[SOLVED] Repairing botched Debian installation

AntonyFromWatertown · 09-16-2020, 10:20 PM

I am attempting to install Debian 10 on a HP 15 laptop. I've had versions of Ubuntu running on the laptop in the past, so I know that it is capable of running Linux. I have been using the AMD64 netinstall image on a USB thumb drive. During installation, I was told I needed the following firmware: rtlwifi/rtl8188efw.bin and rtl_nic/rtl18106e-1.fw . I didn't have the firmware handy at the time. My first five attempts with various display managers were able to install, but would not fully boot. The Debian Display Manager would hang on the Gnome display manager. Others would display the message "rt18188ee: Firmware is not ready to run". I was finally able to get a bootable installation with LXQt. Currently, the laptop boots into a shell, without xwindows. The first time I ran 'startx' I was given the error message "/root/.Xauthority does not exist". Now I get multiple error messages cumulating in "Unable to connect to X server: connection refused". During boot, the following message is displayed:amdgpu requires firmware installed.

I updated my /etc/apt/sources.lst with contrib and nonfree, hoping that would correct my problem. However, I have absolutely no network connectivity, either via Ethernet or wifi. When I am using Ethernet, I am given an IP address by my router, and my router shows that my laptop is connected. However, for some reason, my laptop is unable to connect to the internet. All of the other devices connected to my router are able to connect without any problems. I suspect that the problem could be due to the rtl_nic firmware issue. However, when I was running off of the netinstall image, I was able to connect via wifi.

I'm out of ideas on how to correct my installation. Any assistance would be appreciated.

EdGr · 09-16-2020, 11:09 PM

Run "nmtui" from the console to check and update the wired network settings. If you can get the wired networking to work, you can download the firmware and install it.

Alternatively, you can put the firmware on a USB drive (using another computer) and install it from the USB drive.

Your laptop needs both the WiFi and GPU firmware.
Ed

HappyTux · 09-16-2020, 11:22 PM

Give one of the images with the non-free firmware a go and see if they will do the trick and get you a working setup.

https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/u...ding-firmware/

AntonyFromWatertown · 09-17-2020, 02:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EdGr

Run "nmtui" from the console to check and update the wired network settings. If you can get the wired networking to work, you can download the firmware and install it.

Alternatively, you can put the firmware on a USB drive (using another computer) and install it from the USB drive.

Your laptop needs both the WiFi and GPU firmware.
Ed

Unfortunately, nmtui doesn't seem to be included in the utilities that were installed on my laptop during installation. "nmtui: command not found", both at user and root.

AntonyFromWatertown · 09-17-2020, 06:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HappyTux

Give one of the images with the non-free firmware a go and see if they will do the trick and get you a working setup.

https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/u...ding-firmware/

It didn't ask me for the network firmware. However, on boot, with the Debian Display Manager installed, it freezes on 'Started Gnome Display Manager". Also, it was still requesting the amdgpu firmware. I am going to try later with a lighter weight display manager.

EdGr · 09-17-2020, 06:58 PM

The Debian installer is bad at auto-installing firmware. With the non-free iso, the firmware is present on the USB drive. You can install it manually by:

Code:

Boot into recovery mode from the GRUB menu
mkdir /mnt/z
mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/z  # make sure that /dev/sdb1 is the USB drive
cd /mnt/z/firmware
dpkg -i wifi_firmware_file
dpkg -i gpu_firmware_file
reboot

This should fix the WiFi and GPU.
Ed

AntonyFromWatertown · 09-18-2020, 08:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EdGr

The Debian installer is bad at auto-installing firmware. With the non-free iso, the firmware is present on the USB drive. You can install it manually by:

Code:

Boot into recovery mode from the GRUB menu
mkdir /mnt/z
mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/z  # make sure that /dev/sdb1 is the USB drive
cd /mnt/z/firmware
dpkg -i wifi_firmware_file
dpkg -i gpu_firmware_file
reboot

This should fix the WiFi and GPU.
Ed

Recovery mode is not an option in grub. I am going to have to reinstall again using a lighter window manager.

EdGr · 09-18-2020, 08:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AntonyFromWatertown

Recovery mode is not an option in grub. I am going to have to reinstall again using a lighter window manager.

Your Debian version seems quite different from mine. I install the DVD iso of "testing" with the non-free firmware. The DVD includes more software.

Without the GPU firmware, no GUI will work. You need to install the firmware manually from the console.

Missing firmware is a common problem. The Debian developers do not seem to give priority to fixing the installer. This is unfortunate for an otherwise good OS.

ETA: You can get a console prompt with Ctrl-Alt-F1 through F6. Ctrl-Alt-F7 returns to the (broken) GUI.
Ed

AntonyFromWatertown · 09-18-2020, 11:44 AM

I was able to boot with the LXQt image again. I still didn't have a working window manager and booted into a shell. However, the firmware for my network devices loaded and were working. I googled about and found a tutorial for installing video firmware at https://linuxconfig.org/how-to-insta...bian-10-buster . As root, I ran

Code:

apt install firmware-linux firmware-linux-nonfree libdrm-amdgpu1 xserver-xorg-video-amdgpu

I then ran startx, only to be disappointed as it crashed out the same way that it did before. However, when I restarted my laptop, et voila, I booted into LXQt.

Thank you everybody for your help.