Using external USB SSD for a full Mint install

Linux Mint
41

Thanks! I thought there was still some time for Win 8.1. :slightly_smiling_face:

42

Hi
This is a topic near to my heart. I found this explanation very lucid and works perfectly. It virtually covers every eventuality - uefi boot, bios boot, whatever you care to throw at it.
https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=287353

I know it sounds a little weird but I run mint from a 128gb usb3 flashdrive all the time. I travel between two countries very regularly, keep all my documents in the cloud (I’m a huge fan of insync) and have every app you could ever want installed and configured. Yes I appreciate that a flash drive can fail and so I keep a backup using timeshift ready to go if needed. My experience over the last three years shows that a failure is pretty unlikely.

43

in regards to

i just started reading through

and wouldn’t you know (2nd paragraph down):

This is crucial because there’s a bug in the Ubuntu installer, also used by Mint, which in UEFI will bollix the internal hard drive’s bootloader even if one specifies the new bootloader should be installed only to the USB drive.

2 Likes
44

It is true - there is a bug. However the author of that item describes how to avoid it and I have followed his method many times without screwing up the bootloader - I would hate to tell you how many times I have done just that using other methods.
I particularly like his second method headed UEFI - Hybrid Install
Give it a go!

1 Like
45

a very-well written and thorough set of instructions. i removed my hard drive to make my install work, but hybrid and unflag/reflag are both impressive and sound like they would have gotten the job done. i wasn’t aware manually installing the uefi bootloader was an option. the description for how to deal with multiple grub installs on a multiboot system was helpful for how i like to keep my system set up.

thanks again for the link :slight_smile:

46

Thanks Paul! Great to know! I still have the install on my flash drive and it works fine. I just got a bit concerned hearing that it could fail and that an external SSD was a better choice.

Thanks for the link, too - very informative!