Ubuntu 10.10 has killed my machine?

[ahayzen]

Hi

i previously had Ubuntu 10.04 on my machaine and I was trying to install ubuntu 10.10, it started the install started copying the files then if stopped with:
installer encountered an error copying files
Errno 5 input/output error.

So i tried it again, same thing. then i tried redownloading the iso and got the same thing. i ahve tried burning on different cd drives and i have also tried using a memory stick. All have come to the same problem.

Next i tried to reinstall the old Ubuntu 10.04 and got:
and error saying something along the lines of
Couldn't complete copy (can't remember exactly) then
/target/usr/lib/firefox-3.6.3/libxul.so and the same message:
installer encountered an error copying files
Errno 5 input/output error

So what have i done to my machine? Is it the ISO, CD Drive, computer or the HDD or what? I can't even boot from it anymore because the install wiped the / directory and i am currently writing to you from the live CD.

Please help get my computer running again.

Andy

[cek]

Sounds like a hardware issue. Since you are able to run from the live CD, likely points to a hard drive issue.

If you already created the partitions you could manually check them by unmounting them from within the live CD session and manually running fsck to see if it gives any errors.

[ahayzen]

thx for the reply. i did that and it resulted in an i/o error, for sda and sda1. But i can see and use all of the files in /home which is on a separate partition. So would a reformat fix this or is it a hard disk fault even though i can read the files? Andy.

[Colo2]

If it was me, I'd try formatting it before claiming the drive to be dead.

[ahayzen]

ok thx for the help. Is there a command to format? Because i don't think the installer is doing a full format just a quick one. Andy

[cek]

If you know the correct partition the command is simple, but depends on the file system type you want to make. For now, I'd try something simple like ext3, you can format with the following command in a terminal if the partition is unmounted.

sudo mke2fs -j /dev/sdaX

where /dev/sdaX is the partition you want to format (/dev/sda1 for instance). Be careful not to format your /home partition (unless you have a back up and want to do that).

[ahayzen]

Thank you for the reply cek.

I reformatted the partition and then tried running:

sudo mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1 -cc

In terminal and let it run the tests but it came to no problems. I then tried the installer again and it said that it could read from the squashfs (something like a bad sector). So i am downloading another iso of 10.10 from a different location and then i am going to burn that to CD and see if that works.

I will also try your code sek (sudo mke2fs -j /dev/sda1) if that doesn't work.

I will report further when i have tried this CD.

Hopefully i can have my desktop back soon.

Thank you for all your help so far guys.

Andy

[viralmeme]

I was trying to install ubuntu 10.10, it started the install started copying the files then if stopped with: installer encountered an error copying files
Errno 5 input/output error.

It's a bad burn, or an incompatible DVD player ..

The installer encountered an error copying files to the hard disk:

[Errno 5] Input/output error

This particular error is often due to a faulty CD/DVD disk or drive, or a faulty hard disk. It may help to clean the CD/DVD, to burn the CD/DVD at a lower speed, to clean the CD/DVD drive lens (cleaning kits are often available from electronics suppliers), to check whether the hard disk is old and in need of replacement, or to move the system to a cooler environment.

[mike555]

a thumb print on the cd will also return errors , just saying.

[ahayzen]

Ok so i have tried everything and can't get it to work.

i have tried running from a memory stick and installing that way, error.
i have tried burning CD's from different drives and running them in different drives, still error.

The most worrying thing is that i have tried running the old 10.04 install and that failed at 38% with:
'The installer encountered an unrecoverable error. A desktop session will now be run so that you can investigate the problem or try installing again.'

But the interesting thing was that i tried resizing the swap and / partitions and that it got all the way to 38% where as it normally gets about 15%. So is it just a bad sector on part of my HDD, meaning that if i put the partitions in the right place i would be able to dodge the error?

So what should i do now.

many thanks for all your help

Andy

Another thing to note is that i can read perfectly from the files that are stored onto the HDD. So any of the files stored in /home and 'installed' on / I can see, hope that helps.