can't mount any partitions from Live USB on HP Laptop

Question

I've installed Ubuntu 20.04 on a disk partition in a new HP laptop, but are unable to boot into it. I found that there are issues with dual booting on HP machines using UEFI and some successful workarounds (https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2392797).

My problem is that when booting from an Ubuntu live USB, I'm unable to mount any of the partitions on the hard drive.

GParted throws this warning when started: GParted warning - space unused

And all partitions cannot be mounted, with variations of Unable to detect file system! or Unable to read the contents of this file system!. GParted - partitions list

This is what appears in the description of the Linux partition:

The device /dev/nvme0n1p3 doesn't exist

Failed to open '/dev/nvme0n1p3'.

The device /dev/nvme0n1p3 doesn't exist

Unable to read the contents of this file system!
Because of this some operations may be unavailable.
The cause might be a missing software package.
The following list of software packages is required for ntfs file system support:  ntfs-3g / ntfsprogs.

This problem was happening also before the installation, but it seems to have gone through without error.

Are you dual booting with Windows 10 Pro? Is the Windows install encrypted? — walttheboss, May 28 '20 at 12:13
Do you have ntfs-3g package installed on your live USB? Note to do so your live USB would have to have been created with persistence. — WinEunuuchs2Unix, May 28 '20 at 15:16
@WinEunuuchs2Unix ntfs-3g was installed but somehow creating a live USB with persistence solved the problem — mishamtrope, May 28 '20 at 17:35
If you are amicable to the suggestion I'll create an answer after work and you can accept it as it could be helpful to others in the future. — WinEunuuchs2Unix, May 28 '20 at 19:35

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered May 28 '20 at 22:49

As mentioned in comments the SSD partition attempting to mount is a Windows partition. For that to work you need ntfs-3g package installed. To successfully install packages to a Live USB it needs to be a persistent Live USB:

can't mount any partitions from Live USB on HP Laptop

1 Answers1