Help installing Ubuntu?

it should satart automatically when you put the cd in

i think you burnt it wrong. you DO NOT burn the .iso to a disk as a file, like you would do for say, a word document you want to send to a friend.

you have to burn it with a special ISO burner. Here is a link to one (Choose deepburner FREE version NOT pro)

http://www.deepburner.com/?r=download

Once its installed choose burn ISO and point it to the .ISO file. To reduce error risk burn at the lowest speed and use good cds (NOT rws)

if it still wont start automatically once you have burnt it the correct way come back and post again (some pcs need to be told specifically to start from the CD)

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I have installed MEPIS, debian, knoppix, kanotix and ubuntu countless times. And many other operating systems. If you want to do it so you can install easily then I would advise getting a good partition editor. There are many out there. I use gparted. It is run like a live linux cd and is really easy to use.
One thing to remember when burning an iso is that you must check the md5sum .
See this thread.
http://www.linuxquestions.org/linux/answers/LQ_ISO/Checking_the_md5sum_in_Windows
The md5sum is a number that is generated from the binary content of your iso. If the md5sum that you download at the site matches the one that your software can detect then the iso is complete and has no extra goodies (that you don't need, like a rootkit).
If the md5sum matches then burn your iso as an image. I think that is what it is called in windows but i can't be 100% sure. I haven't used windows in a long time. 3 Years or so. I heard that nero can burn isos ok so that may be a choice.

Burn your iso on good media and don't use a cd-rw just a cd rom is fine and will be more reliable.

When you download the iso that you want you should be able to see where to download the md5sum too. It should be right under the spot where you clicked the iso to download. Download the md5sum. The md5sum will be a series of 32 numbers and letters. 32 digits in all. Never burn an iso that doesn't have a matching md5sum. The iso can have malware or be incomplete as to cause trouble down the road and maybe right off.

Create some new partitions. Gparted can shrink your existing windows partition. You need to do this if you want to dual boot ubuntu and windows. Dual booting linux and windows is the best way to experience linux for the first time. .

When you have used gparted to shrink your windows partition be sure to leave 5 or more gigs of free space so that you can still download things into windows if you choose.

You need to create some partitions for ubuntu to install to. The first will be a small partition of at least 5 gigs. This will be your root partition. The root partition will be represented in the ubuntu installer as /. or it may be ./
It stands for root in any case. You format the root partition as ext2 or ext3.
Now you need to create a linux/swap partition. This partition will only need to be 1 gig or 1000Mb in size. be sure to format it as linux/swap.
Now that will give you 3 partitions and you can only have a maximum of four primary partitions on a hard drive. The way to get around that is to make your fourth partition an 'extended' partition. This 'extended' partition must use ALL of the free space that is left on your hard drive. An 'extended' partition can be divided up into as many smaller partitions that you may need down the road.
You will now create a home partition out of some of the free space in the extended partition. I usually use between ten and twenty gigs for home. Depends on how big the drive is.

When you are installing with the ubuntu installer you have to tell it where you want the root partition to be, where the swap is and where the home is. The partitons will be the ones that you created with gparted or the partitioner of your choice. This is the same method I use for installing MEPIS. MEPIS is similar to installing ubuntu but I think that the installer MEPIS uses is a bit easier for a new user. But ubuntu will dojust fine.
Ubuntu will load grub (Grand Unified Bootloader) in the Mbr of hda. Then when you boot up you will have a choice between windows or ubuntu.

If you want a dual boot system with ubuntu and windows then ubuntu can do it for you without much pain. Hope this helps you a bit. Feel free to ask any question that you may think of.
There are no silly questions. Not asking is silly though.

One more thing that i forgot to add. you may need to go into your computers bios and set it so it boots from the cdrom first. Then your cd should be detected. Does the cd work on another computer?

In a VERY stubborn dell I had to uncheck or disable the option to boot from the hard drive in bios. No matter what I set the bios to it would race staright to the empty hard drive and try to boot. By unchecking the option to boot from the hard drive your system will most likely be able to read the cd. You can still install to the hard drive with the option to boot from the hard drive disabled in bios. Just be sure to re check the box to boot from the hard drive in bios before you try to boot. Or it won't work.

Junior Poster

122 posts since Jul 2005

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as he said this is a clean system with no OS currently installed, if he follows my instructions and just clicks through the install it should all be fine as ubuntu should autopartition and use the whole drive

good jnob with the MD5sum though, i forgot that

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Thanks! Very much! Right. I was rambling a bit there. Sorry.
I was just giving him some more options. You never know when someone is reading the thread and may want to dual boot.

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I think you misunderstand me, i was just making sure the OP wasnt overwhelmed by your long post

I was also just trying to say well done for mentioning the MD5Sum thing

and report me to the mods all you want, i am in no way " harassing you" - i think we just got off on the wrong foot over the whole MEPIS thing

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Bullseye there buddy. I am sure we did just that. I feel a lot better now that we have put that behind us. i have a bit of ground to make up with some other members and I know that but thanks again. I changed my post fast but you got me a bit quicker. :) :)

Junior Poster

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dont worry about it, im glad we got that sorted out :)

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by the way mepnoob2005, on the dells (ive got a 5150), dont set it in the BIOS. Hit f12? and choose a one-off boot device

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jbennet that's good to know about the dell 5150. You never know when you'll run into one when installing. I have set up a lot of guys with MEPIS here in sunny british columbia. I try to get as many guys off of the windows merry-go-round as I can. Every year there are new software versions and the windows user either has to buck up or get left behind. So I give free MEPIS cds to everyone that I can.
Surprising how many are out there that have NOT heard of linux. It's an installers dream come true. LOL :)

Junior Poster

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yeah, the dells are wierd. theyve got a stupid recovery partition which you hit control + f11 tto recover from. this will be destroyed by installing GRUB to the MBR.

However, you can work around this by installing linux on a hard disk of a different connection type and putting grub on the MBR of that (when you do the F12 thing you can choose either SATA disk or IDE disk as a boot device)

Also i dont know if you know this but a large proportion of dells will not get any sound whatsoever under linux or vista. You can fix this by applying the most recent BIOS flash.

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I have a PC I'd like to install Ubuntu on. I burned an iso onto a CD but I dont know how to install it on my second PC. I'm trying to figure it out.

When I start the computer it reads "missing operating system". The hard drive was erased using fdisk. How do I get to where I can install Ubuntu from the CD I burned?

Thanks for any help.:cheesy:

The md5 and correctly burning the iso to CD are good places to start, as far as programs and/or step by step instructions, the Ubuntu page has a lot of useful info https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BurningIsoHowto . I was able to download and burn an edubuntu distro and install it quite easily. If the md5 sums don't match after repeated downloads, you might want to get a downloader program to ease the pain of failed downloads. Also, sometimes you have to force the computer to boot from the CD in the BIOS.

MacGyver Orca

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yes, on some pcs such as dells you can hit a key (f12) and tell it which device to start off

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Speaking of dells and installing I have a dell Gx150 with a pen 3 930Mhz, coppermine CPU,512 Mb ram. (My son's for the last two years)
Well it was so stubborn about live cds that I finally had to un-check the option to boot from the hard drive in bios. Otherwise no matter what I tried ,or which order the hard drive, cdrom,floppy booted from,the computer would skip the cdrom or floppy and go straight to the hard drive. As soon as I unchecked the box in bios so the hard drive couldn't boot then the live cd would boot and boot fine. My son loves that computer. He's going to be 6 in july and he has been dual booting xp and MEPIS for two years or so. Himself.Never too early to start them. And a computer is an awesome babysitter/entertainer.
Anyways like I said unchecking the option to boot the hard drive in bios was the only way to get that one to take a live cd.