Installing Ubuntu 8 from usb key

Last Modified: Mon, 28 Jul 2008 16:26:00 +0000 ; Created: Mon, 28 Jul 2008 16:26:00 +0000

I needed to install Ubuntu on a laptop without a CDROM drive. I followed the guide on https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/FromUSBStick for directions to install via a USB drive.

I copied all the files to the usb key and made it bootable as per instructions on the web, but the installer doesn't seem to work. I can boot from the USB key and get a live session working, but installing to hard disk just doesn't seem to work.

I keep getting the following error: [Errno 5] Input/output error

My guess is that it cannot find some file on the usb key or something. If I figure it out I'll post an update here.

My setup:

  • Ubuntu 8.04
  • Dell D430 laptop
  • 1GB generic USB key drive

Update

I looked into the system's log and noticed a bunch of these errors: [ 254.136906] SQUASHFS error: sb_bread failed reading block 0x73aef
[ 254.136910] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read page, block 1ceb2f80, size 8e6c
[ 254.136958] SQUASHFS error: zlib_inflate returned unexpected result 0xfffffffd, srclength 131072, avail_in 126, avail_out 131072

Most people report that is due to a faulty iso or cd, but I am using a usb key drive and have downloaded the iso multiple times with no change. Others have suggested possible faulty memory on the machine, so I'm going to test that next.

Resolved!

Turns out I have a usb key drive that is damaged. Even though I ran chkdsk and also used HDTune disk scan it still didn't work. I ran Linux's badblocks to find the defective sectors.

Either way I used a different usb key drive, and it worked just fine.