Ubuntu
grub2 package

[External drive] instalation issue w/exernal drive

Asked by nepsik proto

Hi, I am very much a beginner but seemed to have turned my laptop into a desktop. I have a Toshiba Satellite laptop with a My Book Essential 640 GB external drive that I leave attached pretty much all the time. The problem is that I had it attached when I installed Ubuntu and now my computer won't boot unless it's hooked up. I get a grub error message and prompt and the thing is as good as dead. I plug the usb back in and it's good to go. The other problem is that the install took over half the external drive, I have burned the gparted live disk, but before I deal with that I would like to get the 8.71 GBs on the external drive moved into the computer's hard drive, the C drive in ms. So, is there a way to do this, or should I just reinstall with the external drive unmounted? I'd rather not as I've been tweaking and installing for a couple of days now and wouldn't want to have to start all over again, but can if necessary to make my laptop portable again.

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delance (olivier-delance) said : 		#1

1) Managing external removable media
When you install Ubuntu on a removable media, it installed the files need to boot on the "/boot" directory of Ubuntu. And if you remove the removable media which holds this directory...you are unable to boot anything.
A solution is to slightly resize Windows last partition, to create a small "/boot" partition.
If you have a fresh install, the simplest is to reinstall Ubuntu, but you have to choose "manual partition". When the partitions are displayed, mount this new small partition to directory "/boot" (this value is in the list of default partition), the big partition on sdg1 to "/" directory.
2) Moving Ubuntu to /dev/sda
Yes, it is possible to move files from external to internal disk, but after you will have to reconfigure some files, which will take more time than a fresh install (except if you are a real guru of Ubuntu). An fresh install should take two hours, but if to configure files, we do "forwards" and "backwards" in this forum, it will take days.

Conclusion:
you have the choice between:
   a) making a /boot directory on fixed disk and install again in removable disk
   b) an install on hard disk, and using second disk as a pure data disk (without OS)

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delance (olivier-delance) said : 		#2

Hello,
If your issue is closed, please mark question solved.
Else I should have some time next week to help you.

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