Linux mint installer issues

[proper pawn]

Cos there's two different issues in one, I can't properly follow the format in the guidelines :/

Issue 1: Installer progression goes as follows:

Set OS language
Set keyboard language
Connect to wifi?
You need at least 15.5gb of disk space to install, your computer has 0.0 B of space free

Issue 2: Seemingly unable to select install destination

I did ask a friend in another discord server for some help with this, and apparently Issue 2 is cos it's somehow not detecting the intended installation drive. (Garuda found it without issues so why it won't find it now beats me lol)

Attached is a run through of the Installer from launch to problem page.

Note: in the "Disks" program it shows the drive in question, and even let's me mount and unmount it, but the Installer seems unable to find it from the bootable USB.

[lunar orchid]

yeah that "expansion drive" seems weird to be honest

also, did you verify this ISO?

open up the DISKS application in the live desktop, then show it

@proper pawn

[proper pawn]

Lol the expansion drive is my external hard drive xD (I got it cos this rig had, no joke, 256gb of space for the c drive)

[proper pawn]

Not sure how to verify an iso file, but i did download it from the mint site itself

[lunar orchid]

nothing wrong one single bit with 256 GB

[proper pawn]

Except when you need more than like 72 gig total space 🤣 For example, when trying to install destiny 2

[lunar orchid]

it's super easy to verify if u prepped the usb stick with ventoy flasher

[proper pawn]

Never heard of ventoy lol

[lunar orchid]

so u can install the main OS to the 256 GB, and set your external drive to ext4 filesystem, and set to automount, and put your Steam library on it

[proper pawn]

I ended up using balena etcher after pulling the iso out of the .torrent from the site

[proper pawn]

I'm actually intending to use the 3tb drive that's also there for installing Linux on xD

[lunar orchid]

ok can u boot the usb up again, please use uefi mode if pc is made in last 9 years

[lunar orchid]

ideally you should pick the fastest drive technology for the OS

[proper pawn]

True, but when your budget is near-non-existent, it's hard to afford proper stuff lol

[lunar orchid]

what I meant is if the 256 GB is an SSD, choose that over an HDD for the OS

[lunar orchid]

.

Ready, @proper pawn ?

[proper pawn]

My bios don't look like that 🤣 The hardware (handed down computer lol) is so old the newest bios update was 2015

These are my options lol

[lunar orchid]

uefi: USB

Then give about minute n half to load

[proper pawn]

So not generic device? (That's the one with the iso loaded as a bootable disk)

[lunar orchid]

once on desktop, open start menu n type disks

[proper pawn]

Was following the installation guide yesterday and it said to make bootable media, then load into it lol

[lunar orchid]

like this

[proper pawn]

Btw, this is the drive (just mounted it too) that i plan to install on

And using the installer still claims i only have 0.0 B of space

[lunar orchid]

ur crazy if u install to a slow-ass hdd over SSD

But what u can do is have separate home folder located on the 3 TB

which will give u very fast booting and program launching, with the benefit of tons of storage

[proper pawn]

Hard to install to an SSD if i don't have one installed, or the money to buy one lol

[lunar orchid]

look at this picture, then look at list in disks app

[proper pawn]

And I just tried dragging the "install Linux mint" shortcut into the 3tb drive and launching it, and still got the "you have 0.0 B of space" page

[lunar orchid]

no no no, dont skip ahead k

[proper pawn]

This is my list... If anything, only the 256gb might be an ssd

[lunar orchid]

if u wanna do it right

[lunar orchid]

open eyes

[proper pawn]

Showing me something for a drive I do not have doesn't help

[lunar orchid]

ok first make absolutely sure u booted in uefi mode. open terminal

[lunar orchid]

you're SO blind.

look at the DISKS APP

the first device in list

do efibootmgr

[proper pawn]

Which is the C drive... Where my windows is currently installed lol

[lunar orchid]

do efibootmgr in terminal

[proper pawn]

Which btw, a good chunk of my stuff has had to be installed there so it even functions (mainly certain steam games i play often, cos on the d drive steam thinks the files are corrupted)

[lunar orchid]

u could still dual boot on it if has at least about 80 GB free there

[proper pawn]

Nope, I've compressed and moved everything I can, and only got up to 72 gb of space

[lunar orchid]

if it's too full, fine nvm

[proper pawn]

Mind you, that's with even straight up having to reinstall entire games... And apparently the space is all consumed by the windows folders alone

[lunar orchid]

results plz?

[proper pawn]

If the resolution is too low, lemme know and I'll resize the window

[lunar orchid]

no it's great. so these listings mean you are in uefi mode, which is good

ok next, go to disks app again

choose the 3 TB drive

[proper pawn]

Originally tried to install garuda but hit issues with installing lutris ("You don't have Python3-pygame" i think it was, or -pygmy, but i had both parts individually)

[lunar orchid]

what windows vesion r u using?

[proper pawn]

Windows 10

[lunar orchid]

can u reboot to it please to check its booting mode?

so u may install Linux in same way

[proper pawn]

How do I see the booting mode?

[lunar orchid]

win-r, then msinfo32

while in windows

[proper pawn]

Worked that out when you mentioned "win+r" lol

Would it be msinfo64 for a 64 bit os?

Nvm it worked with 32 lol

[lunar orchid]

what it say on BIOS mode line

[proper pawn]

Bios mode shows uefi... secure boot is off, whatever that is...

[lunar orchid]

ok next thing is kill fast startup. open cmd as admin

or powershell as admin

needed for safe troublefree dualboot

[proper pawn]

I think it might be off anyway cos I had garuda running xD (Even had it set to priority booting over windows lol)

[lunar orchid]

open cmd anyway

as admin

[proper pawn]

By cmd you mean command prompt right?

[lunar orchid]

powercfg /h off

yes

[proper pawn]

Rip doesn't look like it did anything xD

[lunar orchid]

it wont show stuff

u just hit enter and it turns it off

[proper pawn]

Ok, next?

[lunar orchid]

ok reboot usb the EXACT same WAY u did this past time

uefi usb

[proper pawn]

Alright I'm back in. Now what?

[lunar orchid]

open gparted from start menu

choose the 2 TB target hdd from the top right

[proper pawn]

Lol as soon as the window open it came out with an error xD

[lunar orchid]

i think it calls it sdc

...

[proper pawn]

Anything to worry about?

[lunar orchid]

hopefuly not serious thing

[lunar orchid]

.

or 3 tb

[proper pawn]

Apparently it's bad enough that clicking the x or cancel closes gparted

[lunar orchid]

whatever

ok open disks app

[proper pawn]

Ok done that

[lunar orchid]

pick 3 tb again

[proper pawn]

Ok

[lunar orchid]

show it

it should be showing the partitioning style

[lunar orchid]

go to dots menu top riht

[proper pawn]

Formatted it for Linux last night during my first attempts to install lol

[lunar orchid]

choose format drive

choose GPT

[proper pawn]

The "format disk..." option? (It doesn't say drive lol)

[lunar orchid]

Yes that

[proper pawn]

Heh... defaults to gpt

[lunar orchid]

ok

do it.

then show the results.

it should be saying the partitioning stylee on 4 th line near top after

[proper pawn]

Lol went with the "replace existing data with zeroes" option (just for the sake of ensuring less possible issues) and it immediately said it will take 10 and a half hours 0.0

[lunar orchid]

nooooooooooo

FUCK NOOO

[proper pawn]

So I should do the quick format?

[lunar orchid]

SIGH please yes

[proper pawn]

Ok, it's got GUID partition table now

[lunar orchid]

it says on 4th line?

[proper pawn]

5th line. 4th line is size

[lunar orchid]

k good

what's the dev name? sdc?

[proper pawn]

Yep, /dev/sdc

[lunar orchid]

k close disks

nothing else should have been touched or mounted

choose the "something else" option in installer

[proper pawn]

That hasn't shown up for me

[lunar orchid]

why the hell not??

run it now n see

if it dont show on page 1, it may shown on page 4 or 5

[proper pawn]

The entire progression has been "welcome [choose language]", "choose your keyboard layout", then "wireless [connect to wifi or choose i don't want to connect right now", followed by "you need 15.5gb of disk space, your computer has 0.0 B"

But yet it's meant to be able to be installed via usb

[lunar orchid]

run it again now plz

[proper pawn]

Yep, same as before

[lunar orchid]

now that you've booted as UEFI

i think that ISO screwed. that's two errors now. first gparted, now this

[proper pawn]

The video i added to the original message here shows the entire thing

[lunar orchid]

reburn ur USB with ventoy flasher, and copy the ISO onto it

from Windows.

exact and simple guide: #1295816480256163892 message

then verify against the shasum on website, do it right from ventoy itself. in its boot menus

compare the resulting sum to the website one I showed u where it was in an early pic

[lunar orchid]

.

also ur BIOS may be doing some weird funny-ass RAID shit. make sure u check BIOS settings, and turn off RAID n set storage mode options to "AHCI"

btw, if the checksum thing doesn't match, u downloaded a bad ISO

[proper pawn]

Where would I find raid settings?

[lunar orchid]

avanced or config

[proper pawn]

What am I looking for specifically? Just tried googling it and found one person who got to the setting on reddit, but I don't have the option they did (advanced/intel rapid storage technology").

These are all the options btw (above the advanced menu)

If it helps, the motherboard is running msi click bios 4 (as i mentioned earlier, it's a handed down pc lol)

[lunar orchid]

i mean just look GOOD wiht ur eyes

in all the settings. if there's absolutely no mention of RAID, Storage, or ACHI at all, then leave it

i g2g bbl

[proper pawn]

In integrated peripherals there's sata mode which is set to achi mode

*ahci

[proper pawn]

Just got to checking (had to run an errand lol), and the sha256sum matches

[lunar orchid]

u checked on ventoy?

[proper pawn]

Though based on the manual thing it may have been my using balena etcher that caused the problems

[proper pawn]

Yep, just finished and booting now

[lunar orchid]

thereebby checking the written ISO

u should 100% get the 'something else' option

[proper pawn]

Nope o.o

[lunar orchid]

wtaf?

[proper pawn]

Wtf... This usb has 32 gig of capacity too

[lunar orchid]

WTAF

nvm the usb, can u show disks app again?

[lunar orchid]

which of those is the ventoy one?

[proper pawn]

The 31gb drive

[lunar orchid]

sandisk?

[proper pawn]

Yep

[lunar orchid]

unplug the generic one then

[proper pawn]

There's no other usbs plugged in lol

[lunar orchid]

what is that 2nd last one in list?

"generic"

[proper pawn]

No clue. When I click it the contents shows as "no media"

[lunar orchid]

that could be the whole issue right there

[proper pawn]

Gonna try a flailing hail Mary though and actually move the iso into the 3tb from windows and see if that works

[lunar orchid]

waht's its dev name?

[proper pawn]

Doesn't seem to have one

[lunar orchid]

u cant install shit that way

[proper pawn]

The bottom 2-3 lines are just "------"

[lunar orchid]

that's absurd to think u can just move the iso

show full pic of the usb generic thing

[proper pawn]

Will need to wait til it finishes copying. Shouldn't be long though

[lunar orchid]

wtf?

u hadnt even made a filesystem before u left

remember, i had u just create a GPT partition table

on the 3 TB

the very fact there's a ghost usb generic thing attached is the culprit right there

check all ports

unplug anything but ventoy stick, mouse, keyboard, and monitor

[proper pawn]

O.o it really is a ghost drive... Even with everything else unplugged (including shit that can in no way be a "generic storage device", it's still there

Huh... It actually does have a dev thing: sdf

Apparently it's got an identify as thing of "/dev/disk/by-id/usb-Generic_STORAGE_DEVICE-0:0"

[lunar orchid]

welp

let's just say it's not causing the issue

open gparted

in mint live environment

pick the 3 tb

is it still fully unallocated?

[proper pawn]

Not quite; i experimentally edited the partition, leaving 20 gig free and formatting the rest to ext4 (Linux only)

And gparted still comes up with the error

[lunar orchid]

can u open ur computer, unplug all drives. just leave the 3 tb connected

then re-power, and boot ventoy

[proper pawn]

Dunno which physical drive is which lol

[lunar orchid]

look at the brand and serial number in DISKS

[proper pawn]

But apparently, according to a Google search of the gparted error, it's an issue with the drive

[lunar orchid]

just leave "it" connected, and no other

[proper pawn]

Ran sudo gdisk -l /dev/sdb (3tb dev), and it shows this:

Apparently gpt is "damaged"?

[lunar orchid]

china special

can u do something worthwhile... shut down,

wait get the model n serial #

of that drive from DISKS app

[proper pawn]

Ok

Just need the 3tb one right?

[lunar orchid]

then shut down, unplug ALL drives, EXCEPT that one, and the windows 256 ssd

then after, boot Windows up

i'll send u a vid to follow to clean the absolute shit out of that 3 tb

using Windows command prompt

https://youtu.be/F6dKHuFiQcQ?t=472 (7:51)

follow that section accurately , as he says. make sure sel correct drive, so u dont blow out ur win drive

[proper pawn]

👍

Rip can't work out how to get the drive out without breaking it or it's rack (or both) xD Gonna have to bring in some outside (in person) help lol

[lunar orchid]

if it's SATA connection, just pull the data cord at either end

may have a spring tab to push in

or pull the wide power connector

for each drive

except the two mentioned to stay in play

by the way, 2 TB has nothing to do with 3 TB, but this may also have thrown a wrench in

sdb is probably the 2nd one from top. but irrelevant since you're gonna disconnect all except the 256 GB, and the 3 TB.

[proper pawn]

I don't think it's a sata connection; It looks like it might have a spring latch though, maybe? Waiting for said help still, but will probably try and pull the drive tomorrow afternoon when I get home from a planned adventure 😛 (planned since before my decision to get mint)

this rig is legit a frankenputer though... Like there's all kinds of wierdness with how it's set up and what it does and doesn't have, all in terms of hardware

[proper pawn]

Hitting the "screw it" button; Gonna try following the video tomorrow afternoon, or failing that, thursday morning. If the extra hard drive proves to still cause issues I'll just take it to a local repair shop and dump some consulting fee cash on them to help me out with the pins or whatever it is that hold the drive in place.

(I so can't wait til I can start putting money aside to go towards building a completely fresh rig too...)

[lunar orchid]

you can pull the power cable off too if the data cable is too stuck

and you can try either end of the cable

[proper pawn]

not sure which cable goes to the right drive 😛 Bit it shouldn't be too much of an issue; Mainly just working on some other stuff tonight outside of back end stuff lol

[lunar orchid]

just trace the cable back with your hand

snip a few zip ties if needed

[proper pawn]

I ended up hitting the "screw it" button just before while waiting for something else, and apparently gpt is still corrupted o.O

Mind you, I did follow the steps in the video you sent, so it shouldn't be an issue now, I didn't think

[lunar orchid]

Ya cuz it's corrupted on sdb, I bet. you just cleaned sdc (the 3 TB)

[lunar orchid]

This really can't be that hard.

[lunar orchid]

sdb is the one with all the weirdness on it

[lunar orchid]

sdc is likely the name given to the 3 TB , third one down this list.

[proper pawn]

That would be disk 2, right? I'll try cleaning disk 1 today we well; fingers crossed it fixes things

[lunar orchid]

don't confuse the drives. look at the gdisk picture above, look at gnome-disks app in live environment again. 'clean' command via Windows offers NO warning and takes no prisoners.

[proper pawn]

Yeah, I know. I looked at the size of each disk to make sure I wasn't confusing any (and also took out my 2tb external before doing the clean cos i wasn't sure which one was the internal 2tb lol)

Also could part of the issue be that I did the whole process in the video (including the creation of the simple volume) the first time around?

[lunar orchid]

it's fine to make a new volume

[lunar orchid]

this is what you got when you ran it on sdb, which i can see on the command line. it is 1.8 TiB and full of weirdness.

[lunar orchid]

according to this pic, you only have two 1.8 TiB (2.0 TB) drives, so you want to be dead sure neither have unbacked-up data you care about, and dead sure to choose the correct model before doing the clean (full wipe)

you can do lsblk -f on command line to get more detaile drive info, including UUIDs

[proper pawn]

Yeah, I fixed that issue by simply unplugging my external hard drive which sits on the desk xD

Cos one was like 2733gb and the other was 2732gb lol

[lunar orchid]

@proper pawn you may also verify which disk is which using "Disk Management" in windows, and noting the ever critical drive number

again , just be sure u have data backed up before wiping that crazy funky 1.8 TiB one

[proper pawn]

yeah, I hadn't ever used it lol

[lunar orchid]

insane

Model ST2000 there in yellow 2nd line

[proper pawn]

😮 Cleaning both 2tb and 3tb (and tjen trying also unplugging my fully functional external) got me further in the install xD I just tried it, expecting the same as always

Every previous time it's gone "Your computer has 0.0b free"

The only difference this time is that I did NOT use windows 10 to make a new GPT simple volume

The installation is working now :3 Currently on copying files lol

[lunar orchid]

oh nice. which drive did you choose to install on?

[proper pawn]

The 3tb xD More space there for future games lol

Thanks a million for helping me btw 😄

Btw, for programs, which version of a download do i need?

Like I want to get firedragon but do I need appimage, or the tar.zst?

[lunar orchid]

im not sure what firedragon is, but whichever is MOST legitimate

[proper pawn]

Firedragon is a fork of floorp which is in turn a fork of Firefox. I went to the firedragon github, but there's 2 different packages; appimage and .tar.zst

On Windows it's just "Oh grab the exe" so it's easy there lol

[lunar orchid]

yw. I take it you got it installed, and it's up and running fine then

[proper pawn]

Yep, just setting up my first programs now and customising it xD

[lunar orchid]

appimage is easier. just mark it executable. and run it. u can drag a link to the desktop. (ctrl-shift-drag)

[proper pawn]

Side note, I wouldn't be surprised if Firefox becomes the new internet Explorer equivelant on Linux with their recent decision to break one of their promises xD (I think it was selling data from memory?)

[lunar orchid]

if you want to put a pure Linux filesystem on the internal 2TB drive (the ST 2000) you can do so from the DISKS app. just select the unallocated chunk, and press the + icon.

or make it NTFS in Windows disk management, if you expect to need more storage space for Windows stuff

[lunar orchid]

then shut down, unplug ALL drives, EXCEPT that one, and the windows 256 ssd
then after, boot Windows up
i'll send u a vid to follow to clean the absolute shit out of that 3 tb
using Windows command prompt
https://youtu.be/F6dKHuFiQcQ?t=472 (7:51)
follow that section accurately , as he says. make sure sel correct drive, so u dont blow out ur win drive.

This actually worked once you zapped both problematic hard drives with that fix! SOLVED

(I had never seen drives with such f'd up partition tables that it even made gparted choke)