Installation from USB stalls

Hi,
I made a USB 24.04 startup disk with USB-creator-gtk and it worked well on several laptops and PCs usually with Windows 10 on them. I now have such an old PC and it boots from the USB stick as usual, the Ubuntu wheel shows on the screen and then it stalls with a grey screen. Nothing happens. What might be the reason for this? How can I install Ubuntu Mate on this PC?
Thanks for hints!

Can we assume the PC meets the minimum requirements?

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I think yes. It worked on other PCs of the same making! What is somewhat strange is that the panel offering default, install/try Ubuntu; and something else I do not remember, comes up twice.

There are plenty of linux superstars on this site that can probably help but we/they will probably need more information.

Check the USB for any log files that may explain why it failed.

Otherwise, I would make sure the bios is updated and try again with a fresh .iso.

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  1. You could try nomodeset e.g. in the GRUB menu on boot, press e and add nomodeset after quiet splash to the line starting with linux: ; but given that the logo comes up - I'm not expecting this to work.
  2. Try recovery instead; similar to the previous suggestion.

If you can get to a text terminal, then the problem lies somewhere in the graphics 'target' - and this might be an issue with the particular kernel being used and the graphics hardware.

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Thank you all so far! Some more details:

  1. on booting I get the menu:
    UNetbootin:
  2. Defaut
  3. Try or install Ubuntu Mate
  4. Ubuntu Mate (safe graphics)

whatever I chose or when I just wait the same menu comes up a second time.
I then either do nothing or chose one of these three options. The menu then disappears and is replaced by a screen showing 'Ubuntu MATE' and the dots running from left to right below. Then a grey screen is shown and nothing happens. Of note, when I chose 3), see above, the final screen is blue instead of grey,

I do not see how I might change any parameters in grub as pressing 'e' does not lead to anything. Once the grey or blue screen comes up the PC is unresponsive to anything and I can only restart it by power cycling.

What concerns the minimal requirements: Win 10 runs without (apparent) problems. So, it should have the minimal requirements for Ubuntu 24.04 as well (?).

The BIOS is quite old (its an HP PC: 5.15 06/25/10) and I cannot see any option in the Setup Menu to update it (if this would still be possible)

Running the HP diagnostic tools shows that all the hardware is OK
As already mentioned, on another PC the boot USB stick works as expected.

I plan to next try using the Ubuntu Mate 22.04 iso. Any ideas are very welcome!
Thanks!

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Apologies, I haven't got a Live USB to check right now; but I'm quite sure that boot options can be edited. It may be a different key, or you may have to interrupt the boot after you select "Try Ubuntu" etc. If I get time over the next day or two; I'll check the exact procedure.

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Very nice, thank you!

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Do you have another computer to boot the USB stick on? I had a similar problem. I had a USB stick with Ubuntu Mate 22.04 LTS that I had used multiple times but would not work on a small refurbished laptop my wife wanted all her recipes on to get rid of multiple cook books. It would boot but not install so I got frustrated and put Sparky Mate on it. Then I booted it on my main laptop and same problems, it would boot but wouldn't start. I then wiped the USB stick and reinstalled it and it worked. Somehow that stick had gotten corrupted on the last installation I did that worked. I don't know why or how.

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Are you sure you are using the same install media?

and

are completely different utilities.

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My USB stick works perfectly well on my laptop and on another PC. So, I believe that this is a problem with the hardware of the PC which it does not work on. I had made this USB stick with Startup Disk Creator some time ago. Strangely, on booting on the problem-PC it shows "UNetbootin" and then the three options as indicated earlier. I'll try this method: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0qrydSnV4g later today and report.

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I now tried the method described in the link I indicated but it did not work. I was unable to direct it to boot from the contents of the iso file I copied into the new partition as is indicated in the post.
I had an old ubuntu 12.04 life disk that worked perfectly well. I shall thus make a life disk for 24.04 and hope that it works.......
I am sure to finally get it to work but would be happy to understand where the problem is.....

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I now made a new USB boot stick with BalenaEtcher > same negative result but I was able to enter the Grub Menu and added "nomodeset" as suggested by Stepen_Wade earlier. This did not change anything. If anybody has an idea of what I might change in the grub menu, please tell me!

Hi, @dieter-erich :slight_smile:

You wrote:

It is indeed good news that you were able to enter the GRUB Menu, from the new USB Boot Stick / Flash Drive with Ubuntu MATE 24.04 LTS ("Noble Numbat"). My suggestion, in that same Grub line that you edited to add "nomodeset", is that you edit it to also delete the words quiet splash in that line and then press the key combination CTRL + X to boot that kernel. By deleting the "quiet splash" part, you should be able to see the boot messages on your screen. If that boot also fails, I suggest that you take a picture of the screen with the messages that appear on screen (using, for instance, the camera of your phone) and reply again, in this same discussion topic, with that screenshot.

I hope this helps :slight_smile: Please, keep us posted!

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I believe you can also set the boot 'target' to a terminal by addingrd.systemd.unit=multi-user.target. Otherwise you can add a "runlevel" to the end of the command; for text (only) - you can use 3.

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SOLVED!
Thank you all for your suggestions and willingness to help! I finally succeeded:

  1. tried a USB stick with ubuntu mate 24.04 this time prepared with balenaEtcher for Windows. However I got the same negative result as before.
  2. I then prepared the same USB stick with 22.04 again using balenaEtcher for Windows and this time it worked: I installed ubuntu mate 22.04 and then manually run a system upgrade to 24.04. Of note, after installation of 22.04 a window came up suggesting to upgrade, which I answered with yes, but this did not work. I had to do it by manually entering the commands. So, the way how to do it is first installing 22.04 and then upgrade manually to 24.04.
    There were some glitches, though, for example it stalled in the middle of the upgrade process and I had to power cycle the PC. I have no clue why all the other methods I tried did not work. Apparently, there is a problem with ubuntu mate 24.04 and the particular hardware of my PC.
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Still some more: invoking graphics applications such as xclock or glxgears results in a grey screen and immediate restart of the windows manager, which then shows the login panel. When I then login and invoke megacity --replace the graphic works even when I close the terminal from which the command was issued. So I believe that a problem with the windows manager was the reason for the initial problems. However, I still do not have a fully functional system as I do not want to always use this work around. Suggestions are again very welcome!

Your initial problem was that your install media would not boot. It has nothing to do with your window manager. @ricmarques has given you an instruction to collect boot messages to clarify the situation.

When you restart your computer in the middle of the upgrade process, the result may be unpredictable. The suggestion is to perform a successful installation / upgrade. You can check your release upgrade logs here: /var/log/dist-upgrade/.

Metacity, I assume. Metacity is not used and thus not installed by default in Ubuntu MATE. Ubuntu MATE is using marco as a window manager.

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