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I am trying to setup Ubuntu on an external USB hard drive to see if I can reliably move it between computers. This has been far harder than I thought it would be.

I got the external HDD to boot and run quite well on my laptop (which is 6 months old, core i3, 4gb ram). I can switch between my USB drive's Ubuntu 16.04.2 and my local drive (which has both Ubuntu 16.04.2 and Windows 10). So far, so good.

When I try to boot that same drive on my desktop computer (7 years old, core i7, 12GB ram), it will not boot. When I set the external HDD to be my boot drive (in the bios), I get the following error:

error: file '/boot/grub/i386-pc/normal.mod' not found.

Entering rescue mode...

grub rescue>

When I set my local hdd to be my boot drive and then choose the external hdd from the grub menu, I get the following error:

error: file '/boot/bmlinuz-4.8.0-56-generic.efi.signed' not found.

error: you need to load the kernel first.

Press any key to continue...

Then I get bounced back to the local hdd's grub menu.

My question is, why can this drive boot fine from a newish laptop but not from a more powerful, but older, desktop computer?

I did install Ubuntu on the external drive from the laptop but I have tried many variations including using 17.04 and installing from the desktop. Regardless of what I try (including many of the recommendations from this site) I am unable to get my external drive to boot from my older desktop computer.

Any ideas are welcome.

Community
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John
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1 Answers1

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when it comes to EFI/uefi I can't help as I've mostly dealt with legacy mode. most if not all /boot/* files can be modified; but the MBR of the 'boot' drive is a binary sector; so must be overwritten. I also can't help with fixing w10.

i've only done it with commands (and not often enough to remember) so won't in case of misleading/error.

a quick search found https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RecoveringUbuntuAfterInstallingWindows https://www.howtogeek.com/114884/how-to-repair-grub2-when-ubuntu-wont-boot/ http://howtoubuntu.org/how-to-repair-restore-reinstall-grub-2-with-a-ubuntu-live-cd

the first (help.ubuntu) looks dated; and includes a link to boot-repair (which I recall good luck with once on 14.04; but ages ago). both are dated 2015

the second I've used successfully once; but also had it fail for me too. (2017)

the third I didn't see a date for; I liked it as I recognize the commands, but it provides no explanation so you'll have to rely on man. (I think the third is from How can I repair grub? (How to get Ubuntu back after installing Windows?) which is old)

this isn't an answer; nor what you wanted - but I'm hoping contains some clues so you can help yourself. i've used boxes where an external drive can change according to which usb-port is used (motherboard had more than one usb controller) so in my experience its play until you get it working. I also have no fixing experience with w10 so can't include what it (if anything) it changes. [this is a big comment really!]

guiverc
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