Just newbie (dumbie?) unable to instal linux

[Sumk]

Hi everybody, recently i got my hands on toshiba satelite c660, and i wanted to install linux on its old hard drive, and today i tried it on new ssd.

 

After i got my hands on this notebook i made ubuntu usb with rufus, put it in, select try ubuntu after it fully booted clicked install ubuntu, selected internal HDD and after all the settings and installing shut it off, pulled out usb as it promts.

 

After starting it up again notebook failed to boot from every option, including the HDD saying no bootable device and either to select from menu (HDD, Lan, cd/dvd) or enter bios.

 

No worry something wrong happend throug out the install a did it all again. No luck even second time.

 

Tryed same process with Mint wich elegedly was on that machine before again nothing.

 

While in live usb mod with ubuntu it was showing that the hard drive is bad, no biggie i thought since it was running befor i got it. It just probably isnt in best shape but functional. Since many attempts later the install wouldnt fuction i blamed it on the drive and got new SSD. Today it arived tryed again Ubuntu, Mint no result.

 

Im starting to wandering it is some problem with UEFI/Bios. That im installing UEFI version but it only has Bios so it cant find it. After quick search the drive has to be in right prtition style GPT for UEFI and MBR for Bios. Some people on internet seem too prepare partitions on the drive before instaling, some say that the instalation should handle it. Also some text are talking about needing bootloader to point to the OS instal. I understand that bootloader is needed, but i have never cared about that when instaling windows neither about bootloader neither about making the right  parritions for it (if i didnt demanded more parritions straight away myself).

 

Am i wrong to think that installing linux from usb should just work without me creating partitions for it or instaling bootloader, also never noticed anywhere to have 2 separate versions of instalations media for UEFI and for Bios. Hopefully i am right that instalation for 32 and 64 bit doesnt mean Bios and UEFI version.

 

 

Thanks in advance to everybody who at least wil take a time to think about what i wrote even if they dont respod. And many thanks to those who will respond.

 

 

Also any interesting articles to fill my lack of knowledge are appreciated.

 

 

For curious readers i also tryed instaling HomeassistantOS and proxmox, intention is to let this be my first enry to homelab. At least to start linux figure out how ssh works, since it supports wake on lan maybe get that fidling with. And if i cant have that also next to HAOS using proxmox because it wouldnt handle it, the lowest i want to get from it is that HAOS.

[C2dan88]

12 hours ago, Sumk said:

Im starting to wandering it is some problem with UEFI/Bios. That im installing UEFI version but it only has Bios so it cant find it.

If your bios is non-uefi - old school, two color - only has keyboard navigation (no mouse support) bios do not format your drives as GPT. Use MBR, Ubuntu/Mint should detect this automatically and install and configure GRUB bootloader for you..

 

12 hours ago, Sumk said:

Some people on internet seem too prepare partitions on the drive before instaling, some say that the instalation should handle it.

Can leave the installer to setup its own partitions. More experienced Linux folk prefer to setup their own home (user data) partition seperate from the root (os) partition but that is not necessary.

[Sumk]

1 hour ago, C2dan88 said:

If your bios is non-uefi - old school, two color - only has keyboard navigation (no mouse support) bios do not format your drives as GPT. Use MBR, Ubuntu/Mint should detect this automatically and install and configure GRUB bootloader for you..

 

Can leave the installer to setup its own partitions. More experienced Linux folk prefer to setup their own home (user data) partition seperate from the root (os) partition but that is not necessary.

So im not mistaken to think that OS installation should handle formating the drive and setting up bootloader.

 

I strongly belive it is Bios. No fancy colours or logos, no mouse suport as you mention, no sign of legacy boot or other option to change that, (although that doesnt have to be present even if it woud be EUFI enabled, at least from what i read) no sign of secure boot.

 

Problem is i was never formating that drive into GPT neither to MBR when instaling any linux distro there is option to instal it next to already instaled os (linux os i installed but cant boot), delete drive an make new install, or third to make instal with option to crate my own partitions. I allways used the second option. From that point no promt of choosing if i want to install for UEFI/Bios or use GPT/MBR. Only things it asks is to choose name of user, name of machine, password i want to set.

[E-waste]

@SumkJust to get away completely from any possibility of UEFI options, find an archived version of Ubuntu 7.10 or something that did not come with it at all.  That would eliminate that part.

 

Alternatively, make the usb using rufus.  The tool has an option to use mbr mode.

[Sumk]

Few new information, maybe even a resolution that gives me more questions.

  Just to remind readers i have two Notebooks HP probook 430 that definetly has UEFI (with option to use legacy mode) and old toshiba that im trying to install linux without much of a luck.

 

After all previous tryes, yesterday i found some time to get back to it.

   Firstly i took out the drive with elegedly instaled linux, then put it in my HP, had to disable secureboot and set to boot from that drive and VOILÀ there it is. In linux i checked and the boot partition of the drive said EFI. After that i restarted it, now with changes to force legacy boot only, no luck and even got the same messages.

 

From that point tryed creating new boot USB with rufus, now focusing more ot the option to choose MBR/GPT as i found out i have some ISO that dissable this option therefore i wasnt paying atention to it before at all.  Armed with new USB (again mint) choose option to force MBR (changed targed system from "UEFI no CSM" to "BIOS or UEFI") also ticked box with repairs for older BIOSes. Put my HP back to Legacy mode only, installed from USB and. Nothing, operating system not found. Switching back to UEFI mode the new os is there, when i checked partitions it even said that partition is BIOS.

 

On 11/9/2023 at 1:34 AM, E-waste said:

@SumkJust to get away completely from any possibility of UEFI options, find an archived version of Ubuntu 7.10 or something that did not come with it at all.  That would eliminate that part.

 

Alternatively, make the usb using rufus.  The tool has an option to use mbr mode.

After reading this went straight to it found Ubuntu 7.10 made a USB and went straight to boot. After it taking a while trying to boot up it showed that my graphics card either wasnt found or wasnt beefe enough or something in that sence, and that it will display only in low quality mode, with options to to either manualy configure it or leave it display everything in low qualiti mode. Whatever option i choose it again went to booting up and there it hung up and did nothing.

  Tryed it on that old Toshiba and same story only after it hung i let it run for 1hour just to make shure it didnt just take a long time. (probably a bad iso file or something like that i guess?)

 

  This morning i got info that before i got it it elegedly run Mint somewhere around version 16. After a while found ISO of that version made USB tryed installing and...

 

OMG!!! IT ACTUALY WORKS!! No pointing to that drive even with the usb still pluged in it went straight to installed OS on my internal SSD.

 

So now im wondering, how come? If i had Os installed with BIOS partions that didnt fired up what other stuff it can possibly request.

 

Can anybody make sence of this?

[E-waste]

6 hours ago, Sumk said:

it went straight to installed OS on my internal SSD.

Which device did you get it working with?  Try a new mint installation as well, since 16 works.

[Sumk]

7 hours ago, E-waste said:

Which device did you get it working with?  Try a new mint installation as well, since 16 works.

Mint 16 is working on the older Toshiba machine.

  I have tryed mint 21 before without any luck, even before i put up this whole thread, as was said in the first post.

[E-waste]

12 hours ago, Sumk said:

Mint 16 is working on the older Toshiba machine.

O.K. so what happens when you boot the new iso on the Toshiba machine?

 

I have been thinking this whole time, you might be able to make it work using Ventoy:

 

And push F4 or whatever it is, and use "text" mode to speed up the screen, as it has been terribly slow for me on older hardware, several seconds (not just a few) between screen updates

 

https://github.com/ventoy/Ventoy

 

So instead of flashing the ISO, you actually install the ventoy software directly onto the USB drive.

 

You also have the option to use mbr format for the software.  All you do is copy the whole ISO file onto the larger partition, no extraction, and boot ventoy and select the ISO file.

 

I bet that will solve it.  It does not work for all iso files, particularly older iso files or niche software, but it should work with most Linux iso files.  Since hopefully you still have the Ubuntu 7.10 iso file, try using that with ventoy.

[Sumk]

When i installed any other newer linux (Ubuntu 23.04/ Mint 21.2) after restart and unpluging the USB, it fails to find any OS and promts me to install one. Even after going in to boot menu and selecting to boot from internal SSD it just says it failed. (see added images)

 

 Probably heard of Ventoy, that name sounds familiar, but i dont really know how it works, what it does or how to use it. I have to figure that out. I can give it a try with the new versions of linux, but is there any specific reasone to use it on the Ubuntu 7.10?

 

 

[Sumk]

  Yesterday i tryed ventoy and managed even better results then before. With ventoy there was no problem with installing Linux Mint 21.2. From ventoy i selected Linux mint .iso, the same file as i was using this whole time, selected install and after reboot it booted up without any pointing to that drive or anything like that, it just worked. One other change i made while installing it, this time i selected OEM installation (only because i hoped it would be just a bit faster when you dont have to select timezone and name the machine before reboot). Maybe that could contribute to it too somehow.

 

  But i stiil dont understand what was the problem, how it got fixed, or how any of this could have helped to resolve this. This whole experience just tells me that i really dont understand computers much, and definitely not as i tought. My expectation was to create USB bootable drive, put it in, click install, and done. If someone would tell me it would take over week of trying and help of comunity, i would tell them they are crazy.

On 11/13/2023 at 7:32 PM, E-waste said:

I bet that will solve it.  It does not work for all iso files, particularly older iso files or niche software, but it should work with most Linux iso files.  Since hopefully you still have the Ubuntu 7.10 iso file, try using that with ventoy.

  To your sugestion, before mint i tryed launching that 7.10 ubuntu installer from ventoy, i got to choose if i want to install, check memory..., after clicking install it throw up bunch of "init" comands and last one allways said "Kernel panicked, terminatig init comand" or something in that mind, definetly it said "kernel panicked" that line cheered me up :D.

 

BIG THANKS to @E-waste for lot of help and his time and also thank to everybody who tryed to help, gave some thoughts, or maybe just took a time think about this.

 

  If anybody still wants to share thoughts about what they think happend here or share some articles about this topic i would like to learn. If anybody wants me to try something out or add any additional info just write here i will still be watching this thread for a while.

 

 

 

 

 

NOT related to the topic

  Thanks a lot @E-waste for sugesting ventoy it is exactly what i was hoping of like a year ago when i wanted to make ultimate PC diagnostick/repare USB with lots of iso, additional applications like HWinfo, advanceIPscaner..., and stiil be able to use it as regular USB so i can have one large memory sized USB that i carry with me then bunch of 8GB drives.

[E-waste]

1 hour ago, Sumk said:

To your sugestion, before mint i tryed launching that 7.10 ubuntu installer from ventoy

No idea here.  Try it on another pc, if it doesn't work on either, try another download source:

 

https://old-releases.ubuntu.com/releases/

 

Try 7.04, and then try 8.04 and keep going up to find what works.  And when you installed ventoy to the usb, did you use MBR or uefi mode?

 

Use the ventoy -h help menu for available comnand line options.  You'll have to reformat the whole flash drive and do ventoy -i /dev/sd (letter of usb disk) if you want to switch to guided partiton table (gpt) which will not work on older computers.

 

ventoy uses mbr mode by default, -i plus -g will use gpt mode

 

https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_start.html

 

Unrelated, if you haven't seen LM 19 wallpapers, then I recommend checking out the linux mint wallpaper archive on github.

[Issac Zachary]

I'm not sure if this is your problem, but I was trying to get Linux (newer version of Linux) onto an Asus eeePC 4G Surf (701) and wasn't having any luck. But it turned out the laptop wasn't 64 bit OS compatible. I did end up putting a 32 bit operating system on it, although it ended up not being Linux. I did get a light version of Lubuntu 32 working though, but decided not to go with it.

[Thomas4]

The easiest way to determine if your Linux disk (or whatever medium you're using) IS good is to simply boot into the live mode (the default) and open it and play with a few of the programs. ANd when installing use the open source drivers unless you have an NVidia card. You can afterwards install proprietary drivers if needed.