what to do when X install fails?

[Brian Craft]

On Mon, Feb 28, 2005 at 08:00:48AM -0800, Matt Zimmerman wrote:
> On Sun, Feb 27, 2005 at 11:33:23PM -0800, Brian Craft wrote:
> 
> > On Sun, Feb 27, 2005 at 08:12:05PM -0800, Matt Zimmerman wrote:
> > > That's the only way that this can
> > > happen without severe errors (and corresponding messages).
> > 
> > This is apparently false. I didn't get any error messages during the
> > install. Are they reported on another VT, or in a file somewhere?
> 
> Errors are reported differently during the different stages of the process,
> but in this case, the error I would expect would be displayed as a dialog,
> which you would need to acknowledge in order to continue, and you would have
> been dropped into aptitude at the end of the process.
> 
> > After some time with the installer I discovered I could pass in
> > "debian-installer/framebuffer=false" at boot. That avoids the problem
> > with the server, and the X packages are installed. However it also
> > grossly modifies the install process, for reasons I don't pretend to
> > understand. Instead of automatically stepping through the install
> > process, it presents a menu with each step, and every item must be
> > manually selected in turn. I have no idea what this has to do with
> > "framebuffer=false". It's rather bizarre.
> 
> What do you mean by "the problem with the server"?  Did you discover what
> the specific problem was which (apparently) caused the installation to fail?

After the 1st install (no X packages) I used apt-get to retrieve XFree86
and a few other packages. I found that configuring the package left the
X server unusable because of a frame buffer problem. After editing the
config file to disable the frame buffer, it started working. That's why
I tried passing in framebuffer=false the 2nd time I ran the installer.
It did work. XFree86 was installed, and the config file was usable.

However the installer, as I mentioned, required me to step through the
whole process from a menu. It didn't report any error, and the only
difference in the input that I could recall was that I passed in
"debian-installer/framebuffer=false".

> We need much more information in order to diagnose the problem, because this
> process has been tested on a variety of hardware and generally does not
> exhibit this behaviour.
> 
> If the installer asked questions in the way that you describe, that means
> that an error occurred early in the process (or an expert install was
> requested).  I don't see how this could cause a problem with installing the
> desktop packages, though, so perhaps you're encountering more than one
> problem.
> 
> Are you using a CD-R?  Is it possible for you to test using an official,
> pressed CD?  Odd problems like this can sometimes be caused by bad media.

Yes, it is a CD-R. I don't have a pressed CD. I could try a CD-R burned
on a different drive. Doesn't the installer check the MD5 of everything
before it runs? I also ran md5sum on the disc after burning it. IIRC
there was a file in the top directory with hashes for all of the
packages on the disc.

b.c.