Installing Ubuntu from USB stick onto itself

Question

My HP Proliant Microserver USB boot and run stick failed so I created a new Ubuntu 16.04 USB bootable stick on my mac as per my previous notes, e.g.:

hdiutil convert -format UDRW -o ubuntu-16.04-server-amd64.img ubuntu-16.04-server-amd64.iso
diskutil list # shows disk3
diskutil unmountDisk /dev/disk3s1
dd if=ubuntu-16.04-server-amd64.img.dmg of=/dev/rdisk3 bs=10m  # Write to the first partition!!!
diskutil eject /dev/disk3

I then installed the USB stick into the HP and booted which comes up into the install process where I followed all steps until partitioning where I selected Use entire disk. An error then pops up stating that a failure occurred writing the partition table probably because the disk is in use and suggesting a reboot. I then attempted a reboot, but the USB stick no longer boots.

I also tried the above with Ubuntu 18.04 (from ubuntu-18.04-live-server-amd64.iso), but when it reaches the file system setup it shows no disk to install to (it must install to itself). Hitting Cancel then reboots the system starting the install process all over again.

I know this worked in the past for 16.04, but cannot figure out what is going on - unless the USB sticks are a problem?

Any suggestions would be much appreciated. Note that Ubuntu must run from the original boot USB stick with full functionality, e.g. create users, network config, disk volumes, etc.

Possible duplicate of Can Ubuntu be installed to the pendrive it was booted from? and Can I install Ubuntu onto a USB flash drive using the SAME flash drive? — karel, Dec 27 '18 at 15:37
@tkr: For a Full install USB drive that boots both BIOS and UEFI installing from itself, you can use the toram option with an install similar to: https://askubuntu.com/questions/1083330/how-to-make-an-usb-ubuntu-installation-more-compatible-with-different-computers/1083577#1083577 — C.S.Cameron, Jan 04 '19 at 03:22

sudodus · Accepted Answer · 2021-11-23T15:58:20.980

Things are much easier, you have a margin for mistakes, if you have two USB pendrives (and two USB ports). One of the pendrives can be cheap, small and slow with at least 2 GiB for Ubuntu Server, Lubuntu, Xubuntu and 4 GiB for standard Ubuntu Desktop and the other flavours of version 20.04.x LTS. The other one should be more powerful to serve well for an installed system. See this link,

help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/FromUSBStick#Prerequisites

But if you really want to or have to install into the same USB pendrive, you can boot to RAM with the boot option toram. See the following link,

Boot options

This will release the live system's dependence of the boot drive, so it will be available as target for the installation.

There are more details at the following link,

Can Ubuntu be installed to the pendrive it was booted from?

Thanks for the help - using the 'toram' boot option did the trick even if it took me some twiddling (function keys) to enter it for 18.04. — tkr, Dec 28 '18 at 13:38
@tkr, I'm glad it worked for you. Good luck with Ubuntu on the USB stick :-) — sudodus, Dec 28 '18 at 13:43

Installing Ubuntu from USB stick onto itself

1 Answers1