I just got an old laptop from a friend.... Toshiba Satellite a10-s811 and i tried to install linux.... I am new to this (VERY NEW...) After searching in google i found out that there are users who installed linux successfully (so i thought there was no hardware problem....)

The problem is : i boot from the ubuntu cd an the whole thing stops at the brown screen -> there is no install icon.... when i boot from the kubuntu cd the procedure is very slow, not reacting immediately when i click at the install icon, 15 minutes each procedure (language, time etc) and never finishes. When i boot from an XP cd everything goes well...

I dont know whats the problem and i cant find anything on the internet - I really want to start using linux sooo... some help?

Even if i wont find out whats the problem.... THANK U !

How old is the Laptop? If its old old like a pI or a pII with little ram then yes you will have problems with a newer, or should I say full linux install.
I have a pI 266cpu laptop with 384 meg of ram 4.5gb HD I installed slackware 11 on it with Fluxbox as the Windows Manager and it's usable. If your laptop has about the same specs as mine slackware would be a good choice, or maybe DSL (Damn Small Linux). Being new to Linux I would give slackware a try though.

well,
not much to go on.
I have been using laptops for a long time with no problems.
the spec looks okay. If you get the back screen then the video must be working.
how much memory you got?

are you sure the CD you have is OK?
has it been burnt correctly or damaged?

maybe try downloading and burning puppy linux (it's small) to see if that will
boot up.

a friend of mine couldn't ubuntu, but i had it on my laptop no bother
maybe try another distro

another good beginner is SAM sam or pclinux

Did you try to use the Alternate CD? The Alternate CD provides a text-based installer that helps get Ubuntu on machines with less than 128MB of ram.

Hope this helps!

it has a celeron 2.4, 80gb hdd and 256 ram soooo..


what i cant understand is why others have installed Ubuntu successfully at the same laptop (from what i've read at least)- which means there is no problem with the motherboard or anything else (i think i should repeat, unfortunately, that xp run so my hardware is OK) - and i cant

i burned two copies of ubuntu an kubuntu (total 4), on cds and dvds from two different desktop pcs (in case it was the cdrom or the cds). All had the same result..

Thanks for your answers anyway and i am really sorry 4 making the mistake to post this here and not to the laptop section!

Does the laptop have a windows operating system installed? Do you have the ability to connect to the internet? If so, you could use unetbootin to install many different distributions. Ubuntu is a great one.

http://lubi.sourceforge.net/unetbootin.html

Well that's not old! Try going into the bios and disable plug n play if it's not already, sometimes that will cause all kinds of problems.

You could also give Debian Etch netinstall a try, while I'm thinkin about it, maybe test your memory with memtest86 just to make sure your not having memory problems.

Back to Ubuntu, maybe give 6.10 a try, I don't know if it's just me but I have had better luck installing 6.10 on older systems than the newest version.

When you try to install try pressing Ctrl + Alt + F2 or F3 this will allow you to view whats going on, and maybe see whats causing the problems. To get back to the first screen Ctrl+Alt+F1

When I installed slackware on my laptop I had a PCMICA modem card that caused it to hang, so that may be another place to look.

bios = no such thing as plug and play

memtest = ok!

netinstall = havent tried it yet cause i am new(as i said) and a bit afraid i 'll do sth stupid!

i have a toshiba topic100 cardbus..is it possible to be a problem? i mean not even letting me install?? what can i do about that??

THANX anyway!!

i forgot ---> with ubuntu 6.10 the same... no install icon after 12 min (i didnt wait any longer cause of my previous experience.. )

I had same problem with 7.10 not going very far off live cd so I redownloaded the image and burned again and it came up. Might not be the case since all the other versions are giving ya heck also, but I just thought I would mention it.
Wish ya luck,
Scott

try another distro, there's plenty of nice ones just as neat as ubuntu.

i couldnt find the answer soo...

i tried fedora 8... had a problem with hdd cause it was in fat32(i had winxp on) so i formatted the disk....

Then i installed ubuntu... They work perfect.... They r great...

i think my problems had to do sth about my ram(256). i 'll never know..

thanx for your help every1...!!!

maybe ram yes. The install can take up quite a bit compared to normal everyday running.