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I burned a live USB of Ubuntu on a flash drive nad I used it to install to a different flash drive which does not work fine.

Specifically, the one it's installed on is 16GB and the boot goes a little like this: I boot the computer, I get to the log in screen, I log in, and after that it goes black displaying the following errors:

screenshot

Basically, I get multiple lines saying:

EXT4-fs error (device sda1): ext4_find_entry:[number]

What's going on? How do I fix this? I use an Asus CM5571.

Andrea Lazzarotto
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Haley Kiersten Catherine Bays
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    I would appreciate greater quality of the pictures... Please do not halve the screens, it would be great to write the text as text instead (after taking pictures...). Also, what is your Ubuntu version? – EKons Aug 25 '16 at 22:40

2 Answers2

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First of all, a premise: doing a full system install on a flash drive is generally not recommended, because it will definitely shorten its life. USB thumb drives are not suited for continuous, repeated writes on it and a full OS writes a lot of files while running.

It would be much better to use a live system with a persistence file. Now, about your problem:

EXT4-fs error (device sda1): ext4_find_entry:[number]

Your have input/output errors on the drive. This can have two causes:

  • the file system is damaged
  • the drive is damaged

In the first case, you can easily solve it by running a file system check. You can use the live USB you have (the one that works fine), run it and open Gparted after plugging the faulty drive. Then:

  • select the faulty drive from the dropdown menu
  • click on the main partition
  • click on Partition → Check
  • follow the instructions

However, if the drive is faulty there is little you can do. You should think about getting a new one before it's too late because you risk losing data.

Andrea Lazzarotto
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Bottom line... building bootable... reliable... USB flash drives is voodoo art. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't.

You could format the target 16GB USB flash drive and try to install again. It may work, or it may fail in any fashion it chooses.

It's much more reliable to burn the .iso to a DVD.

Cheers, Al

heynnema
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  • oh... "Voo Doo" that's why that last USB didn't boot. If you have to reformat the USB do you have recommended format (no pun intended) and preferred program to use? After formatting do you have a preferred utility to burn the .ISO to the USB? – WinEunuuchs2Unix Aug 26 '16 at 01:41
  • It's much more reliable to burn the .iso to a DVD. Cheers, Al – heynnema Aug 26 '16 at 10:17
  • «voodoo art» seriously? OP clearly has I/O errors (damaged drive), there is nothing magic happening. – Andrea Lazzarotto Aug 26 '16 at 10:34
  • @AndreaLazzarotto yes, voodoo art. As the OP tells, the original build on the USB flash drive gave no indication of any read/write or I/O errors, yet, once booted, fs and read errors. You recommend a partition check (fsck), but I wouldn't trust any repairs made with that many (that kind of) errors. Hence I suggested the reformat the USB flash and try to install again. If that failed a second time, then the USB flash is probably defective. Cheers, Al – heynnema Aug 26 '16 at 15:24