Installing LM on a SSD

[atanere]

Safe travels and I look forward to it (your Ubuntu experiences), I AM intrigued.

Hi guys. I just wanted to report back on my Ubuntu/Mint confusion. After a 9 hour drive home yesterday, I've spent nearly that long today installing Mint and Ubuntu numerous times side-by-side on two different UEFI laptops, one with HDD and the other with SSD. As @wizardfromoz noted, these distros can coexist just fine, as my own experience proved to me today, both with Secure Boot disabled and also with it enabled. It also worked fine choosing both "install alongside" or "something else" in the Ubiquity installer. I also installed Mint first, and Ubuntu first, to see if that was the issue. I was basically trying to make it fail, but it didn't (except for a few wonky cases with the HP laptop, because it is a stubborn beast anyway).

But to make sure you know I was not hallucinating about this issue, I'll also let you know that this fear of installing Mint and Ubuntu together came from a very reputable source: J.A. Watson, a tech writer who contributes articles frequently to ZDNet and others. He has actually harped on this issue for several years at least, so it must have settled into my brain as fact as I read his reports. Some examples:

From June 2014: "Oh, one last comment about UEFI boot to close this post. As was the case with the previous Mint 16 release, the UEFI boot directory will be named 'ubuntu', so if you want to install Mint 17 and Ubuntu both on the same UEFI boot system, you will have to be careful about that. The most obvious solution, renaming the boot directory after the first of them is installed, doesn't work (it won't boot that one any more). The solution I have found which does work is to create a second EFI Boot partition, but neither Ubuntu nor Mint will let you specify the UEFI boot partition to use on installation, so you have to copy the boot directory to the second EFI partition after installing. This is not a big deal, if you are "advanced" enough to be installing both distributions on one system, then you should also be able to handle this."

From January 2017: "As I have mentioned many times before, one of the unfortunate side effects of this is that Linux Mint uses the same EFI boot directory name as Ubuntu, so if you plan to have both of them installed on the same system, you have to make some special allowance for that. As this Mint installation is the first of the two I will ignore that for now, and deal with it later when I install Ubuntu." (Except that he did not return to this problem in this article.)

He has referred to this problem in the intervening years, and was apparently experiencing problems even before 2014. So I was convinced he was right, and his argument made perfect sense that using the same bootloader location could be a problem (/boot/efi/EFI/ubuntu). I don't read his articles regularly, but I have run into them often and I enjoy his friendly writing style. And he certainly seems to know what he's doing... so I'm confused as to how he has not realized before that these distros can work together.

Oh well, enough of that. My apologies for the diversion.

 

[atanere]

That is precisely the correct error messsage wiz with the kernel panic. I get that after a use two using the live USB, and also now on the ssd. I did go through the "something else" option on the installer in the first attempt. After creating partitions using parted. However unlike when using it on the hdd it didn't have an option to mount point (i think I was going with /). The installer gave an error message, something like "root point not set, select a point using the partitioning tool". I tried to go into gparted for this but didn't see where to go, and the installer wouldn't let me progress after this.

After you created partitions with Gparted, and then in the "something else" options.... you would have seen either "free space" that you created, or else ext4 if you created a filesystem with Gparted too. When you saw this, you need to double-click on the partition that you created (free or ext4) to get the option for the mount point (which will be /). So the "root point not set" error is because you missed this step. BTW, the / means root... the root, or top level of the filesystem. It is required as a bare minimum as a place to install Linux into.

If you used Gparted to create a efi boot partition, then you will also carefully need to choose that as the bootloader location. It should be available with a dropdown selector... so if the default is /dev/sda you may need /dev/sda1 or whatever partition number matches the efi partition when you see the full list of partitions with the installer.

I hope that makes sense. I've been through a similar install so many times today my head is spinning. But the kernel panic you've run into is not a normal thing. Wizard is right... test your download (MD5 or SHA256 checksum) to be sure you do not have a corrupted .iso that you're starting with.

 

[wizardfromoz]

Goodonyer, atanere. For checking with Ubuntu & LM. It's not about "The Gospel according to Chris (me)" . Just like a skittish racehorse, I can be wearing blinkers too, it applies to us all, I think. Anybody calls me out, feel free, lol. We both might learn something, or reinforce what we already know or believe. And that's just one of many things I find absorbing about Linux.

I am surprised about JA Watson though. He does not seemed to have learned, over 2.5 years, that he is in error in this regard (some of this dates back to the last century).

@atanere , I have comments, answers and input to much of what you have presented above, but they would digress from the thrust of the OP's thread subject, which is installing LM on an ssd. So with your approval, I will start to craft a new thread that addresses these issues, focused on multibooting.

Cheers

Wiz

 

[wizardfromoz]

From #22:

If you used Gparted to create a efi boot partition, then you will also carefully need to choose that as the bootloader location. It should be available with a dropdown selector... so if the default is /dev/sda you may need /dev/sda1 or whatever partition number matches the efi partition when you see the full list of partitions with the installer.

Hope no-one is colour-blind. I refer to the part in bold italics, and in blue.

Under UEFI environment, such as you have, my response is -

"No and No, but you can". Cryptic, let me explain.

Your Ubiquity Installer options here will list, from a dropdown menu on where to place the bootloader:

sda
sda1 - if you have successfully created your "/" (root) partition either with GParted or with the Ubiquity Partition Editing facility

This, under the proviso that only your SSD is plugged in, which has been partitioned to the gpt standard, and formatted to Ext4 file system.

If there are other devices plugged in, they will likely show.

I would just choose sda. You can choose /dev/sda1, which is your root partition, but my upcoming article will address this an option that may or may not be what you want. This can be better addressed if/when you choose to install another Linux alongside your LM.

Cheers

Wizard

 

[atanere]

@atanere , I have comments, answers and input to much of what you have presented above, but they would digress from the thrust of the OP's thread subject, which is installing LM on an ssd. So with your approval, I will start to craft a new thread that addresses these issues, focused on multibooting.

Heck, you don't need my approval. I'm just one of the spammer-deleters here!

Your knowledge of multibooting far exceeds that of most people, including me. And I certainly value and learn from your posts on that topic, and others as well. I'll look forward to your contributions!

Cheers

 

[atanere]

From #22:



Hope no-one is colour-blind. I refer to the part in bold italics, and in blue.

Under UEFI environment, such as you have, my response is -

"No and No, but you can". Cryptic, let me explain.

Your Ubiquity Installer options here will list, from a dropdown menu on where to place the bootloader:

sda
sda1 - if you have successfully created your "/" (root) partition either with GParted or with the Ubiquity Partition Editing facility

This, under the proviso that only your SSD is plugged in, which has been partitioned to the gpt standard, and formatted to Ext4 file system.

If there are other devices plugged in, they will likely show.

I would just choose sda. You can choose /dev/sda1, which is your root partition, but my upcoming article will address this an option that may or may not be what you want. This can be better addressed if/when you choose to install another Linux alongside your LM.

Cheers

Wizard

Yeah? Okay, I will certainly believe you! In my many installs yesterday, I did not try to choose just /dev/sda... no doubt for fear that it might create two separate ESP's (EFI System Partition). So, I guess your future article will tell us whether it does, in fact, create separate ESP's, or whether the installer is smart enough to recognize where it goes when a boot partition has already been created.

@PcBuilderEd, I hope you can see from this back-and-forth that there is not necessarily a "right way" to do everything. In fact, with Linux in general, there is usually more than one way to do anything! This creates its own confusion sometimes, and differences of opinions sometimes too. No worries. Experiment... and learn. Even when you get this first install completed, don't be afraid to tear it down and start again. It's very possible you will have to anyway as you realize you wish you had done some thing or another differently. Don't just wish it... change it.

Since you still don't have the first install done, I will briefly carry on just a bit more... and Wiz can correct me if I screw up (AGAIN ).

We both suggested earlier that there are some "advantages" to creating a separate /home partition as you prepare your new SSD, and I don't know if you are considering this or not. But some reading in the past few days has reminded me of some possible problems with this too. Many software configuration files are stored in /home in hidden files and folders, and there is a potential for conflict between the programs on different distributions all accessing the same config files. I've never used a shared /home partition myself, so I'm sure Wiz will know whether this is a big problem or just a small one.

I do still tend to think that a simple install would be better for you for your first time... rather than trying to prepare for future multibooting, but that's just my opinion. It only took about 15 minutes to install Mint on the SSD laptop by using the entire disk and accepting all the default choices on the installer, except Time Zone. It's fast, it's easy, and it's designed to work for those who don't have all that partitioning knowledge. You could then use Gparted later to shrink your Linux install partition to make room for more installs when you're ready for that. But, anyway, the choice is yours which way to go.

So, time to find/fix that kernel panic problem and get moving! Full steam ahead!

Cheers

 

[PcBuilderEd]

L

Hi mate

That error, I have seen following an install being completed (on reboot, intended to start the new installed Linux Distro) but not on a USB stick before.

You said above



Did you use LiLi (Linux Live) again in those circumstances?

Do you still have the downloaded LM iso? It should read like this

linuxmint- 18.2-cinnamon-64bit.iso

and have a SHA256sum of

d50e69a3e6d6b9d4b9cbe56cd3736cef665b708a4a2e5d9024f8eef439a91bba

Do you have the ability to check the hash algorithm above? I can give you Windows references if needed.

Cheers

Wiz

I don't know if I have the file on either the USB or ssd but I could check the USB on another computer. I also have the ISO on another computer which I could create another bootable USB from if needed.

 

[PcBuilderEd]

Hi mate

That error, I have seen following an install being completed (on reboot, intended to start the new installed Linux Distro) but not on a USB stick before.

You said above



Did you use LiLi (Linux Live) again in those circumstances?


and have a SHA256sum of

d50e69a3e6d6b9d4b9cbe56cd3736cef665b708a4a2e5d9024f8eef439a91bba

Do you have the ability to check the hash algorithm above? I can give you Windows references if needed.

Cheers

Wiz

Sorry wiz I missed this. Yes I've been using Linux live for all the USB operations up to this point. As far as the sha I'm not sure what that is or how to check the algorithm. I do have the ISO and windows on the hdd however I would prefer to not use those as I would need to replace the current ssd with the hdd (replace again) and anytime you perform a mechanical operation there is always the chance to break something. But I can if need to.

 

[wizardfromoz]

Hi Mate

If you have access to a Windows computer where you can also have access to the .iso file itself, here are some Windows alternatives:

Microsoft – FCIV File Checksum Integrity Verifier Tool, download from here

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=11533
and

Raymond’s MD5 & SHA Checksum Utility here (both are free)

http://raylin.wordpress.com/downloads/md5-sha-1-checksum-utility/
What you want is the sha256 algorithm, which for LM 18.2 Cinnamon is

d50e69a3e6d6b9d4b9cbe56cd3736cef665b708a4a2e5d9024f8eef439a91bba

At the Linux Mint website, where I am hoping you downloaded your .iso from,

https://linuxmint.com/download.php

... you would have clicked 64-bit on the line saying Cinnamon. This would have led you to here

https://linuxmint.com/edition.php?id=237

... where it says Don't forget to verify your .iso, and provides the algorithms.

Windows uses these as well, but most Windows users do not know about them, or safeguarding their downloads.

If you do not have the above opportunities, then we can look at alternatives that are Linux-based, with the SSD, if you have two (2) usb ports available and can copy the .iso itself onto a stick.

Sing out if I am confusing you - it is best if we can eliminate a compromised .iso as being a factor in your problems, but if it is (compromised), then we want to be able to download another .iso and verify it on the way. This can be done if you have access to Firefox.

Wiz
Edited last paragraph, which was a lot of drivel, sorry ... tired.

 

[PcBuilderEd]

Ok so I remade the ISO USB live and installed from there and there is an error message "welcome to Linux mint 18.2" and I see all these colors and menus everywhere.

 

[PcBuilderEd]

Oh wait thats what's supposed to happen! Seriously I think we got it this time. Want to say THANKS ALL! You guys have been so patient I'm so grateful. I want to thank you wizard and atanare I'm much further in my knowledge than I've been with windows and linux both. now is there a way to verify this download from Firefox now that its on the ssd?

 

[wizardfromoz]

Woo-hoo

If I read the above correctly, does that mean you are in?

Did you get a welcome as follows?

If so, likely no need to check, but then first thing you want to do is go to Terminal (Ctrl-Alt-t) and type in and enter

sudo ufw enable

It will ask for your password. Enter it (there will be no movement at the insertion point, for security reasons) and press Enter.

You will be rewarded with a message saying that the Uncomplicated Fire Wall has been activated, and it has generated a small script that will enable it at every reboot or startup.

After that, have a play.

Cheers

Wiz

 

[atanere]

Congratulations! Sounds like you've poured your first bowl of Linux soup... now add some crackers!

With your brand-spanking new Mint 18.2 Cinnamon, you might consider this guy's recommendations on ways to enhance your new system. I haven't thoroughly reviewed his list, and remember that they are just another set of suggestions... but there may be some helpful info in there for you.

Now the real fun begins!

 

[PcBuilderEd]

Ok guys I spoke too early. When I boot I get an error message. If I then power off and restart I can boot through the grub.

 

[PcBuilderEd]

Any thoughts !?!

 

[wizardfromoz]

Hi Mate

If I then power off and restart I can boot through the grub.

Do I take it that does not mean that if you try it twice, the second try is not successful?

And what happens when you press "any key to continue"?

Wiz

 

[PcBuilderEd]

Hi Mate



Do I take it that does not mean that if you try it twice, the second try is not successful?

And what happens when you press "any key to continue"?

Wiz

I can't remember about the second try but I'll give that an attempt in the morning. Iirc once I press "any key" it freezes (hence the power off and restart). If it is useful I can go through the process tomorrow (I've had a chat with tequila this evening) and be a bit more precise. Thanks wiz nice hearing from you.

 

[wizardfromoz]

Sleep well and tomorrow is another day.

When you are fresh, if you get no further, take the box apart and make sure there is no dust on contacts from the SSD to the motherboard.

If you DO get further, eg to a prompt that looks like

grub rescue>

we'll go from there.

Wiz

 

[PcBuilderEd]

Sleep well and tomorrow is another day.

When you are fresh, if you get no further, take the box apart and make sure there is no dust on contacts from the SSD to the motherboard.

If you DO get further, eg to a prompt that looks like

grub rescue>

we'll go from there.

Wiz

Excellent will do thanks mate 07

 

[atanere]

Ok guys I spoke too early. When I boot I get an error message. If I then power off and restart I can boot through the grub.

Man, I'm glad you have the patience to keep going! You may can get out of this, or it may be the simple fix is to just reinstall Mint again and start over. But I guess I'd also like to ask at this point what your final install steps were? That is, did you go with "use entire disk" or "something else?" If you picked "something else," how did you structure the partitions?