Fedora 16 - Anaconda - fails to install (possible SSD problems)

[qbic2005]

Hi Guys/Girls

I got a particularly anoying issue with the Fedora 16 installation.
I ve undertaken the following steps:
- downloaded fedora 16 (good start I know!)
- put it on a usb stick, with unetbootin
- tested the live version (found it very pleasing)

- - > but the Anaconda install keeps failing (both 32 and 64 bit versions)
I get to the copying of files but then suddenly it fails to copy any more. And it pops up a message:
"ext4 filesystem check failure on /dev/sda4:
......."

From what I got so far, my disks get correctly partitioned and formated (can check that before the boot device selection) then the file copy starts ....
Once the crash pops up (usually around 50%), I have no more than a few kb available on the '/' - root partition, which is formatted as around 30GB !!
If I do 'df -h' I get all kind of strange disk space numbers for that drive including negative onces (I have seen a lot in linux over the last few years, but that is a first)
I believe I tried any partitioning option from the installer about 5 times now, from full default to max simplicity (no LVM, no swap, ext3, 1 partition only, etc) and anything in between.

Why it kept me busy so long .... the first time I installed it without issues ...
(I crashed that install however, and on the second attempt I got this error
I however decided to throw over mint, which installed like a charm but is way slower
So I decided to go back to fedora, but I'm still stuck at the install...)

Maybe I should file a bug, but then I should get some guidance (first : is a bug report appropriate for such an issue?)

logs attached. - my system Acer Iconia W500 (tablet-netbook without keyboard but AMD-C50 cpu)

Thanks for reading, many thanks for answering.

[pacific0]

Some times usb flash devices become corrupted when you burn several distros, try to format the usb key before burning the iso to it.

I used this method from the fedora installation guide, It worked fine, WARNING! you need to be shure where your USB drive is, this will destroy all data in the /dev/sdx device chosen.

Plug in your USB flash drive.
Find the device name for your USB flash drive. If the flash drive has a volume name, look up the name in /dev/disk/by-label, or use findfs:

su -c 'findfs LABEL="MyLabel"'

If the media does not have a volume name, or you do not know it, run dmesg after you connect the USB flash drive. The device name, similar to /dev/sdc, appears in several lines towards the end of the output.
Use the dd command to transfer the ISO image to the USB device:

dd if=path/image_name.iso of=device

where path/image_name.iso is the ISO image file of the installation DVD and device is the USB flash drive. For example:

dd if=~/Download/F16-Server-i386-DVD.iso of=/dev/sdc

On windows I use imagewriter it always burn without fails, (you will need to rename the iso file to img extension)

You can use another mirror to download your iso, I always use wget to download whether on windows or linux.

Regards

[qbic2005]

- I checked my downloads already with the md5 key (or what was the fedora variant again)
- Nice idea the 'dd' copy to usb, but the installer still fails
- I also want to note that from the live system to the ssd, I got no issue coping over a file from 600MB or the entire /usr directory ... I mean if there would have been a ssd driver issue, it would have popped up, right.

Is there any other way to install Fedora (I mean not Anaconda) (btw Anaconda text mode doesn't pull it either)

Maybe there is a way to manually install Fedora ? has anybody ever tried something like that?
(I mean my other system is a GENTOO, I know a bit my way around the linux OS)
If anybody could roughly describe such a procedure (which can be executed successfully) ....

[qbic2005]

Since nobody seems to be bothered with my issue, I'll give the answer myself !!

I successfully installed fedora 15 and upgraded to 16 with the yum method, simply found in the manual ... (http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Upgrad...dora_using_yum)

[stevea]

Originally Posted by qbic2005

Since nobody seems to be bothered with my issue, I'll give the answer myself !!

I successfully installed fedora 15 and upgraded to 16 with the yum method, simply found in the manual ... (http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Upgrad...dora_using_yum)

That's not so much a solution as a way to bypass the problem.

Both partitions that show errors (sda2, sda4) are failing with this condition ...

23:46:05,853 INFO program: Reserved block count: 6078
23:46:05,853 INFO program: Free blocks: 9620

Which means there are only <14MB available.

I don't know why that should be the case, but ...

[qbic2005]

At least bypassing it is better than not getting it installed

I got some linux experience and yes I noticed the same, about the 14MB. However the indicated size varies over different trails
However, I can garantee you that just before the installation started the partitions where 'ok' and more than large enough. I tested this for the full manual partitioning schemas as for the full automatic and any possible partition variation in between.

So I can reassure you that it was the copy process of anaconda who screwed up the root partition every time. (Why would checkdisk try to repair every file on the system otherwise ....)

Anyway don't break your head, I got around it and for now I seem one of the only ones with this issue.

[Nithalak]

Originally Posted by qbic2005

At least bypassing it is better than not getting it installed
Anyway don't break your head, I got around it and for now I seem one of the only ones with this issue.

No, you are not alone. Here are a lot of others with the same problem

[JEO]

Maybe it's the kernel version that is on the F16 install media that has problems on certain systems. That would explain why an F15 install and upgrade to F16 via yum would work. The F16 kernel that gets installed using yum or a network install would be the latest and not that original one.

[qbic2005]

good thinking

[Dangermouse]

I had the exact same problem last week, i fixed it by running fsck from a livecd in mode 1, mind you it took several attempts before it worked

The error i think was a block written into the future and was caused by a failing cmos battery and a power cut

[youdass]

Originally Posted by Dangermouse

I had the exact same problem last week, i fixed it by running fsck from a livecd in mode 1, mind you it took several attempts before it worked

The error i think was a block written into the future and was caused by a failing cmos battery and a power cut

what is the cmd that you use with the fsck

[posbis]

Hi folks

Had the same issue when I tried to install Fedora 16 onto my new SAMSUNG 830 SSD (128GB). The ISO files always were correct (SHA256 Checksums). Even tried different DVD-ROM drives. Once the error was at around 50% the next time it was at around 75%.
I always use LVM setup mode.

I finally solved the problem as follows:

- Downloaded Fedora-16-i386-netinst.iso
- Booted from this and installed directly from Internet.

This took around 1h15m (around 30 minutes more as from local DVD) but had the advantage that I already had the newest files and kernel installed. So no "yum update" after installation and installing 1GB of updates.

Hope this helps
Regards,
Oliver