How to install Ubuntu Desktop on Raspberry Pi 4

Hey @saxonian, if you plug the hard drive you want to use with the PI into your laptop/PC USB port, then in the middle of that menu where it says ‘SD Card’ and you click ‘Choose SD Card’ you should have an option to select the Hard Drive instead (be careful not to select your PC’s own hard drive!). On my machine the imager actually says ‘choose storage’ as that option. Let me know if this solves your problem!

Hoping to install Ubuntu on a new pi 400 4GB. Does this tutorial apply to 400 as well? Any exceptions? Thank you in advance.

thanks for your tips. I was two weeks ill. That’s why i can’t give you a feedback. Last weekend I installed according your guideline Mate 21.10 on Raspi 4 8GB with SSD 240 GB. It works smooth and at the first impression the operating system is very well thought out. Now I’m just getting an better overview of the operating system. For the most W-Program’s are good alternatives available. If I have enough experience, then I’ll install later Mate 22.04 on my PC for CAD and Video-processing.

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Great, thanks for letting us know you got things working! Hope you enjoy your experience!

Hey @wacojohn it should work exactly the same, just flash the SD card and insert it into the 400. One of our engineers actually used a 400 with Ubuntu as his development machine for a while… Let us know how you get on!

Thank you SO much for the reassurance. I’m finding confusion on what Ubuntu image. One instruction says (simply) choose it with the Rasp. Installer. Another says download it from the Rasp. site. I’m also concerned about the 4GB of memory on the 400. Once I know exactly what and where the image is, I won’t worry about 4GB though.

By golly, … it’s right chere!

Screenshot 2022-01-17 10.07.17 PM

found at:

https://ubuntu.com/download/raspberry-pi

Grab that and burn to SD … right?? thank you again.

Hey @wacojohn the best way is not to download that but to open your Pi Imager and click ‘Choose OS’ then choose ‘Other general purpose OS’ then ‘Ubuntu’ then ‘Ubuntu Desktop 21.10 (RPi 4.400)’ then choose your sd card and away you go :slight_smile: you can do it with the version from the site using the ‘use custom’ option but it’s easier doing it all in the imager app!

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Yes Sir. I figured two ways to go. D/L the pkg, and burn it to SD Card. So I did. Wasn’t sure I could burn a xxxxx.img.xz file, so I ‘FELL BACK’ to use Pi Imager just exactly as you said, and I’m ready to use the SD Card in my 2nd and still in the box Pi 400. Thank you Sir. Peace and prosperity to you and yours.

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I can only boot from the SSD if I have a SD Card inserted.

What does discourse version mean and why does it link to the same artcle?

Do we have a tutorial about how to create an SD card image from scratch? I bought a device called uConsole that uses a CM4 as brain and I would like to bake my own image with some customizations.

rPi imager refuses to download ubuntu server 22 LTS 64bit. Every time it just says fails to connect and lists a different IP. I have confirmed there is not anything on my side blocking it so not sure if its the remote server or the rPi imager but it does not work.

Folks, gentle reminder that comments in this thread should be limited to specific suggestions to improve the documentation in the first post.

Don’t hijack this topic.

If you need a bit of help to get the instructions to work for you: That’s a support question and should be directed to any of our many Support Venues where a whole cadre of community volunteers is ready to help you.

For general discussion about installing or RPis or alternatives or articles of interest, please open a new topic for the discussion.

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