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everyone.

I'm dealing with a seemingly simple and straightforward problem that's really frustrating and I'm hoping someone can point me in the right direction.

My laptop is Medion Akoya E2216T MD 99940. (here is the link of it: https://aldi.medion.com/md99940/nord/?partnerID=101248 )

I'm trying to install Lubuntu/Ubuntu 18.04 on this laptop using a bootable USB. It works PERFECTLY with other laptops. But with this one, it refuses to boot from USB for some reason. I have disabled "Fast Boot", "Quite Boot", "Secure Boot" on the BIOS. , I do see the USB on the connected devices and also the BIOS itself. This exact same thing happens with an external hard drive as well.

I have tried this exact USB in 2 other HP laptops, and they both work perfectly with no adjustments to any settings whatsoever. So I'm firmly convinced that the laptop is the problem

"My BIOS version: American Megatrends, Core version 5.011 . Compliancy UEFI 2.4 PI 1.3"

My BIOS settings are as follows:

Secure Boot - [Enabled]

Secure Boot mode - [Custom]

Quiet Boot - [Disabled]

Fast Boot - [Disabled]

Although I played around with the settings, none of it was successful

Does anyone know what I should do in this situation? I just need to get the laptop to recognize my USB/external hard drive, so I can get to the actual installation.

These are my Rufus settings.

enter image description here

Thanks in advance

Unrivalled confusion
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    Possible duplicate of Bootable USB of Ubuntu Minimal CD – karel Oct 13 '18 at 14:31
  • Most UEFI have another setting for Allow USB boot. When UEFI Secure Boot is on, USB boot is considered not secure, so user has to explicitly allow it. And seting may be there even if Secure Boot is off. – oldfred Oct 13 '18 at 14:55
  • Well, in the "Secure Boot" settings, there is only one other options, which is "Secure Boot Mode", I have tried it both with standard and custom. It's all the same.

    But, on the "Fast Boot" option, if it is activated it offers me several new options, one of them is "USB support" (which can be set to "Disabled", "Partial Initial" and "Full Initial")

    I turned Fast Boot on, just to try it with USB support set to "Full Initial" attempted to boot twice, both with Secure boot on and off.

    Same thing. The laptop is from the end of 2016. So I have no idea why amd64 wouldn't work

     – Unrivalled confusion Oct 13 '18 at 15:52
  • I have had better luck with UNetbootin than Rufus. – C.S.Cameron Oct 16 '18 at 09:58
  • Could you please give me suggestions regarding unetbootin settings and the laptop's BIOS? – Unrivalled confusion Oct 19 '18 at 00:03

1 Answers1

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I've had same problem. Finally I fugured laptop's cpu is 64bit architecture, but it's bios has only 32bit uefi. You can't boot normal 32bit system (32bit systems usually do not use uefi) and you can't boot 64bit because 32bit uefi won't load 64bit bootloader files.

Only solution is to have 64bit system and 32bit bootloader. There is only one distro that I know with this solution implementd: linux Kali, but it lacks drivers for this laptop. So what you need to do is copy 32bit bootloader into ubuntu's usb stick.

Step by step:

Download both kali and ubuntu iso's (both x64)

Make ubuntu usb stick (I used Rufus)

Now open kali's iso (windows 10 explorer can do that)

Copy boot/grub/i386-efi from kali's iso to ubuntu usb

Copy efi/boot/bootia32 from kali's iso to ubuntu usb

Not boot from ubuntu usb - you should be redirected to grub terminal.

Write ls and press enter

You will get list of devices and partitions like (hd0,pt1)

Now use ls (hd0,pt1) to check avalible devices in search of your ubuntu live partition (for me it was second displayed). When you use the right one you will get list of all folders on your usb stick

Once you have right partition code all you need to do is setup booting sequence to this partition:

Write: set prefix=(hd0,pt1)/boot/grub and press enter (of course you nedd to replace (hd0,pr1) with partition you found moment ago)

Then write set root=(hd0,pr1) and press enter

Write insmod linux and press enter - there should be no output, if there is something you need to check if you have not made any mistakes erlyer

Write insmod normal and press enter

And write just word normal and pess enter

You should either get ubuntu's boot menu (use first option) or it should start live system. Installation works normally, all drivers are found and working.

It worked for me on same notebook with Kubuntu 19.04 :-)

Piotr X
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