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Frequently asked questions about the Debian Installer. To ask a new questions, see the contact information in DebianInstaller.
Contents
- Basic questions
-
Troubleshooting
- Q: When I run the DebianInstaller, my keyboard doesn't work!
- Q: How do I copy d-i logfiles to a remote host?
- Q: What do I do if I can no longer boot Windows after installing Debian?
- Q: There seem to be errors reading the CD!
- Q: Your amd64 CD does not boot. I downloaded it from http://someplace/foo/ia64/bar
-
Advanced usage
- Q: How can I install sid (unstable) with DebianInstaller?
- Q: Can I use d-i as a rescue system? What pitfalls are there?
- Q: How do I tell the installer which IP address to use?
- Q: Does the DebianInstaller support creating and installing to software RAID devices?
- Q: How do I install using LVM? Is there any more information about using the LVM installer? LVM installation doesn't work!
- Q: How to use preseeding? How to use network console with preseeding?
- Q: How do I use the hd-media installer?
- Q: How do I install via PPPoE?
- Q: How do I use netinst over PPP?
- Q: Can I use the ISO's vmlinux and initrd.gz files to boot from a hard disk?
- Q: DebianInstaller does not include a driver for my xyz network card, but I have (tarball) driver sources. What are the steps for building that driver?
- Q: How can I create a boot ISO with my own packages?
- Q: How can I build the DebianInstaller?
- Why does the installer work that way?
- Historical questions
- See also
Basic questions
Q: What types of media are available? What versions are available? Where to download?
A: See the main installation page, Installing Debian Stable and Installing Debian Unstable.
Q: How to shrink an existing Windows installation?
A: See the Installation Guide, chapter 6.3.4.3 (Manual Partitioning).
Basically, you need to select the item displaying the size of the partition to change the size. Please make sure that you check the partition for correctness before (best with chkdsk), and that you have a backup of your data, and also are able to re-install Windows (or forget about it totally) in case something breaks.
Troubleshooting
Q: When I run the DebianInstaller, my keyboard doesn't work!
A: Try disabling APIC and local APIC support (supply the installer boot arguments noapic nolapic).
Q: How do I copy d-i logfiles to a remote host?
A: Wait until the network is configured, then use the included web server:
go back to the main menu
Save debug logs
serve over network
- download the logs
A: Wait until the network is configured, switch to a terminal (ctrl-alt-F2), then use the installer ssh client, wget, nc etc.
A: Wait until you can reboot into your installed system, then do:
sudo apt-get install installation-report reportbug
reportbug installation-report
Q: What do I do if I can no longer boot Windows after installing Debian?
A: If DebianInstaller failed to add a boot menu item for an existing Windows installation, please file a detailed installation report.
A: If there is a menu entry, but you get errors when you try to boot Windows, check your bootloader's configuration.
Q: There seem to be errors reading the CD!
A: Confirm the checksum of the CD image itself:
Find the URL you downloaded the image from, and go to the directory part of that URL. You should find a file there called SHA512SUMS - the image should match the associated checksum in that file.
A: Check the integrity of individual packages:
In the installer, click <go back> to get to the main menu, then check the integrity of installation media.
A: Try disabling DMA for the CD-ROM by supplying the installer boot argument ide=nodma.
A: Try repositioning the drive's data cable - a tightly folded cable can cause read errors.
Q: Your amd64 CD does not boot. I downloaded it from http://someplace/foo/ia64/bar
A: The ia64 architecture is not the same as the amd64 architecture and you downloaded the wrong CD image.
Advanced usage
Q: How can I install sid (unstable) with DebianInstaller?
A: see install unstable.
Q: Can I use d-i as a rescue system? What pitfalls are there?
A: Yes, boot the installer in "rescue" mode and follow the prompts until it mounts your hard disk and gives you a shell chrooted into your system.
For more information, see Recovering a Broken System in the Installation Guide.
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DO NOT try to fix the bootloader with the d-i menu item "install boot-loader" - it will insist on reinstalling Debian first.
Q: How do I tell the installer which IP address to use?
A: Run the installer normally and either cancel DHCP detection or wait until it fails - you should be taken to the manual configuration screen.
If you need to configure everything manually, go back twice, then select "Configure network manually" (see 794662)
A: Run the installer in expert mode (select "Advanced options > Expert")
A: Supply the installer boot argument netcfg/disable_autoconfig=true
A: Configure your DHCP server to serve a fixed address to your device.
Q: But DHCP shouldn't run automatically, it breaks on my system/gets the wrong information/is not what I want.
A: DebianInstaller needs to be used by people who don't know what DHCP or static IP addresses are. The default behavior is to use DHCP.
Q: Does the DebianInstaller support creating and installing to software RAID devices?
A: The installer supports software RAID levels 0, 1, 4, 5, 6 and 10, and SATA RAID. If you use RAID for /boot, you may need to use LILO instead of grub (see 251905).
If you do not need to dual boot to MS Windows installed on such a RAID system, please use the DebianInstaller default (software) RAID manager (mdadm) - it is far better tested and seems equally fast.
Q: How do I install using LVM? Is there any more information about using the LVM installer? LVM installation doesn't work!
A: LVM is fairly straightforward to configure using the menu item in the partitioner titled "Configure the Logical Volume Manager". It may help to know some LVM terminology, especially the relationship between a "physical volume" (PV), "volume group" (VG) and "logical volume" (LV).
You can even build an LVM on top of a RAID device even for root. Nevertheless Grub has still some troubles (see 251905).
A: The installer can configure LVM as part of the guided partitioning process.
Q: How to use preseeding? How to use network console with preseeding?
A: See Preseed and Network Console.
Q: How do I use the hd-media installer?
A: See create your own hd-media image.
Q: How do I install via PPPoE?
A: Supply the installer boot argument modules=ppp-udeb (see also Installing Debian GNU/Linux using PPP over Ethernet (PPPoE))
PPPoE installation is not yet supported for netboot.
Q: How do I use netinst over PPP?
A: With the netinst CD-ROM image, or a full CD or DVD, you can set up PPP after the system is installed.
PPP configuration is provided by pppconfig.
Winmodems (budget modems with most of their implementation in a Windows driver) are not supported.
Q: Can I use the ISO's vmlinux and initrd.gz files to boot from a hard disk?
A: No. The vmlinuz and initrd.gz in the ISO file only boot from an optical drive. Create an hd-media image instead.
Q: DebianInstaller does not include a driver for my xyz network card, but I have (tarball) driver sources. What are the steps for building that driver?
A: It's possible to do this, but we're waiting for an end user to help us write the documentation. Please e-mail us at debian-boot (include the output of lspci -v output), and we'll work it out together.
A: See netinst with third party network driver for a lengthy manual procedure of re-packaging netinst with a regular Debian kernel and the third party driver compiled against it. That procedure should give way to the install-time compilation of the driver against the installer's and the target kernels, a la module-assistant.
Q: How can I create a boot ISO with my own packages?
A: See Modifying or customizing images
Q: How can I build the DebianInstaller?
A: See Building the installer yourself
Why does the installer work that way?
Q: Why reinvent the wheel instead of e.g. contributing to Anaconda?
A: Debian's installer needs to work on more platforms and more types of install media than any other. We need to support small servers that boot over the network and S/390 mainframes that only have teletype consoles, for newbies that don't know what Linux is and experts that want to control every last detail. Only a system designed from the ground up can do everything we need.
A: An alternative in SystemBuildTools might be better for your use case.
Q: Is the DebianInstaller graphical?
A: The installer includes a GUI, among other interfaces. See the Installation Guide for more information.
Q: Why doesn't the installer automatically choose the appropriate kernel to install?
A: Not everyone installs Debian on the same machine they run it on. For example, you might install Debian using a VM that resembles a cloud server, then run it on a physical device.
Q: What about SMP support?
A: The installer itself does not need SMP support, as it just needs to install the system. The installed kernel should auto-detect this sort of thing (if not, please file a detailed installation report).
Historical questions
Q: Why is ping not available in the debug shell?
A: You are using an extremely old version of the installer. ping was added in Wheezy Debian Installer Beta 3.
Q: Why isn't the installed system configured to use the language I chose during installation?
A: This problem has been fixed, please file a detailed installation report if you think it's still happening.
Q: Why isn't my hardware supported by DebianInstaller, I know there is a Linux driver for it!
A: Firmware that doesn't follow the DFSG used to be shipped separately, but as of bookworm, they are included in the installer.
See also
DebianInstaller has contact information for new questions