Installing Kubuntu with Plasma on Alienware 17

[jcanino20]

Hi All. I hope I am posting to the right area.

To get right to it, I have been trying for over a week to install Kubuntu/Plasma on my Alienware 17. I have used Linux for years and never had problems installing either a dual boot system or full native on my PCs/laptops. I've even gotten it to work on my MacBook Pro. But I cannot even get to the Try/Install screen.

I have tried searching for solutions on my own. I have followed various suggestions to change my boot parameters to Legacy, etc., all with no success. I have a partition ready to go on my laptop. Although I am currently running Kubuntu in a virtual machine, but I would really like to take full advantage of the power and resources of my laptop.

The end goal is a dual boot system. I need to maintain a windows partition for some music production apps that I need, but everything else I do can be [happily] done in Linux.

Thank you in advance for any support or suggestions you may offer. Please advise me if I need to provide additional setting info, etc. I am more a glorified end-user than anything else, so I probably have a lot to learn about the more technical information.

Again, thank you.
John

[vinnywright]

which .ISO are you using ?

how/with what , did you make the bootable media ?

describe in what way it dose not work ,, how far it dose get , what happens when it quits ,bla bla bla

VINNY

[claydoh]

Where or how specifically is it failing?



Sent from my LG G4

[jcanino20]

which .ISO are you using ?

how/with what , did you make the bootable media ?

describe in what way it dose not work ,, how far it dose get , what happens when it quits ,bla bla bla

VINNY

Hi Vinny,

Thanks for responding to my post.

The ISO file is kubuntu-15.04-desktop-amd64.iso. It was downloaded from the Kubuntu website. I used Universal-USB-Installer-1.9.6.1.exe to write the image to my USB stick. Whenever I do this, I always choose the option to reformat the USB first, so that there is no possibility of anything else interfering with the file system.

When I installed it as a virtual machine, using Virtual Box, everything worked perfectly. I say that because I think the distro I have is fine. When I boot from the USB, I get as far as seeing the Kubuntu logo. It started out with its animated glow, then the animation just stops and it sits there. There is no indication of any hard disk activity. I end up simply doing a hard reboot.

As I said in my original post, I have never had problems installs Linux before, including Kubuntu, so I am at a loss. I hope I have provided the correct info for you.

Thanks again for your help.

John

[jlittle]

The ISO file is kubuntu-15.04-desktop-amd64.iso.

I have USB stick with that iso, which drove me nuts for a while on my desktop. I wrote it using dd. No trouble on another, less old, computer.

First, my desktop's old BIOS saw it as a hard drive, not removable, and I had to find a boot order screen that set the order of hard drives.

Secondly, I must press the space bar before it will do anything. If I press any other key, nothing will happen, even the space bar doesn't work.

Maybe that's what you need.

[jcanino20]

I get as far as seeing the Kubuntu logo. It starts out with its animated glow, then the animation just stops and it sits there. There is no indication of any hard disk activity. I end up simply doing a hard reboot.

[sithlord48]

if you hit print screen / break when that animation is going you should see the boot progress it may provide you with some error ..

[jcanino20]

if you hit print screen / break when that animation is going you should see the boot progress it may provide you with some error ..

I will try this. Thank you for the feedback. Quickly, where in the man pages or elsewhere can I learn more tricks like using the print screen button, etc.? Some of these tips seem like secrets not readily available to a novice like myself. I am happy to RTFM(!), sometimes I just need to know what parts to read!

Cheers!
John

[otisklt]

Up or down arrow should switch to the loading list instead of the splash screen.
See where it stops at in the list.

You will likely want to edit the grub line and append "NOMODESET" without quotes.
This can be done in the grub menu as it is counting down hit tab, then add nomodeset to the end of the line and press enter.