21.04_full installation to USB: unable to install GRUB; grub-install failed

[Earl]

Installing from 21.04 LIVE USB to another USB. Let the installer do everything. It found the existing 20.04 installation and reformatted the ext partition, leaving the EFI partition untouched. Only 2 USB drives in system, no other drives of any kind present. When almost finished, error appears: unable to install grub in /dev/sbd failed. Executing 'grub-install /dev/sdb' failed.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 21.04
Package: ubiquity 21.04.9
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 5.10.0-14.15-generic 5.10.11
Uname: Linux 5.10.0-14-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: zfs zunicode zavl icp zcommon znvpair
ApportVersion: 2.20.11-0ubuntu60
Architecture: amd64
CasperMD5CheckResult: pass
CasperVersion: 1.460
Date: Thu Mar 18 12:12:12 2021
InstallCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/casper/vmlinuz file=/cdrom/preseed/ubuntu-mate.seed maybe-ubiquity quiet splash ---
LiveMediaBuild: Ubuntu-MATE 21.04 "Hirsute Hippo" - Alpha amd64 (20210317)
RebootRequiredPkgs:
 linux-image-5.10.0-14-generic
 linux-base
SourcePackage: grub-installer
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

grub install to USB stick fails. Only 2 drives present in system: 21.04 LIVE USB and FAT32 formatted stick. Build 19 March 2021 of Umate 21.04 Choice was to let installer erase and reformat entire USB stick.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

wrote 21.04 build 21 March to USB stick after checking image with gtkhash. Used this LIVE USB to install 21.04 to a second USB stick, sdb. Normal installation until near the end when BOOM
Unable to install grub in dev/sdb (as superuser). Executing 'grub-install /dev/sdb' failed. This is a fatal error. Only these 2 USB drives sda and sdb are present, no other drives.

This time I freshly created with gparted a GPT USB and a smaller ext4 partition for root, a larger ext4 partition for /home, and a small EFI partition flagged as esp,boot. Boot loader marked as sdb. No files anywhere. Since freshly formatted with Gparted, no formatting during installation. sda is the LIVE USB stick. Choice was 'other' installation, not a full erase and install.

This prevents me from test driving 21.04 as a full install.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

I noticed in GParted, that the fat32 EFI partition has a red circle with an exclamation. Info says:
WARNING: unable to read the contents of this file system! Because of this some operations may be unavailable. The cause might be a missing software package. The following list of software packages is required for fat32 file system support: dosfstools, mtools.

Are the packages dosfstools and mtools available on the LIVE USB ? and if yes, are they available to the installer on the LIVE USB?

According to my bug report 1920255, entering these commands in a terminal window results in an error: command can not be found.

Can the LIVE USB and its installer read the EFI fat32 partition?

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

Since I can not use U20.04 because of video screen tearing/shredding, I had the idea to use MINT 18.3 on another computer. Using MINT 18.3 GParted, I formatted the same USB stick with a fat32 partition and there was no problem, no error msg saying that the fat32 file system can not be read as always happens with Umate 21.04.

This is a show stopper if the 21.04 LIVE USB can not read fat32, because EFI must be fat32.

I would suggest that this is an urgent bug to fix.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

I installed synaptic and found that
dosfstools v. 4.2-1build1
mtools v. 4.0.26-1

are installed in the 21.04 LIVE USB.

So why can 21.04 LIVE USB not read fat32 according to GParted?

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

21.04 Umate build 22 March

Unable to create full installation to 2nd USB stick from LIVE USB.

GParted v.1.1.0 still can not read any fat32 partition.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

Hirsute 21.04 build 23 March

Fatal grub-install error. Hirsute is not able to do a full install.

It appears that Hirsute can not read any fat32 partition.

GParted says about the EFI partition:

WARNING
Unable to read the contents of this file system!
Because of this some operations may be unavailable.
The cause might be a missing software package.
The following list of software packages is required for fat32 file system support: dosfstools, mtools.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

Hirsute build 15 April

Unable to do full install to USB3 stick.

Executing 'grub-install /dev/sdb' failed. This is a fatal error.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

Hirsute build 15 April

Unable to do full install to external USB3 hard disk.

Executing 'grub-install /dev/sdd' failed. This is a fatal error.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

Hirsute build 16 April

Unable to do full install to USB3 stick.

Executing 'grub-install /dev/sdd' failed. This is a fatal error.

This after choosing to do a full erase and let the installer do what it wishes.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

Hirsute build 17 April

Unable to do full install to USB3 stick.

Executing 'grub-install /dev/sdd' failed. This is a fatal error.

This after choosing to do a full erase and let the installer do what it wishes.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

Hirsute build 18 April

Unable to do full install to USB3 stick.

Executing 'grub-install /dev/sdd' failed. This is a fatal error.

This after choosing to do a full erase and let the installer do what it

Additionally, today I tried to do a full install to an external USB3 SSD. The SSD was preformatted with a FAT32 EFI partition, flagged to esp,boot along with a number of ext4 partitions of 16 and 32 GB size. Towards the start of the installation, an error came saying ubi-partman problem with exit code 10.

In summary, until now with multiple attempts to do full installs, all have failed with the exception of one external USB3 hard disk (a second HDD of same make and model failed).

The failures are usually grub-install, but sometimes ubi-partman exit code 10 failures.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

Hirsute build 19 April

Unable to do full install to USB3 stick.

Executing 'grub-install /dev/sdd' failed. This is a fatal error.

This after choosing to do a full erase and let the installer do what it wishes to do.

[Earl (2104-amdgpu)]

After the release of Hirsute, I was able to format USB sticks and external hard disks so apparently the grub-install problem is solved after 22 April. I consider this bug report can be closed, but do not know how to do this.