Linux® For Dummies®, 8th Edition

Tip #1: “The Linux Installer Froze”

When you’re installing Linux, the installation may just freeze. If it does, wait a bit and make sure that the installation program really froze. (Sometimes, the software just takes a while to process information.) If the software looks like it has frozen, there’s no harm in rebooting your computer and starting over — just as you would do with any operating system installation. Sometimes, you can reboot and never have that problem again. At other times, the problem may happen twice in a row and then be fine the third time. Be sure to try several times before giving up.

If the installation still freezes in the same spot or close to the same spot, go to the distribution’s support pages (see Chapter 2). These pages may talk about some known problems and solutions that can help you and should show you how to join discussion lists in order to get more assistance. Otherwise, diagnosing the problem can be tricky and may seem more like voodoo than science. Here are some tips:

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If this problem happens repeatedly at exactly the same spot, you may have a bad installation disk. See the next section, “Checking Your Distribution Burns,” and then return here if that technique doesn’t solve your problem. Otherwise, try the disk in another machine if possible and see whether the installation fails in the same place there. If you purchased this disk from someone, contact their technical support team. If you got the disk with a book, contact the publisher’s technical ...