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So I got a new laptop at work and instead of creating a dual boot system, I bought a 256 GB USB drive and permanently installed Ubuntu 18.04 on it. To boot it, I now just hit F12 during boot (Dell machine) and select the right USB partition. That way I can use my laptop for personal use without storing any data on the on-board hard drive or leaving any other kind of trace.

It has been awesome when it worked, but that is the issue. Many times, including tonight, the boot process will stall at "Loading initial ramdisk" and then nothing happens besides laptop and USB drive getting pretty warm.

Strangely enough, the problem seems to occur rather randomly as I sometimes could boot Ubuntu without an issue the next morning even if it didn't work the night before... I have looked at ways to repair the GRUB on the USB drive using a Ubuntu LiveCD from a second USB drive, but the instructions are not detailed/straightforward enough for me to be successful as it involves editing grub-mkconfig and grub.cfg somehow.

Did anyone have the same issue with an Ubuntu installation on an external USB drive? Can you point me to detailed instructions that let me fix this using a LiveCD?

Chris
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    UEFI or BIOS install on external drive? Default install of grub is to internal drive. But if UEFI, it forgets boot entry if a drive is removed. Lets see details, use ppa version with your live installer (2nd option) or any working install, not older Boot-Repair ISO: Please copy & paste the pastebin link to the Boot-info summary report ( do not post report), do not run the auto fix till reviewed. https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Repair – oldfred Jun 23 '20 at 03:26
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    Have you tried a fsck ? https://askubuntu.com/questions/1006417/automatically-force-fsck-fy-when-encountering-unexpected-inconsistency-run-fs – C.S.Cameron Jun 23 '20 at 05:06
  • Is there a difference of how it boots between cold boot (when shut down for at least 2 minutes) and reboot (when power has not been off)? – sudodus Jun 23 '20 at 09:44
  • I think the cold boot vs reboot may make the difference here. After trying a million times (well, a dozen times) last night, I just booted without a problem twice in a row this morning. The first time, I booted in recovery mode and updated the grub just in case. The second time I booted in regular mode, et voila... – Chris Jun 23 '20 at 12:04
  • Waited 3 minutes after shutting down the WIndows OS, then booted Ubuntu from USB without a problem. Can someone explain why cold boot is a must? – Chris Jun 24 '20 at 04:33

1 Answers1

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  1. Switch off laptop
  2. disconnect the large LiIon battery
  3. unplug from 110/240V mains (or disconnect adaptor)
  4. press Power On button (to drain all power)
  5. wait 30 seconds
  6. reconnect battery and power and switch on
SSi
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  • I cannot follow these instructions as the battery cannot be removed without opening up the laptop, i.e., removing the bottom shell. I will see whether the above cold boot will suffice. Thanks! – Chris Jun 23 '20 at 12:07