Installation • Portable install on external SSD with (or without) UEFI - Possible?

Hello,

thanks I installed inxi and this is the output:

Machine:
Type: Laptop System: HP product: HP Pavilion Notebook
v: Type1ProductConfigId serial: 5CD6165GKQ Chassis: type: 10 serial: N/A
Mobo: HP model: 80A4 v: 91.1C serial: <omitted> UEFI: Insyde v: F.77
date: 12/18/2015

Anyway, in the meanwhile I progressed big time.

1) I found that the /etc/fstab in the SSD drive was mounting partitions from the internal HD - probably a glitch or something in the standard grub installer - I corrected the file contents so that the mounts of / and /boot/efi refer to the UUIDs of the proper partitions in the external drive

2) Looking at various source I tried putting together this script using various info that seemed to work in similar cases

sudo mount /dev/sdb4 /mnt # root partition of external drive
sudo mount /dev/sdb2 /mnt/boot/efi # ESP partition of external drive
for i in /dev /dev/pts /proc /sys /run; do sudo mount -B $i /mnt$i; done
sudo chroot /mnt
grub-install --no-nvram --force-extra-removable /dev/sdb # external drive
update-grub

And after that I incredibly have not one but two drives, one GPT and one the infamous MBR, both recognized as UEFI by the BIOS and they boot, even if both connected (one wins of course).

If none are connected the internal drive boots Windows.

I also have legacy boot disabled and secure boot enabled, so the most future proof configuration.
I still have to check what happens on a different PC but so far so (very!!!) good.

Thank you guys for your help, will report about further testing.

- Mario

Statistics: Posted by mabian — 2024-08-17 21:49 — Replies 6 — Views 135

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