I'm somewhat of a noob when it comes to this kind of stuff, but I am a computer science student so I am familiar with operating systems. Anyway, I'll try to be as detailed as possible in describing this issue.
I have a Toshiba Satellite P75-A7200 laptop that came with Windows 8 (I upgraded to 8.1). This laptop has room for 2 hard drives, and one of those slots comes empty. So I got a 128GB Samsung 850 Evo SSD to install Ubuntu on. I want to keep Windows on the old 750-GB HDD. If I didn't, I probably would've gotten a larger SSD, but that would've been very expensive.
Samsung's instructions that came with the device were about migrating data from an old HDD to the SSD (i.e., replacing the old drive). These instructions didn't work for me, so this is what I did to install Ubuntu:
- I connected the SSD using a USB-to-SATA cable
- From Windows' Disk Management, I initialized then formatted the SSD. I could now see the SSD like a flash drive from Explorer.
- I backed up then formatted a USB drive. I downloaded the Ubuntu 14.04 ISO and used "Linux Live USB Creator" to transfer it to the USB.
- I shut down the computer and held the F12 key as I restarted it, opening up the BIOS.
- I booted from the USB drive and installed Ubuntu on the SSD.
When Ubuntu booted for the first time, everything was OK except for a few things: I couldn't control the brightness, volume or keyboard backlight. Either from keyboard shortcuts or from settings. So I did some Googling and people said to change the grub configuration file in /etc/default/grub. The line I edited was this:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""
I changed it to this:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="acpi_backlight=vendor"
That didn't do anything, even after an update-grub and a reboot. Some other people said to change this line:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
To this:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash acpi_backlight=vendor"
When I rebooted, this was the first time I got my issue. Anyway, you guys probably want to know what the problem specifically is, lol. Here's a description:
When I boot my laptop from a completely shut-off state, the first thing that appears - within 4 seconds - is a black screen that says GNU GRUB at the top, followed by something about auto-complete being enabled if I press TAB, followed by a command prompt:
grub> _
I have no idea what to do here, though I can use "ls" and some strange-looking files appear. I type "exit" and the BIOS shows up again. This is where it starts getting really weird. This is the boot order:
1. HDD3/SSD3
2. HDD1/SSD1
3. HDD2/SSD2
4. ODD
5. LAN
6. USB
Enter Setup
HDD Recovery
If I click "enter" while highlighting the first or second ones, a purple-background screen appears with the following options:
- Ubuntu
- Advanced options for Ubuntu
- Windows Boot Manager (on /dev/sdb2)
- System setup
But if I try to boot Ubuntu, a blank purple screen appears, my CPU fan turns on and it just hangs. CTRL-ALT-DELETE takes me back to the initial black "grub" command prompt, from which I just type exit again.
What's really weird is that if I pick the 3rd option from the boot order, a pop-up shows up asking me to pick 1 of 3 options:
- ubuntu
- Windows Boot Manager
- Ubuntu
Picking ubuntu (lower-case u) takes me to the same issue as before (hung-up purple screen). Picking Ubuntu (upper-case U) takes me to... Windows! No clue why.
The only way it boots to Ubuntu is if I go hit from the BIOS boot order, which goes into BIOS settings. From there, I go to the "Boot" tab which is supposed to edit the boot order. I don't actually edit anything, I just hit F10 to save, and that takes me back to the purple screen with the 4 options on it. I hit enter, and Ubuntu boots right up. Strange!
I figured the issue was with grub, so I've been messing with the grub configuration file some more. This is what /etc/default/grub looks like right now:
# If you change this file, run 'update-grub' afterwards to update
# /boot/grub/grub.cfg.
# For full documentation of the options in this file, see:
# info -f grub -n 'Simple configuration'
GRUB_DEFAULT=0
GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=0
GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=true
GRUB_TIMEOUT=0
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian`
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""
# Uncomment to enable BadRAM filtering, modify to suit your needs
# This works with Linux (no patch required) and with any kernel that obtains
# the memory map information from GRUB (GNU Mach, kernel of FreeBSD ...)
#GRUB_BADRAM="0x01234567,0xfefefefe,0x89abcdef,0xefefefef"
# Uncomment to disable graphical terminal (grub-pc only)
#GRUB_TERMINAL=console
# The resolution used on graphical terminal
# note that you can use only modes which your graphic card supports via VBE
# you can see them in real GRUB with the command `vbeinfo'
#GRUB_GFXMODE=640x480
# Uncomment if you don't want GRUB to pass "root=UUID=xxx" parameter to Linux
#GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_UUID=true
# Uncomment to disable generation of recovery mode menu entries
#GRUB_DISABLE_RECOVERY="true"
# Uncomment to get a beep at grub start
#GRUB_INIT_TUNE="480 440 1"
Everything else on the machine works pretty much OK, except for the fact that I can't control the keyboard backlight. I was able to get control of the volume and brightness by following the instructions here.
Anyway, what I'm looking to do is get rid of the black "grub> _" command-line that shows up in the beginning, bypass the BIOS and boot straight into Ubuntu when I press the power button. If anyone else has had this issue, all help would be appreciated.
Thanks.
