Trouble seeing SSD for installation on Dell Optiplex

JimLS

New Member
Mar 20, 2025
15
0
1
Have a Optiplex 5040 with 500 GB Hard drive. Added an M.2 500GB SSD. Ubuntu is installed on the SSD but I want to install over it (wipe out existing Ubuntu installation). I could only see one drive on install - not sure which it was. I changed bios from RAID to AHCI. Bios sees both drives but now having trouble setting boot sequence in BIOS. Was going to load System Rescue CD (live linux CD) and look at drives with gparted or similar and wipe the Ubuntu install but can't select the DVD drive as boot in bios. For boot options I had changed from Legacy to UEFI and it doesn't see the drives and it is preventing me from switching back to legacy.

Once I get past this step I saw something about not using /dev/sda1 type drive labels and using disk by-id instead. Anywhere I could read up on how to do that. I am planning to use the hard drive for storage for an application (zoneminder) so I think the proxmox install can ignore it.
 
BIOS wasn't letting me change some things but a restart and it was in legacy mode and the drives were visible. Changed the boot order so the USB install media was first and did the install. Did not see a way to enter drive by id or even change the drive but the ssd was selected so I proceeded. Good for now but still curious about the drive by id. Some places recommend it as being more stable.
 
Last edited: