Kubuntu won't start

[saralogan]

I bought an Acer Aspire 3680 laptop in April and it came pre-loaded with Vista. I got sick of it and three days ago I wiped out the harddrive and did a clean install of Kubuntu (6.06 Dapper Drake). I'm a fairly new user of Kubuntu -- I've used it on friends' computers, and briefly on my own.

I started up this morning and it told me I had updates, but when I went to install them, a message popped up saying that I couldn't use the package manager to update. So I thought I'd wait and do other things first. Later, I tried playing a DVD, and it opened in Kaffeine but wouldn't play after two or three seconds and caused the system to freeze up completely. Since I'm so new with this OS, I don't know the equivalent of ctrl-alt-del, so I just held down the power button in the hopes I could restart (always a bad idea, I know).

Well, that didn't work, since it got past the Acer screen and said:

PXE-E61: media test failure, check cable
PXE-M0F: exiting PXE ROM
A¬¬UèV@=!!=öé

The first ¬ was actually two on top of each other, and the ö was more like a sun (I don't know how to key those in), with the cursor blinking at the end. I couldn't type anything.

Now, the only way to get it to boot up is to run it in safe graphics mode with the LiveCD, but I don't know how to recover the files I'd transferred onto my hard drive from my iPod. I would be okay with re-installing Kubuntu (or another OS) but I really really don't want to lose those files (I have work and class and personal writing I really need). Is there any way to recover them? Or is there anything I can do to make my computer run properly? I have the worst computer karma, it seems.

[dibl]

Re: Kubuntu won't start

I would give Feisty (7.04) a try -- it seems to do a better job of handling the newer hardware. Use the "Alternate Install" CD for more control of the process.

[penguin.ch]

Re: Kubuntu won't start

Is there any way to recover them?

I'd say so: boot into a live system (e.g. Knoppix), "from there" access the files on your harddisk and move them to some external medium (e.g. an usb stick).

[Ant2ne]

Re: Kubuntu won't start

When I boot from the live 7.o4 CD I can attach a USB flash (thumb) drive and then copy your files to this device from your hard drive. (You may need to manually mount the hard drive, i don't remember) But when booted with the live CD, and a wired internet connection, you can continue to surf the net. Perhaps you could e-mail yourself these documents if you don't have a thumb drive handy. (that was a good pun :P)

As for your crash, I had a lot more luck with Feisty than Edgy with the newer hard ware.