[SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

EMR · 2016-05-15 03:11:01

When booting from the install ISO burned to a USB disk, it loads the menu. But all four of the install and live session options end the same way - they all go to a text-mode screen with a flashing underscore cursor, don't respond to input, and light up the USB stick's indicator light. Well, I suppose I can't say for certain that they never load. I've waited about an hour so far, and there's been no change, though it's reported in this thread and possibly this Stack Exchange question (though that was with LinuxMint) that it can sometimes take "hours" so I'm going to wait overnight and see if it loads itself up (maybe it's loading from the USB extremely slowly?)

If that's not enough information to at least find a direction to dig in (and I'm sure it's not) this is running on an Acer Aspire One Cloudbook 11, and I've already switched to legacy boot mode (because I don't know of a compelling reason to use UEFI and it seemed like it would be less of a hassle-maybe not.)

Last edited by EMR (2016-05-16 00:59:15)

hhh · 2016-05-15 03:30:50

This sounds like a corrupt USB transfer, it can happen if you use UNetbootin or if you've done a direct download and didn't checksum the ISO.

To transfer the ISO to USB in Linux, in a terminal cd to the directory with your ISO and use the cp command...

sudo cp bl-Hydrogen-amd64.iso /dev/sdb;sync

Change the ISO name and USB drive letter (without a number after it) as necessary.

On Windows, use one of these programs instead of UNetbootin...
https://www.debian.org/CD/faq/#record-windows

On Mac...
https://www.debian.org/CD/faq/#record-mac

Horizon_Brave · 2016-05-15 03:34:23

I can't tell from your post, did you get through the install setup and then once you go to boot, it blanks out? or do you not even reach the bunsen install process?

hhh · 2016-05-15 03:37:15

^

EMR wrote:

When booting from the install ISO burned to a USB disk, it loads the menu. But all four of the install and live session options...

He means the Live grub menu, pre-installation.

ghorvath · 2016-05-15 08:29:32

On one of my old machines (Acer Travelmate 210) the Bunsenlabs live session ends the same way. I cannot get the gui, I can ping the machine, but cannot ssh into it (because for some reason the live system does not have ssh, why exactly is that?) So in fact, the live system boots properly, a lot of modules, etc is loaded, but when it should switch to the graphical interface, it stops doing what it should.
If somebody tells me ow I can prevent the live session to try to load the graphics, I can probably confirm that the cli works as intended.

I think the problem lies somewhere with the graphical part of jessie or the laptop, or maybe the 3.16 kernel does not like this particular machine, I am not sure. Never tried the install part (no point, wheezyfied Crunchbang works perfectly on this machine, so I just stick with it until LTS expires).

Anyway, if somebody manages to diagnose this problem, I will be interested in its solution, as well.

Head_on_a_Stick · 2016-05-15 10:49:30

ghorvath wrote:

If somebody tells me ow I can prevent the live session to try to load the graphics, I can probably confirm that the cli works as intended.

To switch to a console screen (TTY), use <Ctrl>+<Alt>+F2

To avoid the black screen, highlight the BunsenLabs GRUB menu entry and press "e" then add this to the end of the line that starts with "linux":

nomodeset

Then press <Ctrl>+x (at the same time) to boot the modified entry.

If you have an NVIDIA card, you may have to use:

nomodeset nouveua.modeset=0

If you have an Optimus machine, try:

nomodeset i915.modeset=0 nouveua.modeset=0

To make these changes permanent, add the parameter to /etc/default/grub and run `sudo update-grub`

ghorvath · 2016-05-15 11:12:12

Head_on_a_Stick wrote:

To switch to a console screen (TTY), use <Ctrl>+<Alt>+F2

I already tried this, CTRL+ALT+F? do not work.

Head_on_a_Stick wrote:

To avoid the black screen, highlight the BunsenLabs GRUB menu entry and press "e" then add this to the end of the line that starts with "linux":
nomodeset
Then press <Ctrl>+x (at the same time) to boot the modified entry.
If you have an NVIDIA card, you may have to use:
nomodeset nouveua.modeset=0
If you have an Optimus machine, try:
nomodeset i915.modeset=0 nouveua.modeset=0
To make these changes permanent, add the parameter to /etc/default/grub and run `sudo update-grub`

These, I would have to try.

hhh · 2016-05-15 11:39:08

ghorvath wrote:

I already tried this, CTRL+ALT+F? do not work.

On my system, both Ctrl+Alt+F1 and Ctrl+Alt+F2 take me to a console and Ctrl+Alt+F7 brings me back to a GUI.

ghorvath · 2016-05-15 12:09:59

hhh wrote:

ghorvath wrote:
I already tried this, CTRL+ALT+F? do not work.
On my system, both Ctrl+Alt+F1 and Ctrl+Alt+F2 take me to a console and Ctrl+Alt+F7 brings me back to a GUI.

On all my other machines, your suggestion works perfectly. With this one very old laptop, this is not the case. Up until the GUI does not start to load, I can switch without any problems. Then when it wants to load the GUI, that is when I no longer can switch between the consoles.

EMR · 2016-05-15 14:18:59

Thanks for the help-knowing that I could edit the boot options took me down a path that ultimately got the live session to boot. I ended up needing the following parameters:

edd=off noapic nolapic acpi=off

However, the stackexchange question that got me the acpi/apic stuff also indicated that setting up a working system with those params would be a hassle (adding the params to grub would not be that bad, would it? Or am I missing something else?)

Also, will it be able to use the SSD with edd off?

Head_on_a_Stick · 2016-05-15 15:24:52

EMR wrote:

adding the params to grub would not be that bad, would it?

Well, you would lose all ACPI functions so there may be problems with battery display, lid & power button behaviour, XF86 hotkeys, ad nauseum but that may be the only way to boot it with kernel 3.16

EMR wrote:

Also, will it be able to use the SSD with edd off?

EDD is the BIOS Enhanced Disk Drive Services [1] and may cause the drive to fail to boot [2] but you might as well try it.

[1] https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/ … rs.txt#L61

[2] https://lwn.net/Articles/12544/

EMR · 2016-05-15 15:55:41

I can always go to a backported newer kernel later, right? (or just compile one myself.) I'm more concerned with making this thing work than making it perfect on the first install.

The battery display, however, is broken in the live session, I imagine it won't magically work when it installs. That'd be slightly annoying, but I save my work and such. Right now I'm just trying to figure out how to edit the command that boots the system to add the arguments I mentioned before.

Head_on_a_Stick · 2016-05-15 16:03:34

EMR wrote:

I'm just trying to figure out how to edit the command that boots the system to add the arguments I mentioned before.

Edit the file at /etc/default/grub (as root!) and add the parameters to the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX line, like this:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="edd=off noapic nolapic acpi=off"

If there are any pre-existing parameters already there, add the new ones within the same quotation marks with each parameter separated by a single space.

Then save the file and update the GRUB configuration with this command:

sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

EMR · 2016-05-15 20:46:22

Interestingly enough, though I needed to modify the boot arguments to load the graphical installer, I didn't actually need to modify anything to get it to boot once installed on the machine. Still need to get WebGL working, but the system seems otherwise fine (I'll make another thread for that at some point.)

In any case, marking this as solved, thanks for all of the help!

Horizon_Brave · 2016-05-15 20:54:59

EMR wrote:

Interestingly enough, though I needed to modify the boot arguments to load the graphical installer, I didn't actually need to modify anything to get it to boot once installed on the machine. Still need to get WebGL working, but the system seems otherwise fine (I'll make another thread for that at some point.)
In any case, marking this as solved, thanks for all of the help!

Would you happen to know which one of the boot arguments was the one that "did it" ?

EMR · 2016-05-16 00:58:33

In the boot selection screen, hit tab to modify the boot command. Remove 'quiet' so you can actually see the output. I repeatedly ran it and googled the errors. I'm not sure I have a minimal set, but what I needed was:

edd=off noapic nolapic acpi=off

As I said before, none of that was needed to boot the system afterwards.

#1 2016-05-15 03:11:01

[SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#2 2016-05-15 03:30:50

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#3 2016-05-15 03:34:23

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#4 2016-05-15 03:37:15

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#5 2016-05-15 08:29:32

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#6 2016-05-15 10:49:30

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#7 2016-05-15 11:12:12

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#8 2016-05-15 11:39:08

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#9 2016-05-15 12:09:59

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#10 2016-05-15 14:18:59

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#11 2016-05-15 15:24:52

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#12 2016-05-15 15:55:41

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#13 2016-05-15 16:03:34

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#14 2016-05-15 20:46:22

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#15 2016-05-15 20:54:59

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

#16 2016-05-16 00:58:33

Re: [SOLVED]: USB live boot/installer hangs (Acer Aspire One Cloudbook)

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