Different approach to repair problem .. . hiring a technician?

[rudy5]

Hi briandu2, thanks for your detailed reply.

AFAIK, my XPS-13 is up to date in terms of Dell drivers &c.; I remember watching these get checked and updated by the BIOS back in September, early on in this adventure.

Having had a similar problem before (enough times), I booted on a Ventoy  USB, where I placed the Ubuntu version (22.04 in your case?) and booted  up from there.  Then reinstalled the OS BUT.......did not reformat the drives (so you do not lose your data!)

Are you saying that re-installing the OS overtop an existing OS will leave the old home directory untouched, i.e., the data intact?

One of the options offered by the Dell boot-up menu is to revert to the shipped setting, which was Ubuntu 16.04. Do you have any knowledge or views about what will happen if I select this --- will I end up with an Ubuntu 16.04 operating system, with my October 2024 home folder?

There's more (and I have to do a bit of further studying), & am meantime much obliged for your answers to these queries!

[oldfred]

With my Windows Dell system the reinstall of the Dell image totally reverted system to as purchased all my data was gone.
Not sure then with a Linux system whether it checks the format box or not on install. I would expect it does.

You can reinstall to same / (root) but not check format. You never check format on a separate /home partition.
Your files then are not changed, but if you modified system files (like grub) those would be the original default settings.

Benefits of a release-upgrade (over clean install) by guiverc, but I prefer clean install & restore from backup
https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2501145
Over install without formatting to reuse same home data. "Dirty Install"
System settings or anything in / may be overwritten with defaults. Good backups still important
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UbuntuReinstallation &
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1941872
https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2496620

[him610]

Is there anybody with sufficient knowledge of Ubuntu linux, and the Dell XPS-13, living within ca. 150km of Vancouver, B.C., to undertake this task for me?

Are there no Linux User Groups (LUG) in the Vancouver, BC or Washington State areas that could provide some assistance on your issue?

[yancek]

Linux User Group in Vancouver at the link below.

https://vanlug.ca/

Doing an install of 22.04 WITHOUT formatting would seem to be the simplest solution. I did it twice in the last month on a different Linux distribution and there's no reason it would no work on Ubuntu. Nobody is going to guarantee anything obviously as it easy for a user to make a mistake.

If the drive in question is sda which you posted above with 4 partitions, leave sda1 along as it will be used for EFI boot files. Since you don't have windows you can delete sda2 and use that 3GB for your / filesystem partition or create another small data partition. When you get to the point of selecting partitions, select sda3 for the / mount point for the filesystem and make sure you do NOT select to format that partition. That has always been an option with Ubuntu installs but I have not done a clean install of 22.04 so...? You an leave the swap partition, no need to change anything.

The link below explains the installation. It is the ubuntu.com site and you can find instruction on the installation on the menu on the left, Section 6, Type of Installation.

https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/install...f-installation