It was installing all day yesterday and I looked at the screen this morning and it said there wasn't enough space to install something. I ignored it and pressed OK. It then completed the installation and restarted. When it restarted, there was a list of OS's to choose from and some memory tests. At the top was Zorin OS and at the bottom was Windows Vista, which surprised me because I thought it removed it from the computer. When I boot it up to load Zorin OS, it says "uncompression error -- system halted."

I noticed when I take off the usb with the zorin installer, it doesn't have the list of OS to choose from. It goes to a black screen that says 'boot mgr missing'.

The 'boot mgr missing' screen was actually the screen I got when I first tried to install Zorin OS by partitioning the main hard drive of the laptop instead. When I activated the partitioned hard drive and restarted, it was a failure and I could not start up Windows again, getting the screen 'boot mgr missing'. That was what prompted me to use another laptop to put the ISO image of Zorin on a USB where I was able to install Zorin OS all day as described in the first paragraph.

My first post and thank you for your tips!

Go here https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Repair create and post a boot-info summary.

1 members found this post helpful.

Ok, so if I read it correctly, I will download the boot repair disk file and put it on a USB and plug it in the laptop that won't boot up. Then there should be a boot summary function that will let me post it on here.

If your able to connect to net with live iso that you installed with, you can do option 2

Here I got it:

http://paste.ubuntu.com/p/FWHs789BJF/

Are you wanting to get rid of windows or keep it? It looks like windows is still on /dev/sdc1, windows recovery partition on /dev/sdc3. If you was attempting to install to /dev/sdc2, the partition isn't large enough, you will need a minimum of 20GB. linux doesn't install to ntfs formatted partitions. The standard is to install to ext4(there are others) formatted partition, that the standard windows system can't read from.
If you are ditching windows, during the installation select use whole disk and the installer will partition the drive for you. Any files that you want to keep back them up to a usb for you will loose them when you select the whole disk option.

I do not want to keep it. It isn't supported anymore by Microsoft which prompted me to look for other OS's that will work for this laptop. What should I do?

Thanks,

Get any file you want to keep off the drive, at the partition stage select use whole disk the installer will do the partitioning.

I've taken the files off the drive.

Where is the "partition stage"? Is that during boot up when I have the USB with Zorin plugged in?

When you start the zorin intaller, it is after “do you want to install updates” extra software selection.

I already had the Zorin OS installed though, which gives me the screen:

"GNU GRUB version 2.02"
*Zorin
Advanced options for Zorin
Windows Vista
Windows Vista something something

Should I have had ran the repair disk file summary WITH the Zorin USB plugged in? Because I'm not sure it was detecting the installation. Should I re-do that thing?

Looks like running it with the Zorin USB won't even let me go into the repair disk desktop. It keeps going to Zorin OS selection screen.

I don't see "do you want to install updates" anywhere.

Zorin wasn't installed correctly. You need to do a reinstall.
https://zorinos.com/help/install-zorin-os/

Thanks but how do I do a re-install if I can't get the "Zorin OS welcome menu" to pop up since it goes to the "OS selection screen" that i mention above?

It does not mention this scenario in the link you provided.

What did you do to get the zorin installer to boot to install the first time around?