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December 4th, 2021 14:00
Manipulating the partition table
Dell understandably does not support users mucking around with the partition table, but that should not preclude users from discussing that subject with one other. To that end, I will describe one way of doing that. You need to boot into a system such as any Linux version that provides a virtual environment in which you can run software that can operate on your hard drive. That environment treats the hard drive as an external device. I've already done this with a Kubuntu installation memory stick. In that case I choose to try Kubuntu rather than install Kubuntu. The environment that results operates outside of the hard drive's memory. In particular, you can run a partition editor such as gparted.
I'm thinking of trying an experiment where I zero out all of memory and then do a factory reinstall. I don't if it will work, but it ought to.
What led to explore this topic is a situation where none of the factory install images I've gotten from Dell support have worked. The most likely cause is a corrupted partition table, and the procedure I describe offers some hope of allowing the factory reinstall to move forward. Needless to say, there's no information in the machine that I need to save.
pwabrahams
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December 8th, 2021 09:00
OK, so I tried doing the simplest possible thing according to your suggestions. After Start-F12 I chose to boot from the factory restore image (there were no other plausible choices anyway), At the blue Setup screen, I chose to Repair, then got to the command-line interface. I called up diskpart. then did "select disk 0", then "clean". I verified that there were no partitions on the disk. I then exited, went to Start-F12 again, and loaded the factory image restore. I proceeded through the Setup ritual and got the same result -- the process aborted after starting Setup. as before.
But there's one anomaly I didn't think to mention before. On the One-Time Boot screen, the one I get via Start-F12, there is a list of UEFI boot devices. That includes, of course, the USB stick. But it starts with one other item that has appeared ever since my troubles began: a single line reading "Ubuntu". Choosing that line at the moment gets me the "no boot devices" message; earlier in my travails it got me to the installed Kubuntu system.
I think that the "Ubuntu" line first appeared after I first installed Kubuntu, incorrectly. That installation gave me a working Kubuntu but killed my access to Windows. My guess is that the incorrect installation wrote something somewhere, and it isn't on the disk, at least no visibly. Whatever is causing Ubuntu (with no other information) to appear in the UEFI boot list is probably the source of my problems and the reason that none of the fixes have worked.
jphughan
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December 8th, 2021 10:00
@pwabrahams Dear God, man. That is not the simplest possible thing, nor is it even remotely what I suggested. Ok, I'm going to break this down as clearly as I possibly can here:
jphughan
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December 8th, 2021 12:00
@pwabrahams Glad you're all set, even if it involved a rather circuitous route. Happy computing!
pwabrahams
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December 8th, 2021 12:00
The problem got resolved in an unexpected way. Dell themselves decided to solve my problems by replacing my hard drive, so all is well now.
I really appreciate your generosity in helping me. and I apologize if I seemed inattentive to what you were saying. The people at Dell are constrained about the kind of help they can provide. It's really useful to converse with people who can discuss the wider picture, such as interactions between Linux and Ubuntu, and the Dell community seems to be open to that kind of conversation (as is the Linux community).
In the way of personal background, I'm now 86 years old. I've been working in the computer field for over 65 years, but my mind doesn't work as well as it used to. In particular, my short-term memory is very weak.
I made a big mistake in trying to install Kubuntu without regard to the current state of my machine. I've set up a number of dual-boot systems without encountering the kind of mishaps that plagued me this time. I know that there's plenty of information around on how to do it, but I made the mistake of assuming that what has worked for me in the past would work for me this time.
Thanks again.