XPS 13 9370 Ubuntu full disk encryption

@Christophe14

The previous version is built into the squashfs in the image.  Adding it into that directory will treat it like a patch and will cause it to get installed into the image.

The USB key is read only?  It was written using which tool?  The USB creator on ubuntu?

If that's the case that it's read only that will make this a little more difficult.

1. Make sure you have a copy of  the ISO image somewhere.  If not, then copy all the contents from the USB key to a folder.

2. Format the USB key FAT32 using your favorite tool.

3. Copy all the contents either from within the ISO image or from the folder you made back to the USB key.

4. Add the dell-recovery deb file into that directory debs/main on the USB key.

Hi Mario,

It is more complicated than expected (at least for me).

The USB key was written using Ubuntu Disk.
In fact, it contains two partitions:
- partition 1 is ISO 9660
- partition 2 is EFI FAT

That's why, I can't write any file on partition 1. ISO 9660 is read-only.
It seems not possible to convert ISO 9660 with write permission.

I also cannot format in FAT 32 format due to the table partition (under Ubuntu or Windows).
Anyway, the EFI partition is required to boot the USB key. So, I cannot delete also EFI partition.

As a consequence, I am not in position to write files and test the fix proposed :-(

Have you made a trial ?
Could you propose an ISO file with fix included ?

Thanks.

Kind regards

Christophe

Forgot to answer these.

> Have you made a trial ?

Yes, i've seen that this fix will resolve the encryption issue.

> Could you propose an ISO file with fix included ?

It will take a while for recovery images from support.dell.com to be regenerated, re-promoted etc. containing this fix.

@Christophe14

I suppose Ubuntu's disk creator switched to writing out ISO9660 in the last version.  It used to write out FAT32.  Both work from the perspective of how it gets installed but it's much more difficult to update the image in this case.

Did you try adjusting partition table using GParted?  You should have been able to from there.

If you can't get your USB disk formatted, there is a very convoluted set of instructions I'll offer.

1. Reinstall with creation of recovery partition.

2. Go through regular setup process.

3. Download and install dell-recovery deb.

4. Re-do creation of ISO image and write to disk again.

Dell Recovery has a self patching feature where if the version installed when running dell-recovery is newer than the one on the recovery partition it will inject itself into the new ISO image.

Hi  @dell-mario l ,

I have got bad news.

I have unsuccessfully tested the proposed solution to recreate the Dell Recovery ISO file with the new dell-recovery deb (version 1.60 provided) during this weekend.

I have performed two attempts consisting of:

- reinstallation of Dell XPS Ubuntu factory image
- installation of new dell-recovery deb v1.60
- creation of the new Dell Recovery ISO file

The first attempt : I have created the ISO file from Dell Recovery application and after I have used Ubuntu Disk application to write the USB key.
Passphrase secret created was "eeeee" => Not recognized after new full disk encryption installation.

The second attempt : I have directly created the Dell Recovery Media USB key from Dell Recovery application.
Passphrase secret created was "rrrrr" => Still not recognized after new full disk encryption installation.

So, either the fix provided does not solve the issue, or Dell Recovery application is not injecting the changes into the new ISO file created.

Maybe I could provide you the new Dell Recovery Media ISO file created, so that you can test it.
Or you can provide me the new Dell Recovery Media ISO file including your fix, so that I can test it.
I am talking about the Dell Recovery Media ISO file and not the Dell XPS 13 Ubuntu factory image.

Thanking you in advance.

Kind regards.

Hi @Christoph123

Were you in position to test Mario fix ?

I am also curious to know what .deb packages you have installed on top of standard Ubuntu 18.04.1.

Looking at Dell Recovery Media ISO content, there are a lot of .deb packages in different folders and I don't understand the sequence of installation and which packages shall be installed.

For example, there are NVIDIA packages whereas there is no NVIDIA video card inside (I think) in XPS 13 9370.

Thanks !

And also please confirm that you see in the debs/ directory or debs/main directory that updated dell recovery package in the ISO image.  You should.

I did check that it failed previously and worked properly with that patched package on my side as did some of my colleagues.  Assuming you built it right (it sounds like you did) I do wonder if you are also having a second problem.

Can you please do the following:

1) Boot live media and unlock /mount the root partition.

2) Copy /var/log/installer/* and put it in a Github gist or somewhere that it can be viewed?

That will confirm the version of dell-recovery used and any errors from installation.

I can't share an ISO image.  Like I said there is a lengthy process to getting new images created and posted to the web.

In what I was proposing I was meaning to check booting any other image that manually mount the partition using the "Disks" utility.  This would allow you to fetch the logs out to further investigate where the problem you are seeing is.

You can look at the contents of the ISO by using "less" or opening it in file-roller on Ubuntu, 7z FM on Windows, or any tool that can look at the file listing on the ISO. 

FYI I won't be able to check on hardware again myself until after the US holiday on my side. 

dell-mario, thanks for you work on this. I am going to chime in with a couple of things. I know you won't have hardware until after the holiday, but if you see this and have any thoughts, I may have time to try some things.

christophe14: I don't think it has anything to do with french keyboard or installing from command line, as I see the same behavior.

Just to be sure we are all on the same page, this is what I have tried:

1. Download https://github.com/dell/dell-recovery/releases/download/1.60/dell-recovery_1.60_all.deb

2. sudo dpkg -i Downloads/dell-recover_1.60_all.deb

3. run the dell-recovery application, select build OS media

I have tried installing from the resulting flash drive, and it took be a bit to figure out that the option for encrypting is buried under an option where you select between using the whole disk or only the linux partition. When I choose the later, I see an option to use encryption. If I choose this, I can select a passwd, but after reboot, the passwd is not accepted as reported above.

dell-mario: I just checked and the resulting flash drive does NOT have dell-recover under debs or debs/main, so it appears that installing this on the OS before creating the recovery media does not cause it to be included in the recover media.

Hi @jdrogers and @dell-mario l

From what I have seen dell-recovery_1.60_all.deb is updating chroot.sh. This file is copied locally on the hard disk.
But I don't see this file on the Dell Recovery Media USB key. Same thing for the .deb package, I confirm it is not in the USB key generated.
I wil be in position to post the var/log/installer files in the coming days.

Another strange thing when you create directly the Dell Recovery Media USB key after Ubuntu/Dell configuration, an ISO file is created in the Download folder. But the ISO file is not bootable: it contains only one partition and not the EFI one.

Kind regards

Hi @dell-mario l,

I have sent you the var/log/installer content.

Thanks !

Kind regards.

One other thing I just noticed: I am able to write the .deb into the recovery partition on the ssd (as opposed to the usb flash key). I tried reinstalling using the recovery partition instead of the usbkey, but I can't seem to find a way to get the option to do encryption and it only has the choice of reinstalling.

In the end, I may do full disk encryption manually anyway, since I was just reading that the installer option does not allow setup of encrypted swap which is how I have had my previous laptop for years. I am still happy to test things if I can be of help for the next few days.

Hi @dell-mario l,

I am not able to create a new Dell Recovery USB disk with dell-recover_1.60_all.deb copied in debs/main.

In fact, I haven't found a working way to re-create manually two partitions (EFI and FAT 32) on USB key so that I can copy files on these partitions.

Could you please share how you did it ?

Thanks in advance.

Kind regards,

Christophe