Kubuntu 21.04 fails to install from DVD

[vanadiumboy]

I made an account on


launchpad
and added my comment on


https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...r/+bug/1930880


I recommend that you do the same.

[jglen490]

What you point out is undoubtedly true. The real question is why use a DVD as an install medium?

DVD is slow.

Even if a DVD is reliable, it's not up to the very good self-checking and other complexities that are not only required but are also useful with modern installers.

One DVD-R can hold all the data needed for a single install, but a USB thumb drive can be used over and over for many distro installers.

All but the very oldest of computers/laptops have at least one USB connector, and the very oldest of PCs/laptops are NOT going to work well with any except the simplest of distros.

In my opinion, there is never a good reason to use a DVD to install any fairly current distro on any fairly current machine.

[GreyGeek]

Twenty years ago I saved all my data on CDC and later DVD backups. Collected about 200 of them between 2000-2007. When I got this computer in 2012 I decided to use its DVD to read those backups. Fully 1/3rd of them would not read. Even using recovery DVD techniques popular at the time didn't help. The ONLY DVD's that reliably retained the info burned onto them were the RW DVDs. When USB sticks grew to 8B and higher it became increasingly obvious that USB was the storage medium to use. I have a handful of 32, 64 and 128 GB USB sticks holding all that data. So far, none have ever failed to read or accept new data.

That's when I decided to take the DVD out of this system and replace it with an HD Caddy into which I put a 320GB HD, and later a 500GB SSD.

DVD's, like the old ZIP Drives and the 3.5" floppies, are a dead technology.

Now, one can get a 256GB Micro SD card for $35, and a 32GB one for $8. Or, this off brand 512GB SD card for $31.

[claydoh]

I have a pack of DVD-R disks on the way (5 bucks!) so I will yank the burner out of a dead chassis I have and put it in my less old PC, if I can get that one to boot. May need a video card. And maybe hook up the one in my ~1.5 year old PC, as I never bothered to plug it in after adding my nvme card lol. Have not burned a disk since at least 2012, when I moved to Georgia.

Will test

[vanadiumboy]

If the argument is that you want fast speeds, then USB sticks need to be thrown into the trash and you should be using a HDD or SSD.


DVD-R: I had the same experience that these things are of poor quality. Sometimes, they become unreadable after 2 y. My CD-Rs are still readable.


USB stick reliability: It depends as well. I have a 32 GB Verbatim stick where at one point, writing to it was 10 kB/s and then 1 B/s and then 0B/s.
I bought 2 other USB sticks. Performance varies wildly. Sometimes it writes at + 10 MB/s and then it is 10 kB/s. I have tested from multiple PCs.


Also, I don’t have many USB sticks. I have 4 and they all have slow write speeds or randomly varying speeds.
I have 10 DVD-RW and also many DVD-R, maybe 100.
I can have multiple distros on a few DVD-RW (1 distro per DVD-RW).


“In my opinion, there is never a good reason to use a DVD to install any fairly current distro on any fairly current machine.”


==I don’t know. I don’t know where the future is headed. Some people sell Linux distro DVDs on ebay.
It seems as if people prefer to download their games and their adobe photoshop.

I prefer to have the DVD-ROM.

[jglen490]

There's nothing wrong with an HDD or SSD, but those are a bit of overkill.

Yes, a thumb drive won't last forever, they're not built the same as an SSD or an M.2, but a thumb drive is almost a commodity item. I have a stack of cheap Ebay ones. I download an ISO, burn it to a stick, and use it. At some time the stick will just no longer work and it goes to the trash (the city I live in has it's own recycling facility), or it can go directly to some e-waste company.

[jlittle]

... an HDD or SSD, but those are a bit of overkill.

But not for backups and lots of other purposes. Just copy an iso to one and iso boot from it. Quicker and handier than USB sticks, though for a target with nothing on it a utility USB to get started is needed; such a utility is useful anyway.

[jglen490]

In terms of backups and other additional storage alternatives, I agree. As an install medium on bare hardware, or other unbootable (for whatever reason) media, a thumb drive is a simple and effective solution. I have nothing against the ISO boot method, when appropriate.

[vanadiumboy]

Alright, glad to know that I am not the only one that runs into poor quality USB sticks. I had a 8 GB USB stick that I had bought in ~2008. That thing lasted a long time but I can’t find it anymore. It just seems like as time goes on, the quality of production goes down. Or the memory cells are too small now.
When floppy disk started to go out of style, the production quality seemed to be going down.


I hope the same doesn’t happen to HDD. I have a feeling that SSDs are inferior to HDD.


I’m going to have to look into how to burn an ISO to an internal HDD.

[GreyGeek]

Alright, glad to know that I am not the only one that runs into poor quality USB sticks. I had a 8 GB USB stick that I had bought in ~2008. That thing lasted a long time but I can’t find it anymore. It just seems like as time goes on, the quality of production goes down. Or the memory cells are too small now.
When floppy disk started to go out of style, the production quality seemed to be going down.


I hope the same doesn’t happen to HDD. I have a feeling that SSDs are inferior to HDD.


I’m going to have to look into how to burn an ISO to an internal HDD.

When 16GB USB sticks came out I saw an ad for one on Amazon at $8/2 at the time. They had stainless steel cases. Looked cool.
When I tried to use it the sucker maxed out at 512KB. I found some software that tested for fake USBs. But, if one has to buy it to test it then the software is useless. That's when I began restricting my USB purchases to name brands like Samsung of Sandisk.

IMO, SSD's are superior to HD's. I have two SSDs. Both are 500GB Samsung 860 EVO's.
I've been using them for 2 and 3 years. Just before I got my first 3 years ago I also purchased a 320GB Toshiba HD. That HD now has 16 bad sectors and my Smart Drive info is telling me to make plans for replacing it.. Avoid the cheapies and buy name brands. They have their reputations to maintain. Toshiba is a name brand but the HD market has dropped into the commodity basement and profit margins are razor thin, so quality is the first to suffer. Sooner or later HDs, probably sooner, are going to the infinite bit bucket in the sky.

[Fred47]

Installation media is matter of personal choice. I still like having physical media sitting on the shelf, just in case, so I still use DVDs. Speed is not an issue, as installing the OS just doesn't happen often enough to matter.

[jlittle]

I?m going to have to look into how to burn an ISO to an internal HDD.

There's no burn process; I often boot into an iso directly from where I've downloaded it. The trick is to get the grub commands right, as they vary by distro, though all the *buntus are the same.

[vanadiumboy]

There's no burn process; I often boot into an iso directly from where I've downloaded it. The trick is to get the grub commands right, as they vary by distro, though all the *buntus are the same.

I was thinking of having a blank HDD on SATA0 and a HDD on SATA1 that has the ISO burned to it.
I boot up from SATA1 HDD and I tell the installer to install to SATA0 HDD.
Because, what?s the point of buying USB sticks if I have a bunch of old SATA HDD that are small and not getting much use.

[gh4wi]

If you want long term reliable storage, use a DVD /w a silver colored read/write side (MEMOREX). If you use a colored DVD (ie blue or green) (Verbatim) them expect problems at some point.
USB sticks work for awhile, but will fail, just like floppies when exposed to static electricity. Yes, I have seem them fail.

Newer Laptops do NOT have DVD drive built in, one must buy an external USB DVD drive to read the old stuff.
Some non-new PC's can not boot from a USB stick, so a DVD is needed for them.

Too bad Kubuntu 21.04 can not be installed from a DVD, Kubuntu was one of my two favorite distros.
I just burned a DVD for the Mint 20.2 BETA on the same PC that I tried to burn Kubuntu 21.04, and the Mint DVD worked ok.
So for now, one must install Kubuntu 21.04 from a usb stick, old PC's that can not boot from a USB stick are left behind.

[Snowhog]

So for now, one must install Kubuntu 21.04 from a usb stick, old PC's that can not boot from a USB stick are left behind.

Well, at some point, all older technology dies by the roadside. It's inevitable. Progress marches on.