[SOLVED] 10.04 32-bit live-cd not working properly, not installing [Archive]

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 02:52 PM

When I put the 10.04 livecd in my laptop and hit F12 to boot to the cd/dvd rom, then the ubuntu livecd starts working. "UBUNTU" appears on the screen with around 5 whitish little round lights below the word, and they turn red one after the other in the usual progress screen. But it never moves beyond there. The next screen never comes, which gives the option to install or boot to the livecd. After several minutes it just ultimately becomes a multi-colored screen and then goes blank. I have tried it on several computers and the same happens. But the cd's are both like new, completely undamaged, and seem fine.

I am in a rural part of India, and do not have such an internet connection which is capable of downloading the Ubuntu livecd. So my friend in the USA has downloaded the 10.04 32-bit, burned two copies of the livecd, and mailed both cd's to me. These I am using, and the same problem happens with both cd's. With past versions, his mailing them to me like this has always worked just fine. And he has made a cd of the same 10.04 for himself which he downloaded and sent me, and tells me it is working wonderfully for him. And as he has sent me two cd's, I do not think they would both be corrupted. Especially as we know his original download was successful because he used the livecd on his own computer. And he tested the two cd's he sent me, before mailing them.

What can I do to fix the problem and get the cd's to work?

mikewhatever

June 2nd, 2010, 03:02 PM

Start by checking the integrity of the downloaded iso.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/HowToMD5SUM

fooman

June 2nd, 2010, 03:09 PM

as the cd boots, and after choosing language....press "f6" for more boot options

choose "nomodeset" from the list and see if that helps.

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 03:30 PM

as the cd boots, and after choosing language....press "f6" for more boot options

choose "nomodeset" from the list and see if that helps.

You say "after choosing language"-- but as I tried to describe, it never reaches to any stage of choosing language. It just gives the "UBUNTU" screen and never gets beyond it.

@mikewhatever: It looks like what you are recommending is a way to check the integrity of the downloaded iso file. As I mentioned, that file is in the USA. So I cannot check it here. I just have the livecd. But my friend has used that same iso file which he used to burn the cd's he sent me, and burned his own cd with which he installed 10.04 on his computer. Plus he tested the cds before sending them to me, and says they were working fine.

fooman

June 2nd, 2010, 03:32 PM

You say "after choosing language"-- but as I tried to describe, it never reaches to any stage of choosing language. It just gives the "UBUNTU" screen and never gets beyond it.

when the disc first starts to boot....press "tab" or "esc" and see if you get the choose language message

if you do, continue with the f6/nomodeset option.

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 03:51 PM

when the disc first starts to boot....press "tab" or "esc" and see if you get the choose language message

if you do, continue with the f6/nomodeset option.

ok-- here is what happens: When I selected to boot to the cd/dvd rom, then the "UBUNTU" screen came. And upon pressing "tab", nothing happened. So I pressed "esc", and the "choose language message" did indeed come. So I pressed f6-- but then nothing happened. So I tried pressing "esc" again, and then a menu list came-- Install, Boot to cd, around 5-6 options were listed. So I selected "Install". And then the "UBUNTU" screen came again, with the progress bar of lights beneath it. And after a minute or so, the screen again become blank and nothing seemed to be happening.

So I have tried it again-- started the computer, selected boot to cd/dvd room, at the "UBUNTU" screen pressed "tab", nothing happened. Pressed "esc", and the following message comes

GLib WARNING.
Failed due to unknown user id.
stdin; error 0
stdin; error 0
stdin; error 0
stdin; error 0
stdin; error 0
Generating locals
DONE
Generation complete
Alot of lines then come, too many to type here
Then at the end:

Device firmwarm and download firmware carefully from the website

Then the screen becomes blank

fooman

June 2nd, 2010, 03:59 PM

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 04:09 PM

sorry, just to get this straight...

boot from cd, press "esc" to see "choose language" screen.

choose your language

then press f6 and you should see more boot options.... try nomodeset from there if you see it..

I am trying, but I can't seem to get the "choose language" screen to come this time. It is just giving the lines "Glib WARNING" etc which I wrote above. Please see my posting which is above just prior to yours.

...Now after trying several more times, I havefinally got the "choose language" screen to come. But by pressing F6 there, nothing happens.

fooman

June 2nd, 2010, 04:12 PM

...Now after trying several more times, I havefinally got the "choose language" screen to come. But by pressing F6 there, nothing happens.

at the choose language screen....choose your preferred language.

you should see a menu after that with options of ...install, boot to cd, boot to hard drive, etc,....DO NOT CHOOSE ANYTHING YET!

it is then that you should press "f6" to see more options.

sorry if that does not work for you.

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 04:33 PM

at the choose language screen....choose your preferred language.

you should see a menu after that with options of ...install, boot to cd, boot to hard drive, etc,....DO NOT CHOOSE ANYTHING YET!

it is then that you should press "f6" to see more options.

sorry if that does not work for you.

OK-- by doing as you wrote here, then the f6 button works and by pressing it I do get the list of options. Among the options is listed the "nomodeset" option. When I select that, an "x" appears next to it. But nothing further happens. If I then hit the "enter" key, then the list of options is removed. And by hitting f6, the list again appears. But by again selecting "nomodeset", all that seems to happen is that an "x" appears next to it.

fooman

June 2nd, 2010, 04:37 PM

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 04:51 PM

after choosing f6 > nomodeset an x appears next to it.

press enter and the list goes away (it will stay selected even though you do not see it).

press enter again and let it boot (may take a moment or 2 to startup).

hope that works.

I mis-wrote in my previous note. "after choosing f6 > nomodeset an x appears next to it"-- correct. But then by pressing "enter", all that happens is that it un-selects nomodeset and the x goes away. The list itself does not go away. Repeatedly pressing enter just selects and de-selects nomodeset so that the x appears and disappears. But the list remains.

The list only disappears by hitting "esc". And then hitting f6 again, the list appears.

Once nomodeset is selected and there is an x next to it, I do not understand how to get it to move to the next stage so it will actually boot as you say.

fooman

June 2nd, 2010, 06:05 PM

Once nomodeset is selected and there is an x next to it, I do not understand how to get it to move to the next stage so it will actually boot as you say.

sorry to leave you hanging....i had to step out.

my bad....press f6, select nomodeset (by pressing enter to put a check next to it), then press "esc" and the list should disappear.

now press enter and it should begin to boot the cd.

be patient...it takes awhile to boot fully. as the boot proceeds, you may see some lines of data like "init ureadahead terminated status4"...just ignore those and allow it to boot.

hope that helps.

mikewhatever

June 2nd, 2010, 06:29 PM

...

@mikewhatever: It looks like what you are recommending is a way to check the integrity of the downloaded iso file. As I mentioned, that file is in the USA. So I cannot check it here. I just have the livecd. But my friend has used that same iso file which he used to burn the cd's he sent me, and burned his own cd with which he installed 10.04 on his computer. Plus he tested the cds before sending them to me, and says they were working fine.

I see. Can you tell us your computer specs - CPU, RAM, graphics.

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 06:57 PM

cpu = Intel(R) Pentium (R) M 1400 megahertz
ram = 512 mb

The computer is a Dell business laptop, perhaps 3 years old, and has plenty of capacity for running Ubuntu.

@fooman: After nomodeset is set with an "x", and esc is pressed, then the list disappears and a list of options comes i.e. to install ubuntu, try ubuntu without installing, etc. Whether I select to install, or to boot to the livecd, the same thing happens: the "UBUNTU" screen appears, with the progress bar of lights underneath. After around a minute, the screen goes blank, and nothing further happens.

Such a mystery!

darkdragn

June 2nd, 2010, 07:18 PM

Ok, this is going to sound kind of stupid, but i ran into an issue like this a while ago with an old computer. Isolinux is like a basic syslinux install, and will function as such, and the motherboard, being a little out of date, would not run it properly for live cd's. The resolution to the issue, was to replicate the contents of the livecd to a usb drive, and install syslinux on the jump drive with the -s option. It will be slower, and feel like it's taking forever, but once it gets ubuntu up it will run at normal speed, and once the os in installed on the computer you will be using grub, and won't have to worry about any of this... If you need step by step help for the syslinux install just ask, ^_^

Rubi1200

June 2nd, 2010, 07:52 PM

Ok, the method I will suggest has already worked for a few people here. I will try and make the instructions as clear as possible:

Put the LiveCD in and boot up;

when you see the Ubuntu logo hit Enter;

Choose language and leave the default Try as a live cd or whatever it says again;

Important: hit F6 and then Esc to see the boot line

Or just use F6 and Esc so that you see the boot line as follows:

file=/cdrom/preseed/ubuntu.seed boot=casper initrd=/casper/initrd.lz quiet splash --

Now, again this is important, move the cursor backwards using the arrow keys on the keyboard and remove quiet splash;

Add the following parameters in this order:

xforcevesa noapic noapci nosplash irqpoll

In other words, the boot should look like this:

file=/cdrom/preseed/ubuntu.seed boot=casper initrd=/casper/initrd.lz xforcevesa noapic noapci nosplash irqpoll --

Now hit Enter and hopefully you will be at the desktop admiring Lucid Lynx 10.4

If you get this far, post back here and I will try and help get you further with installing.

Good luck!

:)

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 08:08 PM

@Rubi1200: Thank you very much for your guideline. The electricity is gone now so I have to wait about half an hour until it comes. Then I will post here and let you know how it goes. It's not exactly clear from reading your post how this "boot line" is going to come; I've been dealing with processes involving F6 and esc for hours now, and haven't seen that boot line. But as soon as the electricity comes I'll try exactly what you suggest and see what happens.

@darkdragn: Thank you. I'll try what has been suggested by Rubi1200 as it seems perhaps simpler, and if it doesn't work I'll contact you for the guidelines you refer to.

Rubi1200

June 2nd, 2010, 08:13 PM

@Rubi1200: It's not exactly clear from reading your post how this "boot line" is going to come; I've been dealing with processes involving F6 and esc for hours now, and haven't seen that boot line. But as soon as the electricity comes I'll try exactly what you suggest and see what happens.

Ok, what I mean is that you were already able to see the dialog with nomodeset and an x in it; correct? If, at this point instead of hitting Enter as you had previously done, simply hit Esc and use the arrow keys to move the cursor backwards. You should then see the boot line I am referring to.

If you have problems, post again and we will try and figure things out.

mikewhatever

June 2nd, 2010, 08:16 PM

cpu = Intel(R) Pentium (R) M 1400 megahertz
ram = 512 mb

The computer is a Dell business laptop, perhaps 3 years old, and has plenty of capacity for running Ubuntu.

And the graphics?

Rubi1200

June 2nd, 2010, 08:20 PM

DonaldJ

June 2nd, 2010, 08:28 PM

I had that same problem, "the multi colored screen"...
I solved it by formating the hd with a W98 install CD, then pulled the battery for ten minutes.. Seems there were some Linux viruses, and Windows viruses stuck on the memory...

Plus, I had similar problems with several spare junk hard drives, which turned out to be defective, and a few hd's held a small partition that an Ubuntu install couldn't format out.. You might check your hard drives with a "Windows OS's thorough scandisk".. maybe the hard drive has bad clusters..?

Another thing that causes a lot of those "hair-pulling" install problems is if boot isn't set to "CD first"...
Don't forget to set boot back to hd first after the install...

Good Luck...

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 09:12 PM

Just popped out for a cigarette and was going to post about this. Nice one mikewhatever!

Ok, you can also try this on the boot line instead of what I already suggested:

file=/cdrom/preseed/ubuntu.seed boot=casper initrd=/casper/initrd.lz i915.modeset=1 --

This is a workaround for Intel graphics cards.

See this for more information:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/X/Bugs/Lucidi8xxFreezes

I do not know what the graphics card is in this computer, or how to find out. I do have Win XP installed, so if you want me to boot up into that and perhaps go to device manager, it should tell me there what the graphics card is, right?

Anyhow, I was able to get to the boot line as you said to do, and I changed it to what you last gave i.e.

file=/cdrom/preseed/ubuntu.seed boot=casper initrd=/casper/initrd.lz i915.modeset=1 --

Once that was done, then I hit enter. And then a whole bunch of computer language flashed by on the screen, too much to reproduce here. And in the end it stopped at a certain place, still with computer language showing on the screen. It stood there still for at least 5 or 10 minutes. I thought it was stuck. But then it started working again, and ultimately came to something that looked like a purple Ubuntu screen, with an invitation to install Ubuntu!!! I couldn't believe it. Sitting here in the middle of nowhere in the countryside of India, this work is somehow getting done.

So I opted to install, and set the usual settings of time zone, keyboard, etc. Then when the partition screen came, opted for a side-by-side install with XP. Then clicked enter. Now it is resizing XP, and seems will then install Ubuntu. Wow! Very exciting indeed, you have no idea. I will let you know in 40 minutes or so, if it all works out and gets installed properly. :)

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 09:58 PM

Well, the installation seemed to go smoothly, and at the end report was given on the screen that installation is complete. It ejected the cd and instructed to reboot the computer. I rebooted the computer, and at the GRUB screen selected Ubuntu. Upon doing so, the Ubuntu screen came briefly on the screen, and after that a blank screen came and would not go further than that.

So I rebooted the computer and tried booting to Ubuntu in recovery mode. It has been working in recovery mode for quite some time now, and is still working. I do not know if it will succeed in booting or not.

My computer is only 3-4 years old-- I would have thought it would have installed without a hitch and booted right up. What is going on? What do I have to do to get my Ubuntu working smoothly, and why am I having so much trouble?

mikewhatever

June 2nd, 2010, 10:15 PM

While in Ubuntu, open Applications->Accessories->Terminal and post the output of the lspci command.
A computer age is suggestive, but not descriptive, as far as hardware specs go. It's the hardware inside that really matters.

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 10:32 PM

How am I going to do what you say to do, when I can't boot into Ubuntu? I'll have to boot into XP and find out about the hardware. What is it you want to know-- what the graphics card is? If there is any other hardware you want to know about, let me know. I'm going into XP now, and will find those things out for you.

mikewhatever

June 2nd, 2010, 10:39 PM

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 11:01 PM

Underneath the computer is written: Dell LBLP/N8W098A01

In Win XP Device Manager I found the following:

IDE ATA/ATAPI Controller
Intel R 82801DBM Ultra ATA Storage Controller - 24CA
Primary IDE Channel
Secondary IDE Channel

Processor Intel Pentium M processor 1400 mhz

The computer does not seem to have a separate video card. It is probably integrated into the mother board. There is something in the device manager in Win XP, called "video codecs" -- INDEO Video 5.10.

There is no listing for Mother board or for video card. I could not find the information for those listed anywhere.

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 11:03 PM

I thought you said your could boot in safe graphics mode, is it not the case? Yes, I am after the graphics card model. Why are you surprised? It seems pretty clear by now that you have an Intel 800 graphics, which wouldn't hurt confirming.

I tried to boot in safe graphics mode, but in the end it got stuck and could not boot up.

I am not surprised you want to know about the graphics card model, but I cannot find it in Win XP. Can you tell me where to find the graphics card model in Win XP? I will get it for you right away.

I thought I would get the model or model number from underneath the computer and find out the configuration of the computer on the Dell Website. But underneath the computer I am not getting such information as would allow me to identify the computer for the website.

mikewhatever

June 2nd, 2010, 11:32 PM

swarup

June 2nd, 2010, 11:52 PM

Let us try and use the same trick Rubi suggested earlier. At the boot menu screen, select Ubuntu, press 'e' and add i915.modeset=1 to the boot line, after 'quiet splash'. Then press Ctrl+x to boot.
If Ubuntu boots, make the change permanent with the following commands:

echo options i915 modeset=1 | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915-kms.conf
sudo update-initramfs -u

Apparently, it's a know issue, mentioned in Lucid's release notes.
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LucidLynx/ReleaseNotes#Intel%208xx%20X%20freezes/crashes

When Ubuntu is selected at the GRUB menu and then I press 'e', I get the following message:

RecordFail
infmod ext2
set root=[hd0,6]
Linux/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-21-generic root=UUID=f1030290-8220-455b-fd4\-6d6b43b6d6c0 ro quiet splash
iniprd /boot/iniprd.img-2.6.32-21-generic

swarup

June 3rd, 2010, 12:16 AM

OK!!!! :)

I did what you said at the quiet splash line, and it worked! It booted into Ubuntu. And then I implemented the changes in the terminal window as directed, and now it boots up to Ubuntu without a problem. And the sound is even working!!! This is a historic day. Thank you all very much. :)

mikewhatever

June 3rd, 2010, 01:54 AM

Glad it worked out for you.:)

Rubi1200

June 3rd, 2010, 06:26 AM

YAY!!! :cool:

\\:D/

Hope you enjoy using Lucid and if you have other issues feel free to post them on the forum.

Sanjay Saha

September 8th, 2010, 04:32 PM

I am having the same problem. I received an UBUNTU 10.04 LTS Desktop Edition yesterday. I tried to install it but it showed an error message :
"" may be damaged CD ""
I am confused if it is a 64 bit CD, as there is nothing written any where about the compatibility of the disc, whether it is a 32 bit disc or a 64 bit disc. My pc is of 32 bits. :( Please help.

Mildly_odd

October 12th, 2011, 10:16 PM

Hi
I'm a complete newcomer to Linux as a whole and am trying to follow the recipe to try out Ubuntu from the live CD route.

Background:
The target computer is an old Dell running W98. The version of Ubuntu I have is 11.04. I had also tried the USB route though it turns out there is no boot from USB option in the BIOS setup.

So far I have followed through this thread and initially had the same challenge as Swarup, i.e. getting a blank screen but for the word "Ubuntu" with some coloured lights underneath it.

I've tried as many combinations of the advice given for interrupting the process so as to get the language prompt and to be able to edit the command line that appears after pressing F6 and escape.
e.g. using these options
nomodeset AND/OR xforcevesa noapic noapci nosplash irqpoll
nomodeset AND/OR i915.modeset=1
I also tried bringing forward the CDROM boot in the BIOS priority which helped.

Unfortunately with these various combinations I haven't kept good records of the specific outcomes though it has generally been on the theme of much flowing past of of what looks like the boot script output, sometimes with error reports visibly flashing past, and then the same old screen, now evolved to say "Ubuntu 11.04" with four lights instead of more.

I have had a nose around the internet and have seen more suggestions for the F6 command words though realise that I am just trying things without understanding what combinations might even be relevant. Could anyone suggest a web resource that might make sense of this, e.g. matching commands to the configuration aspects of the computer or to apparent errors reported in the many pages of script that flow past.

Many thanks for any ideas
Duncan