Rolling back to the beginning of this conversation since I noticed several things missing from this attempt to configure dual boot.
Whenever you set up a multi-boot system, there are several things you have to outline BEFORE you make any changes to your system. These really are not optional, there are so many different ways to set up bootloaders that if you don't define these first then you WILL get confused. It also makes it near impossible to ask for help because you don't know what exactly to ask for help with, resulting in random tidbits of advice from the internet. If you really want to dual boot Xubuntu and Debian, start by answering the following 3 questions. Once you have these figured out, you can start to configure it piece by piece. 1) Do you want to use UEFI or Legacy boot mode? This is a bios option and which one you pick will set the stage for everything else 2) Which OS do you want to designate as your "Master" OS? This is the OS you use to configure the bootloader and boot menu. Ideally this is whatever you are most comfortable with so you aren't completely lost when something breaks. 3) Do you want a custom menu? Trying to install a second OS without answering the above questions will create more problems than anyone needs. It's also easier for us to recommend solutions once we know what tools you are working with. -Ben ------- Original Message ------- On Monday, September 18th, 2023 at 9:39 AM, John Jason Jordan <joh...@gmx.com> wrote: > Xubuntu is on a three-year-old 1TB M.2 card and it has worked well for > years. I think I want to change to Debian, so I downloaded the Xfce > flavor of the Debian 12 ISO and burned it to a USB drive. Then I went > out and bought a new 2TB M.2 drive and installed it in the computer in > a spare, unused slot. I booted to the flash drive and went through the > installation, specifying the new 2TB drive, creating a 200GB partition > for / and 1800GB for /home. At the end the installer stopped and said > it had found the Xubuntu installation, and did I want to create a dual > boot? I answered 'yes,' and it said that upon booting I would have the > choice of which OS to boot to. After the installation completed and I > rebooted it went straight into Xubuntu; no option to boot to Debian, > like the new drive wasn't even installed. While in Xubuntu I noted that > the / and /home partitions on Debian had been mounted, so I looked at > them and all the files appeared to be in the partitions. > > The BIOS has a feature where you can choose which disk drive you want > to boot to; all you have to do is hold down F12 and you will get a > menu. I did so, and there was the new M.2 drive in the list, so I > selected it. Unfortunately it did not boot. Instead, a few minutes later > I was staring at a black screen with a flashing underscore in the upper > left corner. The keyboard was inactive, and there was no mouse. > > I had one more trick up my sleeve - go to the the BIOS directly. In the > BIOS I swapped the boot order of the drives so the new M.2 drive would > be first to boot. But when I booted it still wouldn't boot Debian; all I > got was the same black screen and flashing underscore. > > I've been reading up on how to get this to work and I haven't found the > answer yet. Both drives have a separate partitions for / and /home, and > each of them has a /boot/grub/grub.cfg file in the / partition. At the > top of the menu entries, the one in the Debian drive has Debian and > Debian-Alternative followed by 80 (believe it or not) menu entries for > Xubuntu. On the Xubuntu drive the file has menu entries only for > Xubuntu, although only about 20 of them. Methinks some serious tidying > up is overdue, but that can wait. Maybe a command to update grub is the > right way to do it. > > This would probably be easy to fix, if I only knew how. I'm anxiously > looking for suggestions so I can look at Debian 12 on the new drive. :)
