Ths might be a silly question, but asking those is how i learn sometimes. I’m trying to install my first Linux distro to set up a Plex server and one of the few things I know is you need a wired internet connection. My intended server location is across the house from my router, and there isnt much room there to set up temporarily. It would be possible, just a removed and a half. Is it instead possible to connect my SSD via SATA to USB to a laptop, install Ubuntu and wireless adapter drivers on it while connected to ethernet, then put the SSD in the server to boot? Or do I need to do all this through my intended setup?
Thanks for the help, just trying to make my first Linux install as painless as possible.
EDIT: Thank you all for your responses, I’m going to respond as I can since I’m at work. I The number one thing I learned is that I need to do more research. I recognize only a handful of these acronyms lol
Probably not the ideal method, but I’ve used a virtual machine with the disk connected via USB and then mounted to the VM to achieve something like this. It doesn’t interfere with the existing disks or UEFI of any actual hardware then.
I’m not sure if Ubuntu requires a wired internet connection. I’ve installed a different distro yesterday and wifi worked fine during the installation. The installer asked me to connect to network and I used the wifi. I’ve never plugged a network cable into the machine. Maybe it’s the same with Ubuntu. But sure, there are other possibilities. Offline installers and/or you can install Linux on a different machine and then swap the harddisk/ssd. Just take care not to overwrite the internal disk of your laptop. Make sure it writes to the correct disk (or unplug other ones).
I believe the answer is no. I think it installs over Wi-Fi, fine, so long as the adapter isn’t a weird of brand or something.
That’s it. I have installed Ubuntu many times connected over Wi-Fi without any problems, except one special case many years ago. In that case, the system had some brand new Wi-Fi adapter, so I had to install the driver over Ethernet. But in almost any case it just should work and you can simply try to get a wireless connection in a live sytem to find out. And as mentioned above, internet connection is not necessary while installing from USB stick with the usual image. Its just recommended to save time and install the latest updates of some components during the initial system installation. But of course, you can do it later and of course you can do it over Wi-Fi (except some very rare special cases as mentioned at the beginning).
Yes you can do that, make sure you are on the same CPU infrastructure (ie, don’t try to install linux on an SSD from an intel laptop if you’re going to be running it on an arm based processor or something).
Yes, just make sure that the boot setup for the distro install is compatible with what you intend to install it onto (I.E. if your server is going to be using EFI to boot an OS, install your Ubuntu instance as GPT, EFI onto the SSD). Depending on what wireless modules you are using and where you are sourcing them and how you are installing them, you might need to ensure Secure Boot is disabled in the BIOS of your server. This will be the case if the kernel module package you are installing doesn’t sign the wireless adapter driver you intend to use. Otherwise, most drivers you could possibly need should be baked into the kernel and you should be good to go.
(One further sidenote coming from someone who has not used Ubuntu in a long time (since 16.04’s release), it would be good to check in the /etc/fstab file that the filesystem references are using either UUID or PARTUUID. Depending upon the drive layout of the server you are mounting the intended drive into, traditionally labeled references such as sda or nvme0n1 can change depending upon the slots each drive is seated. Using UUID or PARTUUID in the fstab reference alleviates any potential complications from this scenario where fstab might reference the wrong drive in mounting partitions. I do believe Ubuntu would likely do this by default nowadays, but it can’t hurt to check.)
Thanks for all the info. I have no comment since I need to watch like 3 youtube videos and spend another hour reading before I really understand that second paragraph, but I will definitely be referring back to it.
What I did pick up was that the kernel actually comes with basic hardware drivers, which is a huge relief. I have pretty standard wifi hardware on standby, so I can try that.
You don’t need any internet connection to install Ubuntu. Just use the normal install, not minimal network installer. Install from a USB stick.
Also, there’s no requirement for a wire either. If that were the case, you could never install on any modern laptop.
You would need some sort of functioning network to upgrade packages or install anything not in the base image, but this would all be after installation when you have a working OS and wired or wireless won’t matter.
Ah okay. I just remember hearing that all your drivers need to be manually installed and updated in Linux, so for me that included ALL drivers, even basic ones like that. If I can get started wirelessly that would be perfect. Thanks!
It’s almost completely the opposite, drivers are (almost completely) a windows problem. If you’re willing and able to go the open source route, which for most people mean “I don’t have an NVIDIA card or don’t plan on getting every ounce of performance from it” you don’t need to worry about drivers at all (bar some weird cards, but they’re getting rarer and rarer, I don’t remember the last time I had to install a driver that wasn’t NVIDIA).
Good to know I should avoid NVIDIA for Linux. The only NVIDIA card I have is on my gaming rig, so I don’t plan on having to deal with that since I’m sticking with Windows on that until (hopefully) more studios start caring about Linux compatibility. Can’t wait to cut that Microsoft umbilical cord permanently.
That said, do I need dedicated graphics on a Plex server? I was going to go integrated, but your comment made me realize I never checked hardware requirements. Which are probably on Plex’s website. Which I am now going to go check because Lemmy isn’t Google and it’s not your responsibility to hand me answers I can easily find.
Nope, not gonna be that guy today. Thanks lol
