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How can I remove the Try Ubuntu / Install Ubuntu screen on my 20.04 Persistent USB drive?

Being diverted to this screen increases boot time on both Rufus and mkusb Persistent USB drives.

I would prefer a GRUB menuentry for installing Ubuntu.

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Removing the Try Ubuntu / Install Ubuntu Screen

For mkusb, (12.4.3), the Try/Install screen can be eliminated by removing "maybe-ubiquity" from the persistent grub.cfg menuentry, on a drive made using mkusb. Try/Install has been removed from Persistence option in latest version of mkusb.

For Rufus, (3.10), the Try/Install screen can be eliminated in BIOS mode by overwriting the contents of syslinux.cfg with:

default persistent
label persistent
  say Booting an Ubuntu Persistent session...
  kernel /casper/vmlinuz
  append  file=/cdrom/preseed/ubuntu.seed boot=casper persistent initrd=/casper/initrd quiet splash noprompt --

In UEFI mode the Try/Install screen can be eliminated by removing "maybe-ubiquity" from the persistent grub.cfg menuentry.

For Unetbootin, (677), there is not a problem with Try/Install in BIOS mode, but in UEFI mode the Try/Install screen can be eliminated by removing "maybe-ubiquity" from the first grub.cfg menuentry.

The grub.cfg menuentry for installing Ubuntu is:

menuentry "Install Ubuntu" {
    set gfxpayload=keep
    linux   /casper/vmlinuz  file=/cdrom/preseed/ubuntu.seed boot=casper only-ubiquity quiet splash ---
    initrd  /casper/initrd
}
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  • Once again, Rufus is NOT a "Syslinux" based utility. It simply follows what the distro uses, which means that your explanation above is incorrect, because if you only edit syslinux.cfg, you will still get the prompt in UEFI mode. Please bear in mind that Ubuntu uses Syslinux for BIOS boot and GRUB for UEFI boot, therefore, with utilities that follow the bootloaders used by the ISO exactly (rather than add their own as you seem to believe), you need to edit BOTH grub.cfg and syslinux.cfg. Can you please amend your post to reflect that then?
    – Akeo
    Apr 27, 2020 at 9:48
  • Also, I don't mind removing maybe-ubiquity when creating persistent drives with Rufus, but as @sudodus pointed out in the related bug report it may also remove other options that users may want, so I want to consider this carefully.
    – Akeo
    Apr 27, 2020 at 9:51
  • @Akeo: Try what I have written concerning syslinux.cfg, You will see that Try/Install screen has been eliminated from BIOS boot. Yes I have tested in UEFI mode and there was not a problem with Try/Install.once "maybe-ubiquity" has been removed. Removing ."maybe-ubiquity" from grub.cfg does not affect booting in BIOS mode. Editing grub.cfg works in UEFI mode, editing syslinux.cfg works in BIOS mode. Ubuntu can use GRUB just fine for booting in BIOS mode, I prove that here: askubuntu.com/questions/1227221/…
    – C.S.Cameron
    Apr 27, 2020 at 13:51
  • @Akeo: If you put an "Install Ubuntu" menuentry in a Syslinux boot menu, like UNetbootin has, the time wasting Try/Install screen becomes redundant
    – C.S.Cameron
    Apr 27, 2020 at 13:54
  • C.S.Cameron: The problem I had is that the way your post was formulated led to think that, to get a Rufus created drive not to present the prompt in either BIOS or UEFI mode, you only needed to edit the Syslinux/Isolinux config files, which is wrong. To remove the prompt in UEFI mode, you must edit grub.cfg. Only editing syslinux.cfg, which is what you suggested, will change nothing when it comes to UEFI boot. So, once again, you need to edit both files for BIOS+UEFI to remove the prompt, and I just wanted to make sure you rectified that.
    – Akeo
    Apr 27, 2020 at 16:24

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