Last month I replaced Windows 10 that was on my Surface Go with Ubuntu. Whilst Ubuntu is working just fine I recently came across Zorin and want to give it a go.
I have the bootable USB drive working as I have tested it with another laptop. But it is my old Surface device that I want to actually try it on. When I boot it up and access the grub menu there isn't an option to select to boot from USB. I have checked the UEFI settings and USB is selected as the top for booting.
I have tried a couple of suggestions from the forums for trying to update GRUB to get the USB to show up, but to no luck. Wondering if anyone has any suggestions?
Your BIOS should have something like ''Boot Order'' or similar called. When You there choose the stick and click Enter it should started. Maybe You could post a couple of Pictures of Your BIOS if possible?
Other Things:
What Tool did You used to create the bottable USB Stick?
Because of Your UEFI BIOS: Does the stick have the GPT Partition Sheme?
I redid the USB using Rufus this time with the settings below. But it still wasn't showing up in the boot. Microsoft really hasn't made Surface UEFI pleasant to use.
You use Rufus; that is a good Choice. Okay, I see Your USB Stick has 64GB of Storage. The GPT Partition Sheme for UEFI is good. But under ''File System'' stands ''Large FAT32 (Default)''. Do You have there other Options?
It's the same one I used to install Ubuntu onto that Surface laptop in the first place. And it worked fine when I tested it on another laptop (which I don't want to install it on yet). But, I'll try and get hold of another USB stick of a similar size soon to try.
I noticed on your UEFI/Security screenshot, TPM set as Enabled.
I am aware Secure Boot should be Disabled but I also wonder if that is worth looking at changing TPM to Disabled if only Linux (not Windows) will be used.
Other members may wish to comment on this suggestion.
If you can access the grub menu, or boot into Ubuntu, surely someone here can tell you how to add a custom grub entry to boot from your USB. Then you won't have to fool with your problematic EFI. If you can boot into Windows (if you still have it on your machine), surely you can just go edit the boot time value, on boot menu select Other, select Devices, and select USB.
This was why I initially thought the solution to my problem was with Grub.
The only OS I have installed is Ubuntu. But because it is a Surface device, the Surface UEFI is still baked in, which is seemingly adding to my problems.
Could you do something like this or this also but to boot a Zorin USB instead of a Ventoy USB? If someone knows more than me, they can probably tell you how. Or failing that, can you instead put Ventoy on the USB (make sure to go to options and select the GPT partition style because the default is MBR and that might mess your machine, dunno) and then put the Zorin ISO on it (I would throw on an Ubuntu one too since you know that works already, and have it as backup).
Ok also I'm curious how you even got Ubuntu on there.
What does lsblk say? Does it even see your USB?
I have been sort of working on making grub custom entries but I'm not to the level I can really help. I have successfully made one that I can boot to my HDD and NVMe but we really need help of an expert here to help figure this out.
