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I'm not going to be able to provide all the information you will need to sort out my specific problem, but I wanted some general advice on what to do when Ubuntu won't load (for future issues). Suffice to say I'm in no way a computer pro, I just want to use Linux because I don't want to be tied to any commercial outfit for computing and I have been very pleasantly surprised by how easy it is to do everything I can do on Windows (often better) on Ubuntu.

However, I faced this this morning: Grub loads fine, I select Ubuntu and the screen freezes after a few seconds (black screen with minimal text, something about how many kb checked or something like that - it clearly got stuck trying to do something I normally don't notice it doing); after trying to reboot several times I gave up, reinstalled from a live USB iso, and there's no data loss as I have it all backed up in lots of places. It is a bit of a pain though and took most of this morning to sort it all out (reinstalling everything). It's a dual boot laptop and I could get into Windows - I was somewhat pleased that getting into Windows didn't help me sort it out either ;) (I may get brave enough one day to remove Windows altogether - but I'm fairly new to Linux and don't have the nerve yet). My question is, is there a logical series of steps to attempting to repair an installation that won't load, that a relative novice can try? I could get Grub up, choose the various options in Grub but didn't know where to begin to try to repair it. Ideally I wanted to use the live boot USB to repair the installation without deleting files / apps etc.
I am pretty sure it was a software issue - it's all fine now having reinstalled, all the non-Ubuntu partitions are fine and I just reinstalled Ubuntu on the partition it was on and it's working fine now. I checked all the disks from the live USB before reinstalling and no errors found. As I say, please don't try to solve my specific problem as I am well aware I haven't provided nearly enough information to begin, but a general (novice) guide to how to try to rescue a failed system would be really useful - if that is feasible Thanks v much. Will

Will
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  • The first thing I would try with those symptoms is this >>> https://askubuntu.com/questions/226061/how-to-install-the-boot-repair-tool-in-an-ubuntu-live-disc – Raffles Jun 09 '21 at 20:58
  • Thanks ... it was more about the situation when Ubuntu is failing rather than grub not working. It's one of those situations that isn't a disaster but it's just a pain to have to go back to the beginning and reinstall the whole lot. It's probably too general a question for a forum - I guess better to post a more specific question when I have a problem in future. Thanks anyway for taking the trouble to read and answer. Will – Will Jun 20 '21 at 09:01
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    What I did from the very beginning of using Ubuntu is to have /home on its own partition. All my machines are setup as such. You can read about the advantages here and here. I can offer it as an answer if you wish. – Raffles Jun 20 '21 at 15:38

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