I recently acquired a friend's computer to fix, an eTower 566i2 from 2000 because the machine wouldn't boot into Windows XP and would get stuck in a DiskCheck loop. After using Spinrite and the hard drive checking out fine, I decided to try to give her Ubuntu, as she only has the CD key for Windows ME (eww) and doesn't want to spend money.
So instead, I downloaded the newest copy of Ubuntu from their site, and tried to install it. Now, after I select install, it takes literally half an hour to give me a critical error and tells me it's going to launch a dekstop session to assess what went wrong.
Is there anything about eMachines or computers that old that would prevent Ubuntu or at least the latest version from running properly, and if so, what versions would be good to use? Thanks very much in advanced.
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The problem is not Ubuntu, the problem is the machine. Time to pull out every diagnostic tool you can find... – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams Sep 27 '10 at 05:54
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Yeah, that's what I was assuming. Either that or an incompatibility with a new Ubuntu/old machine. Think any older versions would work better? And also, any compilations of diagnostic tools you can think of that would work? – Daniel Sep 27 '10 at 06:00
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What "critical error"? – Joril Sep 27 '10 at 07:04
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I don't remember what it said, but after rebooting, it worked... kind of. Now I get to various stages of the setup questions before installation before it freezes all-together. Each of the 7 questions takes maybe half an hour to load, and so far it's frozen on 1/7, 4/7 and just now when I hit Install again. Also, when I select Try, It will load the desktop and icons for installing and an examples folder. When I tried to open examples, it froze. I'm thinking this machine is just finally dead... – Daniel Sep 27 '10 at 08:34
2 Answers
Maybe it's faulty RAM? Did you try running the memory test?
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No, I haven't tried any other tests. What would you recommend for testing it? – Daniel Sep 27 '10 at 23:47
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Well Ubuntu itself installs Memtest86+ and allows you to run it directly from the boot menu (or the CD / install media) – Joril Sep 28 '10 at 06:58
It could be the install disk you're using, too. I've had a lot of problems with CDs. Here are some solutions I've used:
Choose a different install media, like an USB flash drive. The Ubuntu homepage provides instructions.
If burning the CD yourself, use the slowest possible write speed. Faster write speeds tend to be more error prone.
If you got the CD from Canonical, you might want to run a disk consistency check just to make sure it wasn't excessively dinged up or otherwise hurt during the 6-week-long shipping process.
If I remember right, the Ubuntu CDs have a boot option that lets you check whether the CD is okay by (I presume) running a checksum of its contents and comparing it to a MD5 hash on the CD. If they don't match, the CD is defective. Running with a defective disk can cause problems, like how bad sectors will prevent regular operating systems from running right.
