10.10 upgrade for Netbook gone wrong

[gustapha]

Wondering if any one can throw me a lifeline after I may have destroyed my netbook! I upgraded a couple of times to 10.4 within a couple of days - no probs. Then I upgraded to 10.10 but it did not fully upgrade. I then - thinking I was clever to solve it ha ha!
(idiot) surfed the net and thought this command in terminal may help:

sudo dpkg --configure -a

even though i didn't really know what it was! after it had been processing for a while gave me a few options, i meant to choose the option to keep the same system but i chose against that - and now I have no desktop (just 10.10 wallpaper) and flashing screen - when i turn power switch off - i get the shut down/hibernate features, but there is no log out available.

I know i don't deserve any help - but y'know Karma is real...

Thanks for your time!

[Hedgehog1]

We need to get a look at what your system looks like now.

Please boot off the LiveCD/LiveUSB, select 'TRY', and then:

http://bootinfoscript.sourceforge.net/
Follow the instruction on the website and post the results here.

Please press the '#' button when posting and place the the script results between the two 'CODE' tags.

The Hedge

:KS

[gustapha]

thanks for the quick reply

tried to boot of USB, rearranged my BIOS order to put USB on top but just came up with this error message in DOS format: Vesamenu.c32: not a COM32R image it said boot and then came up with that message repeatedly!

i looked it up and the solution is here:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/syslinux/+bug/617779

it appears I may have to download syslinux 4.02, but how do i use this 2nd stage bootloader?? ive looked it up online and all the answers seem to be in code.

[Hedgehog1]

If your netbook can boot from CD, please create a LiveCD , select 'TRY', and then:

http://bootinfoscript.sourceforge.net/
Follow the instruction on the website and post the results here.

Please press the '#' button when posting and place the the script results between the two 'CODE' tags.

The Hedge

:KS

p.s. If your netbook does not offer a CD boot, then please create a LiveUSB using UNetbootin http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/. This tool seems to give the best LiveUSBs.

[gustapha]

Thanks - i'll have to do the USB option, but this time i'll go to the website suggested as I used a different one the first time. I'll try that late on tonight when i get in from work and report back.

very much appreciate your help!

[Dutch70]

When you get to...

Vesamenu.c32: not a COM32R image
boot:


Type in the word "live" after "boot:" and hit enter.
That is "Live" with a lower case L.

[gustapha]

Thank you Dutch - although when I tried to install 10.10 that problem does not come up any more it is just a flashing cursor now.

Thanks 'the hedge' i tried booting 10.4 from my USB and that works fine so I just did a fresh install of that, deleting the semi-installed 10.10, and that seems to be ok now and works for me for now - my machine is fairly old and was cheap so maybe it can't handle the 10.10.

thanks again for your inspired council!

:D

[Dutch70]

You're welcome...Glad you got it going.

If your computer couldn't handle 10.10, I don't think it would handle 10.04 either. There just about the same as far as that goes. The installers do seem to be quite a bit different though.

If you're computer runs a little slow or seems to lag with Ubuntu 10.04, you may want to try Xubuntu or Lubuntu. They're very nice OS's for older computers. If nothing else, try Xubuntu 10.04 from a live usb to see if you like it.

[gustapha]

Thanks very much, that's good to know! :P i'll try that if i get any further problems with it. I love the idea of ubuntu - free for the people and its good to talk to experts like yourselves.