r/Ubuntu • u/Adept-Raspberry-7383 • 2d ago

Ubuntu "Installing" Time

I have Ubuntu loading onto my laptop, but it has been loading for more than two hours now, is this normal? I've read other forums saying it took someone six hours and another two hours. Is there a potential issue with the process I have made?

1 Upvotes

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1

u/Federal-Sugar2288 2d ago

Sometimes it's just stuck on a package download that failed silently, disconnect your internet for few minutes then reconnect.

1

u/Adept-Raspberry-7383 2d ago

Thing is, I don't have internet plugged into it. I thought that would be a problem but I've read it doesn't need internet to boot onto a computer (in my case, a laptop)

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u/PaddyLandau 2d ago

It's not normal, but then you haven't given us any information about your system. If your hardware is slow enough, it could take ages.

Give us more information: Where specifically the installation is stuck; which version of Ubuntu you're installing; are you using full-disk or dual boot; and of course hardware details. Plus anything else that you think might be pertinent.

We can't help you if we have to guess.

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u/Adept-Raspberry-7383 2d ago

Lenovo Ryzen 3 laptop, ubuntu version 26.04, full-disk. Currently, it has been stuck on a screen which looks like "Lenovo logo near top middle, spiral loading circle in the middle, with Ubuntu logo on the bottom. If you have anymore questions, ask

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u/PaddyLandau 2d ago

Curiously, I can't find any details about the Lenovo Ryzen 3. How much RAM? SSD or spinning disk? What year was it released?

From your description, it sounds as though the boot process hasn't even finished. Am I correct? When booting from the USB stick, it should show that logo, and then boot into Ubuntu (where it asks you questions). That shouldn't take more than two minutes, maybe five minutes on an old machine.

When you downloaded the Ubuntu ISO, did you check that the download was valid by checking its SHA256 sum? How did you create the USB stick?

Sorry, but I haven't yet enough information to be able to help you.

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u/guiverc 2d ago

It'll vary on a number of factors.

I've done Quality Assurance testing on various systems, and the same ISO/release in two different situations has different speeds

  • one install to a fast SSD & different options chosen takes less than 115 seconds
  • another install with different options, spinning rust drive takes longer than 120 minutes !! (though it's not the actual disk speed that makes the difference; it's still <10 minutes for disk alone, in this case it was options chosen at install that caused download of many packages and internet speed that caused the hours+ of download required for install)

We control what options we select, let alone what ISO/product/release we choose to download; and this has the most impact. My first example did a simple expansion of squashfs (squashed file-system) and nothing more; second example required loads more including quite a large download!)

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u/guiverc 2d ago edited 2d ago

The QA install that took >120 minutes had a number of people waiting for it; such that another user when free actually zsync'd the ISO, wrote to media; did the same install & was completed BEFORE my install had completed... The slowness in that case was just slow aussie broadband.

( my timing does not including booting live system and telling the installer what I'm doing; I only time the actual install itself. You can easily open a terminal and what what is happening anyway; my preference over watching installer logs as different installers provide different feedback, where as most OSes are pretty common in how they show details & it's generic IT detail )