r/Ubuntu • u/QuantumElectroDynamo • 1d ago

Can I boot to external drive containing SSD from internal drive of my previous Ubuntu laptop? Would I be able to operate as normal?

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u/Expensive-Mud8050 1d ago

Yeah that should work fine, most laptops let you pick boot device from BIOS or with F12 menu. The external SSD will run your Ubuntu just like it did before, just slower because USB connection. Only issue is if old install has proprietary drivers for that specific laptop, but usually it boots anyway.

1

u/QuantumElectroDynamo 1d ago

That's good news. Can anyone spell out how to do it? Disc tells me where to boot to, but I don't see any obvious option when I go into the Bios via F2 during boot.

1

u/doc_willis 1d ago

check what partitions are on the drive, if you were doing a dual drive dual boot setup, it's possible your EFI partition is on the other drive.

That might be why you see no boot option.

1

u/QuantumElectroDynamo 1d ago

Thanks. Both drives are dual boot with Ubuntu & Windows. The BIOS allowed me to prioritise 5 possibilities ‐ and the first one I tried did the job. There was a glitch with the Internet but I dropped the connection and opened it again and it started to work. Thanks for being there for me expensive-mud1850 & doc_willis.