grub on /dev/sdb (it was logical to me, since I didn't want to mess up my regular drive's MBR). Installer created 5 partitions on my USB drive. After booting from my external drive (look below*) I've got a message saying
Code:
error: no such partition Entering rescue mode... and after that I was in grub rescue console. When I typed ls I've got an output
error: unknown filesystem This occured for all the listed devices... On my internal drive there were (during the installation and running the live cd) 3 partitions detected (vista os, data, rescue disk) so I don't understand the output that ls in rescue console gave me. about booting from external drive: I did that after pressing ESC - I've got a prompt to choose which device I want to boot from - this wasn't working properly; after changing the boot sequence the grub started but with the abovementioned error message...
If there's any info about exact names/types/devices of my installed partitions needed I will run live CD and check it. If any other info is required I will provide it (I tried to describe the problem in the most precise way ) What I was thinking about: maybe there is a problem with ordering of the devices - when I boot from DVD my removable disk is treated as the "second one" and after booting from the removable disk it becames the "first one" or something like that? If any of you have any good info on how mapping of the device names works it would be appreciated, since I couldn't find anything useful or I just don't know what to ask google about.
1) How to install Debian on a removable disk (I had no problems with installing Linux on pendrive but I did that from VirtualBox and it was some time ago) OR how to install GRUB on a removable disk? (unfortunately, I cannot install 64bit system through VirtualBox)
2) What's the logic behind naming devices under /dev? How come the devices in grub have their names mapped as hdx etc and I've read that hdx are the names for IDE/ATA drives and sdx is the proper name for a SATA or USB device
After removing the Windows HDD from my laptop I installed Ubuntu to a new HDD that I installed in it - it works fine when used as an internal drive. But now I have put the Ubuntu disk in an external enclosure and replaced the original Windows HDD internally.
Now, if I change the BIOS boot priority to CD/DVD -> USB HDD -> Internal HDD will it be the case that I can boot Ubuntu when the external HDD is connected and Windows when not?
Also, if I boot to Unbuntu from the external HDD, will the internal Windows drive be left untouched? I'll be in pretty hot water at home if I damage that!
I Installed Ubuntu 10.10 on an external USB Disk Drive - I had chosen to install the boot loader on this drive. When I tried to boot from this drive, I get the the following message:
error: unknown filesystem
after that I get "grub rescue>" prompt
The install was done on /dev/sdb2
I have also tried update-grub using ubuntu 10.04 that i have on my internal drive. It did recognize that I had a kernel on the external drive but still no luck booting. This time i get.
error: no such device d4a3cb16-37b6-416c-a3bc-4f8d03318e28 error: unknown file system error: you need to load the kernel first
Note that the long device name is the same as the mount point when i do a "df"
I boot Ubuntu10.10 from live cd and installed to my external hdd (thats Apacer AC601) . Installation completed but i cant boot from external hdd. i didn't create custom partition layout myself , I choose the option "use entire hdd". Everythings fine with Fedora core 14.
I have been trying for many days now to get ubuntu installed on western digital passport 1 TB USB external hd attached to my MacBook Pro (with intel Duo Core processor). I have installed the latest ubuntu 11.0.4 64-bit (needs to be 64-bit for work) on the external USB hd, and when I reboot rEFIt shows a new penguin icon. So, I selected that, and I see a screen with a penguin in the middle for a while, but then the screen turns black and just has a text error message that says "No bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key". BTW, I checked that my Duo Core is definitely 64-bit. Also, ubuntu does run off the install CD. Even the wireless works and I can use firefox.
I have been reading lots of forums trying to find a solution. A couple that I have tried: 1) reboot and when in rEFIt, choose the sync option and resync the drives. I did that and now the penguin icon just launches a black screen with a different message about "no valid operating system" or something like that. 2) Another site said the key was to change where boot loader got installed, so during the installation, at some point near the end, there would be an "Advanced" button to click on, and in there I could set grub to install onto sdb, the location/name of my external USB hd. However, in the present version 11.0.4, there is no "Advanced" button on any of the install screens.
I really wish Mac just used a BIOS instead of this frustrating EFI. Do I need to edit or alter something somewhere? If so, exactly what?
I am running Lenny. USB storage devices are painfully slow, if the data to be copied is above 4GB it works on transferring for more than half an hour and then comes up with an error dialog(saying something like file size is too big). The problem exists in both read and write.
I did google a bit and here is the output of lsmod | grep hci ehci_hcd28428 0 uhci_hcd18672 0 usbcore118192 4 usb_storage,ehci_hcd,uhci_hcd
I was wondering wether it is possible to boot an eee 901 from an external usb cd drive? (for those who are unfamiliar with the eee, it has no internal cd drive) The cd drive is not listed in the bios boot menu.
I installed Ubuntu to an external hard drive and I wanted it to be a portable OS I could take with me and still maintain my settings and files and what not. My problem now is, I cannot boot into Windows without having the USB drive connected. I also cannot boot directly to the drive by selecting the USB drive from my boot options on start up, I have to let it go into the boot menu.
So I need help with being able to boot directly from the USB drive on any computer, and being able to boot into Windows without having the USB drive plugged in. Hopefully this can be done without re-installing Windows.
I installed ubuntu 10.04 on external usb hdd after having the internal drive disconnected. When now I try to boot i can only do it from the internal. I can see the external when in ubuntu, but no booting. Also I can see the external in the internal grub menu but when booting disappears. I suspect that it has to do whith the designation of volume names, when installing from external the disk is named sda1 but in the internal grub is sdb1. How can I change the name to sdba1 in the external grub
I just installed maverick netbook edition on an external hard drive, creating my own partition table. When I tried to boot the drive, grub rescue mode told me file not found. I installed again and used the default partition table and got the same error. I gave up and tried to boot my fedora 13 internal hdd but was told that there was no such device. I looked through these forums and ran a bootloader script and was told that my internal hdd had a bootloader but my external didn't. I tried to load the kernel through grub rescue, but the file system was unknown to grub. The files are still on my internal drive and I don't want to reinstall just to boot it.
a friend of mine just given me an old 2004 IBM NetVista 8305 desktop and suggested to use Linux Ubuntu which is something new to me. So i installed it via USB memory stick & it works. After installation of the OS I am impressed with functionality & speed. when i conect the external hard drive via usb it doesn't show & i tried my usb flash disc it showed the same problem. I tried both disk in my laptop (Windows XP) & it works.
The thing is i want to have windows xp on my internal drive and ubuntu on the external. Not very hard but i want it so that i can choose what to boot when i start my computer and i also want to store other things then ubuntu on my external drive so i can use it in xp also
The reason i want ubuntu for is to use it while watching movies or chatting osv and use xp for games and my animation programs since they tend to be quite hard to get to work on ubuntu.
I have a 320gb USB hard drive, one partition for my files, one for playing Wii games, and one which I would like to use for an Ubuntu instillation.
To do this, I partitioned my disk accordingly using Windows, then booted from the Ubuntu CD to install the OS to my external hard drive partition. It asked me where I wanted to install the boot loader, so I selected the hard drive itself, rather than the specific partition, reasoning that it would scan the hard drive for a boot record.
However, when I booted it (with USB boot selected) it simply said "No Operating System found, replace system disk and press enter" or something similar.
