GRUB installation failed

mehmeh12

Ok

I formatted my pc and ran a cd containing ubuntu 9.10 and at 94% installation i get a popup saying:'the grub package failed to install into /target/. Without the GRUB boot loader, the installed system will not boot'. What does this mean? can i not install ubuntu 9.10-would i be better off with another linux distribution?

bman

Google is your friend here. From a quick google of "the grub package failed to install into /target" it seems other people have ran into this before.

One option that may work is to not configure your internet connection on install.

Also, if it asks you if you want grub to overwrite / replace your existing MBR software, say Yes.

Don't give up yet. This is only a small hitch that should be easily by-passable. Let us know how you get on.

Kernel

I dunno lads. I said I'd give ubuntu 9.10 a go, dual booting with windows 7, since it's been years since I tried a distro. The live version won't configure my wireless, and the full install suffered these grub problems (albeit probably caused by the windows boot loader).

Linux still feels like you have to struggle with it to get it to work the way you want. And I so wanted ubuntu to be the answer.

Johnboy1951

Kernel wrote: »

I dunno lads. I said I'd give ubuntu 9.10 a go, dual booting with windows 7, since it's been years since I tried a distro. The live version won't configure my wireless, and the full install suffered these grub problems (albeit probably caused by the windows boot loader).

Linux still feels like you have to struggle with it to get it to work the way you want. And I so wanted ubuntu to be the answer.

Although the hype around Ubuntu lately would not indicate it, Ubuntu is NOT all there is to Linux.
If it does not suit you or your hardware then try something else. There are many fine distros out there, and you may have a much better experience with one of those.

Remember it is not Linux that you have struggled with. It is the Ubuntu variant that has given you the problems.

These days I would suggest for testing on your hardware

Mandriva or PCLinuxOS in whatever desktop flavour suits
Mint which is based on Ubuntu
or
Mepis

There is such a lot more to Linux but that seems to get lost in the hype these days ...

bman

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Although the hype around Ubuntu lately would not indicate it, Ubuntu is NOT all there is to Linux.
If it does not suit you or your hardware then try something else. There are many fine distros out there, and you may have a much better experience with one of those.

Remember it is not Linux that you have struggled with. It is the Ubuntu variant that has given you the problems.

These days I would suggest for testing on your hardware

Mandriva or PCLinuxOS in whatever desktop flavour suits
Mint which is based on Ubuntu
or
Mepis

There is such a lot more to Linux but that seems to get lost in the hype these days ...

+1

PCLinuxOS is a great, easy to setup, distro. If I wasn't running Ubuntu / Mint I'd be running it.

Kernel

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Although the hype around Ubuntu lately would not indicate it, Ubuntu is NOT all there is to Linux.
If it does not suit you or your hardware then try something else. There are many fine distros out there, and you may have a much better experience with one of those.

Remember it is not Linux that you have struggled with. It is the Ubuntu variant that has given you the problems.

These days I would suggest for testing on your hardware

Mandriva or PCLinuxOS in whatever desktop flavour suits
Mint which is based on Ubuntu
or
Mepis

There is such a lot more to Linux but that seems to get lost in the hype these days ...

Yeah I know. I was frustrated by the ubuntu problem, but I persisted and it seems to be working fine now. I had to manually partition my hard drive through the boot disc. I may check out mint, is it more refined than ubuntu in terms of resource use and boot time?

mehmeh12

Kernel wrote: »

Yeah I know. I was frustrated by the ubuntu problem, but I persisted and it seems to be working fine now. I had to manually partition my hard drive through the boot disc. I may check out mint, is it more refined than ubuntu in terms of resource use and boot time?

I cant say much for ubuntu 9.10 as i could not get it to install but then i tried linux mint long term support Elyssa. It actually installed and seems ok..although i cant seem to find the firewall ip tables thing anywhere...

ravydavygravy

In Ubuntu/Mint, I guess you should try the following to see what your iptables firewall is configured to do:

sudo iptables -t filter --list
sudo iptables -t nat --list
sudo iptables -t mangle --list

Or, if the shell ain't your thing, use some GUI frontend to iptables (gufw, or Firestarter, or whatever)

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/IptablesHowTo