Ubuntu Installation :: Dual Boot With Xp - Ntldr As Primary - Blinking Cursor
Dec 27, 2010
Six months ago I installed Ubuntu 10.04 to my otherwise Win XP work laptop. I decided to continue to use Windows' boot loader as primary: I told the Ubuntu installer to put grub2 onto a separate partition, then used dd to copy the first 512 bytes into a file in my Windows C partition, then edited boot.ini to link to it - its a common technique that is described in many support forums and blogs. This worked fine, and continued to work until a few weeks ago. One day I chose the Ubuntu option at the Windows boot loader and got a blinking cursor at top left of screen and no grub2 menu. I was able to use SuperGrub2Disk to discover and boot from my grub2 install - so that didn't appear to be broken. I finally fixed it by dd'ing a fresh copy of the first 512 bytes of my /boot partition over to the Windows C partition. So somehow the Windows boot loader decided it no longer liked my original dd'ed file.
The only things I can think of that might have changed and caused this to happen are (on Ubuntu) an update to security packages using the graphical update manager that pops up (I rarely do a command line apt-get upgrade/dist-upgrade and certainly not in this time frame) and (on Windows) a Windows Update - as it is a work laptop I tend to take whatever essential updates it suggests. As you can see I managed to fix the problem. However does anybody have any similar experience or any explanation why this may have happened? Could an over-zealous Windows Update have caused it?
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Feb 10, 2011
I am attempting to install Ubuntu 64Bit Server 10.04 on a new server.
Server Specs:
Xeon E5620
12GB RAM
2X 160GB 7200 RPM in RAID1 (Onboard Software RAID)
Super Micro X8DTI-8
I am doing a typical install with no special functions on a RAID1 onboard Intel array. I know the array works because I tested it by installing Windows Server 2003 which works fine. The RAID also shows as healthy in the BIOS.
This problem is very difficult to remedy because everything seems to install fine with Ubuntu but when you reboot after the install you get a blinking cursor _ and nothing else. It appears that something happened when loading the OS but it's impossible to get past the blinking cursor because you can't type anything or escape out of it. The only thing that it will register is Ctrl+Alt+Del which will restart the server.
The funny thing is it does not display the typical Sigkill and show processes shutting down. The screen goes black and it restarts only to return to the blinking cursor. I am on my 6th attempt at an install with ubuntu and I am seriously considering switching over to windows unless.
I am almost certain this is a RAID issue because I can load the Ubuntu on 1 drive without any issues but I always get the blinking cursor in the RAID.
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Jun 5, 2011
I've tried to install Ubuntu 11.04 for the whole afternoon and I'm stuck.Reason why I use the alternate cd is that I want to use an encrypted logical volume (full system, not just home folder). I did not create the partitions myself, I simply used the installer option for "guided LVM with encryption".But now I have the problem that I finished the installation without error, but when I boot my laptop nothing happens. I do only get a blinking cursor, but no GRUB, which I installed too (because there is a nother hdd with win 7).
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Nov 17, 2010
I downloaded the OS I wished to use, loaded it onto a clean 4.0GB drive, everything went as planned. But then I rebooted, and it never booted the file off of the USB. So, I changed the boot options, and tried it again. Now, every time I boot with the drive in, it goes normally and then opens a blank page with only one line of text detailing the date of copyright, something about Linux, etc... And a blinking cursor. Is this normal and I just have to wait for it to load, or is something not being processed? Any information you guys need I can obtain, I'm not new to computers but I am new to changing OS's.
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Feb 1, 2011
I tried to upgrade to Maverick (server version) usingsudo do-release-upgradeAll went well, but on the first reboot after the installation the PC hangs with grub prompt:error: the symbol grub_xputs not foundI guess it has something to do with my RAID1 setup:sda1/sdb1..RAID1, bootable (system partition, 20 GB)sdc1 ....swap partition sda2/sdb2/sdc2 ... RAID5 (data partition, 3 TB)I made a bootable (using UNetbootin) USB pen drive with 10.10 desktop on it and booted into this desktop version. Aftermdadm --assemble --scanI could successfully access (and mount) my RAID1 and RAID5 drives. However, the system itself does not boot.
after only having mounted /dev/md0 and browsed in the contents, the boot behavior has changed: now the PC does not end up in the grub prompt "the symbol grub_xputs not found", but instead a blank black screen with a blinking cursor left top is shown. Keyboard: no reaction (I tried Enter, Esc, any keys ... no reaction, just a blinking cursor).Then, I tried:
boot into USB pen drive 10.10 desktop
mdadm --assemble --scan ... result: /dev/md0 is available (the RAID1 of sda1 and sdb1)
mount /dev/md0 /mnt/md0
[code]...
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May 25, 2010
Similar problems to mine have popped up elsewhere, but none of the fixes seem to work (or I'm just too stupid). I tried to see what the people at Canonical and elsewhere came up with for Ubuntu 10.4 and, after the live USB checked out fine, I rather foolishly installed the OS on my Acer Aspire One D250 (1GB RAM), to run alongside Windows XP.
It booted up once, I think, and then no more. I believe the problem MIGHT be the Broadcom WiFi stuff, but I'm not sure. Anyway, booting Ubuntu leads to a blank screen with a blinking cursor... which doesn't appear to go away. Recovery mode worked once or twice (had to use ACPI=OFF at least once), then no more. It leads to the same thing: that perpetually blinking cursor.
What I would like is either a fix to get Ubuntu 10.4 launched, or some way to remove the OS and restore my netbook back to what it was. Unfortunately, the MBR fixes that are posted all over cyberspace are useless, as my hidden partition doesn't contain the rtmbr.bin file it needs to work (don't ask me why--I've already posted that question at the AAO user forum). So it seems a fix to launch Ubuntu is the only solution, so that I can at least set grub to launch Windows XP rather than Ubuntu.
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Jan 22, 2010
I have an old laptop, and am a basic linux user, but this install is crazy. I know that I have to have acpi=off to work, and got Linux Mint 7 installed from the live cd but want Xubuntu. The Xubuntu 9.1 live CD works fine as long as I put the acpi=off parameters in the boot string, and I check the additional options just to be sure. But after install I cannot even get into the grub, it says grub loading for a split second then blinking cursor
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Aug 9, 2011
After installing Fedora 15 from LiveUSB and rebooting it just hangs on a black screen with a blinking cursor (underscore) in the top left of the screen. If it's reached grub, it isn't responding to any commands, and mashing several key combinations (such as ctrl-alt-f1) will produce a beep usually emitted only by the BIOS (hinting that it may never be making its way to grub).
The only particularly interesting thing about the install is that by default it wanted to boot itself from the MBR on my primary-master (Windows) disk. Instead I selected the option to boot from "the first partition in sdb1", which is my primary-slave (Linux) disk, (the first partition being /boot). This way I can change which OS boots by changing the boot order in my BIOS, and so avoiding bootloader wars.
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Aug 8, 2010
I got this message today after cleaning out the inside of my computer. Didn't really mess with anything. Booted into Windows XP just fine, had to restart for an update. Burg loaded, I selected Windows and I get:
"NTLDR is missing. Press CTRL-ALT-DEL to restart." WTF? Windows breaks itself. Great. My ubuntu install works just fine. I have 2 separate hard drives, with one OS on each. I can't access the other drive from ubuntu. It says
Unable to mount location Error mounting: mount exited with exit code 13: Index entry out of bounds in directory inode 5. Failed to mount '/dev/sda1': Input/output error NTFS is either inconsistent, or there is a hardware fault, or it's a SoftRAID/FakeRAID hardware. In the first case run chkdsk /f on Windows then reboot into Windows twice. The usage of the /f parameter is very important! If the device is a SoftRAID/FakeRAID then first activate it and mount a different device under the /dev/mapper/ directory, (e.g. /dev/mapper/nvidia_eahaabcc1). Please see the 'dmraid' documentation for more details.
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Oct 14, 2010
I've got two laptops running Ubuntu. Both have had Lucid installed from the live cd. I have upgraded one of them to Maverick. Both distributions are running great after they boot up, but I haven't experienced any faster boot times with either distibution. Both boot to Bios and then the screen goes black with a blinking cursor in upper left corner of the screen. The black screen remains for 30 to 45 seconds and then I get the Ubuntu splash screen for maybe 5 seconds, and then desktop. Why am I not seeing faster boot times? I realize 45 to 60 seconds is good compared to other os's, but I anticipated much faster boot times. Shut down on the other hand is quite fast at maybe 5 to 10 seconds. Does anyone else get this black screen on boot? Seems like wasted time cause I can't tell what's going on during the time there is a black screen. This is not a real big deal breaker, as I don't reboot very often, but I just wonder why bootup isn't faster.
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Oct 20, 2010
I have a box with lucid I rarely boot. When I do there is usually some trouble, as now. The only thing that happens is that a blinking cursor appear, and nothing happens. Usually the box also never shutdown, I end up with having to hardboot it.
What causes this, is there anything I can do to fix it? As of now I can't get the beast back up. I'm running x64, a cheap raedon 5xxx card and an amd x4 processor.
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May 3, 2010
I am getting a much slower boot with the 10.04 upgrade. After choosing which partition to use I get the blinking white cursor in the upper left hand corner and the "Boot from (hd0,4) ext 3..." sits there for a while before coming to the log in screen. There have been quite a few posts about this, a lot of people are saying disabling the floppy drive in the BIOS has worked for them. I don't have a floppy drive on my laptop.
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Jul 1, 2010
In my dual boot system , I am not able to boot for windos XP and getting the following message.
Booting 'XP'
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1
NTLDR missing
Press any Key to restart
System has redhat Linux and windows XP installed.
Quote:
/boot/grub/device.map
/boot/grub/grub.conf
/boot/grub/menu.lst
[code]....
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May 31, 2011
Today I decided to play with my new 11.4 Opensuse dvd. It installed and booted without any problem, and I didn't face any problem until I rebooted the computer to test my newly installed nvidia graphics drivers. openSuse wouldn't boot. Well, the important side is: there are no kernel panics, no "hit enter to restart computer" to find the reason. Just a blinking cursor after an attempt to find the kernel. I only could get out of that by pressing the reboot button. I decided to press c and boot manually:
Code:
grub> root (hd0,4)
Filesystem type is ext2fs, partition type 0x83
grub> kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.37.1-1.2-default
and the computer just froze. At this stage pressing tab for autocompletion at kernel line freezes the computer, too.
Maybe additional boot parameters?
Well, considering that installation brought me to a desktop, the system seems to be up and ready to run. Nothing seems wrong with my menu.lst:
Code:
title openSUSE 11.4
root (hd0,4)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.37.1-1.2-default root=/dev/sda5
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.37.1-1.2-default
(I did not install a bootloader with openSUSE. This is legacy grub bootloader of Debian)
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Aug 20, 2011
Im using 5.6 DVD install to a HW raid1 Card (2 x SSDs in raid 1, Arcea Card Natively recognized by centos anaconda).I select to wipe the entire drive and remove ALL partitions (ive also tried setting this to just remove linux partitions). The install location (raid drive) is /dev/sdh the A-G are other 1.5TB drives.I also un-check EVERY drive except the raid drive (sdh). it then asks me if it ok to wipe/reformat drive (Prompts Yes or No, i click yes)Every time i do this install i get the blinking cursor after post. Im told this means i dont have GRUB installed, i do NOT disable grub or anything related to the boot-loader in anaconda installer (all those setting are left at default). ive also tried setting this to NO boot loader, and i get the same result.
This DOES work as i have gotten it to install and run prefect for a few weeks. I think what i did then was removed ALL THE DRIVES except teh raid drive, and then did the install then. This way the install drive was /dev/sdA and all worked, even when i added the drives back online after the install, the machine ran great and booted several times this way (i had to do a os re-install or else i would have left it as is.)YES bios is 100% set to the raid card as the first device to boot from, Centos 6 installed to the same raid drive boots and works great - but i need 5.6.no google help on this one, searched hard, only one article on Ubuntu doing this all the time.also everytime im retrying to install 5.6, i go into the HW raid card's bios and delete and recreate the raid1 volume (it takes about 10 min for it to format and initialize the raid1 array
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Jul 2, 2010
My internal is sda windows = sda1 recovery = sda2 my external is sdb storage = sdb1 linux sdb2 GRUB is on sdb2's first sector. I tried coping it to grub.mbr on sda1 and added C:grub.mbr="ubuntu linux" all I get when selecting it is _ blinking and no booting. USB booting from BIOS works but I don't want family to have to mess with unplugging and replugging it when they want to boot to Windows. I also tried installing GRUB2 to MBR of sdb and copying same problem.
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May 3, 2010
I dual-boot Windows 7 and Ubuntu. Sometime between 4/18 and a few days ago, something happened with Windows booting up. Ubuntu boots fine, but whenever I try to boot Windows, it just goes to a black screen with a blinking cursor (the command line kind, not a pointer). At first I thought it was Windows, but I have run the repair CD and executed chkdsk /f and chkdsk /r on all partition related to windows. No effect.
I ran a system check designed for issues with booting up, and it found no errors. I have looked at my GRUB files, and they all look fine. I am not sure if it is GRUB or Windows. I tried reinstalling the Windows boot-loader, and it had the same effect, the only difference is that it bypassed GRUB. The reason I think it may be GRUB is that the error happened around the same time as me upgrading from Karmic to the Lucid RC. I have posted this on a Windows 7 forum.
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Mar 9, 2011
I am trying to install any version of ubuntu (I even tried so far another version called jollicloud) but the result is always the same...The computer is a Dell Mini 9. I have pulled out it's SSD because it has broken.I managed to install about some months ago an ubuntu netbook version (10.04, not sure) which all worked fine from a 8GB usb stick Here are my steps:
1. Download ubuntu either netbook or standard version
2. Make a bootable flash with Unetbootin from ubuntu or other programs from windows
3. Put the flash disk and the second 8GB flash to the dell mini 9
4. Boot Ubuntu live from the first flash (sometimes I think I must put the second flash after the boot so it finds only the live version... If I have put both flashes sometimes it won' t boot)
5. install ubuntu to the other flash (to the 8GB flash drive)
6. reboot
and then...only a blinking cursor is appearing to the top left of the screen with nothing else happening...Shift does not do anything.I have some suspicion that there is no Grub at all but I am not sure for this.I am sure there is a way to make it because I ve done it before, but I don't remeber how!
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Mar 8, 2011
I have a problem with booting from a USB flash drive. I have Acer TimelineX 3820TG. I have Windows 7 Home from Acer and I installed Mandriva OS from USB(from USB because this Acer doen't have a DVD drive). It was OK, but I want reinstall Windows 7 and so I did. Now I have Windows 7 Professional and it wrote over Mandriva's GRUB. It wasn't a big problem. For a while I was just using Windows 7 but now I am thinking that I need some OS with Linux and I am thinking about Ubuntu. But when I tried to boot from USB with Ubuntu I get a black screen with a blinking cursor after the BIOS POST.
I was trying many applications to create a bootable USB drive and many versions of Ubuntu (and other Linux distributions), but nothing worked. I tried to Google for answers but I found many problems where all booting goes to black screen but in my problem Windows 7 boots fine from disc but from USB doesn't work.
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Oct 21, 2010
I decided to swap my media center PC over to Kubuntu after I had some issues with the Ubuntu 10.04 to 10.10 update. It has had Ubuntu on it for probably 3 years now. Most notably, the same issue is occuring now with any installer later than 9.04 which leads me to believe it is all Grub2 related.
The install runs without errors, but after booting from HD I get only a blinking insertion cursor. No Grub at all. I've held in shift, nada. I booted to Live CD and reinstalled Grub manually but still no love. It acts as though Grub simply isn't there.
I do have a second hard drive in the box that has Ubuntu 9.04 on it that I use as a backup if the OS HD gets messed up, but it is second in boot order and shouldn't be causing an issue. Besides, if that HD was booting it would be giving me legacy grub, not a blinking cursor.
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May 1, 2010
I have a single XP install on another partition, but can't boot to it now that I have upgraded to 10.04. Also, when starting Ubuntu, it takes a good 30 seconds to actually start booting ubuntu after I have selected it from the GRUB list (just sits there with a blinking cursor)
Noticed other users have been directed to run the boot info script, so here are the results from that.
Quote:
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Jun 22, 2011
I'm unable to boot into my Windows OS so Im trying to install Ubuntu 11.04 on a separate partition, so I can somehow get access to the files on Windows.
I made a live cd and a flash USB, both of which when I try to boot from, will go straight to a blinking cursor and nothing else, it won't allow me to type and there are no error messages. So I can't even get the install started.
I made sure both the cd and flash USB are bootable from another pc from inside Windows.
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Apr 21, 2015
I'm thinking about switching to Debian from Ubuntu, so I installed Debian (debian-7.8.0-amd64-DVD-1) in dual boot with my Ubuntu 14.10 (Uefi install). Installation process was OK (I think), I got a working GRUB that recognizes both OS, but Debian boots to a blank screen with a flashing cursor in the top left corner (Ubuntu boots perfectly). I also ran into some graphics-related problems while installing/booting Ubuntu, due to my AMD GPU graphics, that I solved adding the nomodeset option to the kernel in GRUB, but that no longer seems to do the trick here. Here's some info about my machine:
HP Envy 15
lspci
00:00.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Family 15h (Models 10h-1fh) Processor Root Complex
00:01.0 VGA compatible controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Richland [Radeon HD 8650G]
00:01.1 Audio device: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Trinity HDMI Audio Controller
00:04.0 PCI bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Family 15h (Models 10h-1fh) Processor Root Port
00:10.0 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH USB XHCI Controller (rev 09)
[Code] ....
I don't know why they are listed as microsoft basic data.
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Jun 18, 2009
I installed F11 without issue but after rebooting all i got is a blinking cursor with no error messages or indeed any other form of feedback.
To check i was even getting as far as grub i went into rescue mode from the dvd and edited the grub.conf to remove the hiddenmenu option and set the timeout to something a little larger. This confirmed that grub does in fact seem to be loading fine. Selecting the Fedora entry still however leave me with just a blinking cursor.
Next i tried removing quiet from the boot commandline. same result.
Just in case i had the wrong disks configured in grub i tried swapping root(hd0,0) with every combination available with as expected various errors about either partition not being suitable or files not found.
Using grub to boot manually to a usb disk worked fine so grub does seem to work.
With no feedback at all i tried all the common options people suggest just in case the kernel is booting but not getting far enough to output to the screen. So far i tried noapic acpi=off nomodeset.
I tried installing 3 times so far with slightly different configurations just in case but still no luck.
Basic partition layout in case it helps:
/dev/sda <-- boot loader installed here.
/dev/sda1 /boot ext3 2GB
/dev/sda2 swap 4GB
/dev/sda3 / ext4 634GB
Various other disks are present but not part of the configuration. I double checked they are not mentioned anywhere in the common places like fstab.
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Nov 23, 2009
I used the F12 DVD to upgrade my system, before all the NVIDIA warnings were posted. I have a Geforce 7100 (7 series) card and used the rpmfusion drivers on Fedora 11. After the upgrade, I get a blinking cursor at boot time. What I should do to repair the mess.
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Jun 24, 2010
Problem-PC automatically boots into a black screen with blinking cursor. No message or nothing
I have 4 HD. Primary drive has Windows Vista, Secondary no OS installed. Sata1 HD Ubuntu 10.04, Sata2 Windows 7. Prior to installing windows 7 all was perfect but once I did it, grub got all screwed up. The only way I can boot into grub is if I manually select my Sata1 which has Ubuntu on it and only then it allows me to select Linux or Windows OS. How can I change that so it can boot up normally as before? I'm assuming that grub was installed in the primary drive which has vista on it, but once I installed windows 7 it got deleted and when I tried reinstalling Ubuntu, the grub was not installed in the primary drive.
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May 9, 2010
I just installed 10.04 and for some reason once the grub screen loads and I can pick what I want to launch (regular kernel, or rescue mode), it attempts to load and then I just get a blinking cursor. I've found that I can't load the live CD either unless I use the nomodeset flag. I read in another post that this problem should be fixed by editing the /etc/default/grub file to add the nomodeset flag, which I did via nano. However, the file also says you must run update-grub after you edit the file. I tried this and it said something like it can't find / (is /dev mounted?) The hard drive itself is mounted, so I don't know why /dev wouldn't be mounted. How can I get this problem solved so I can boot to 10.04 successfully from the hard drive? (I'm typing this from the live CD right now).
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Jun 4, 2010
I have installed today Ubuntu 10.4 LTS ..after installation the OS does not boot and just shows blank screen with cursor blinking ...any idea ..I have searched the forum a lot but cannot understand why this is happening ..re-installed twice ..This is AMD64 bit but I am installing the 32 bit ubuntu 10.4 LTS.
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Oct 31, 2013
I installed Debian 7.2.0 (amd64) on a Toshiba Satellite C870D-121 with the graphic installer. It already has Windows 8.1 installed on another partition, and for Debian I'm not using the same partition of course. Actually, the Debian installation is replacing a Ubuntu 13.10 installation that was working fine.
After choosing Debian in the Grub menu, I can see the boot log entries adding and then the screen clears and all I get is a blinking cursor. After a while, some '^@^@^@' symbols appears. Of course I can Ctrl-Alt-F1 to get a virtual Terminal in order to login and try to investigate the problem, but so far I haven't been able to reliably identify the problem.
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Apr 20, 2015
I've been tooling around in linux on and off since I discovered KNOPPIX 3.2. No linux distro has ever been a daily driver for me, though I wish sometimes it were.I've tried many distros over the past couple weeks via virtualBox on my mac and decided to install Debian on my laptop. I've tried multiple times and it has always failed; quite disappointing.
Laptop Specs;
HP Pavilion dv7 3169wm
64 bit AMD Turion II Ultra M620 2.50 GHz Dual-core
I started the install via the live ISO as the netinst & the DVD versions both failed, either by no suitable kernel or just flat out "installing base system failed". I've now found my computer to boot past the POST splash screen , and then to a black screen with a line cursor blinking with no input/output ability.To be clear, I did use uNetBootin to create the USB, and have successfully installed, and used multiple other distros (ubuntuMate, mint, peppermint, Arch, elementary) without issue, or at least nothing I couldn't fix.
How can I get past this and attempt to install Debian? I'd put my linux knowledge at a "beginner" stat, but I'm by no means daft about electronics and computers.
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