Hi all,
I have tried several times to do a fresh install of Fedora 43 in a new SSD disk the installer is buggy and keeps on crashing (it freezes) just before or just after asking for the time zone.
My PC runs perfectly Debian 13 and I never had a problem installing it.
Someone suggested to opt out the third party source install, but there is no such an option during the process.
Someone else suggested to try installing the KDE version (which I do not like graphically, but that would be the least problem), which I did, and the result is even worse: the installer crashes immediately when clicking on the icon from Fedora live.
I know that this is a known issue but I am shocked finding that this issue has been reported for months and continues to be an obstacle that prevents many users from using Fedora.
I am happy with Debian but I wanted to give Fedora a go; but alas, to my greatest disappointment I have to accept that this at the moment is impossible for someone at my skill level.
Any suggestions are more than welcome, I will be very thankful to anyone able to offer me a work around; however, this issue should be raised to the Fedora developers who are not shedding a favourable light on the distro by failing to fix such a disastrously buggy installer.
Thanks
Alberto Costa, Scotland.
You may try checking if your system has any supporting or negative reports at the Linux Hardware Database (LHDB) when used with fedora.
We would need to know more info about the hardware before we can make informed suggestions. From the live installer you might install inxi then run inxi -Fzxx and post that result here so we can see the hardware and drivers used by the installer.
Try the âEverythingâ net installer and select the desktop of your choice.
I found a workaround installing Fedora 42 first and then upgrading the system. Works fine with me now, I had just to set the default grub option to Debian.
It is still a shame that the installer does not work with my computer. Perhaps it is because I use very old hardware (this is an old build from 2016 which runs Debian swimmingly).
Here is the inxi output:
System:
Kernel: 6.12.48+deb13-amd64 arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 14.2.0
Desktop: GNOME v: 48.4 tk: GTK v: 3.24.49 wm: gnome-shell dm: 1: GDM3
2: SDDM note: stopped Distro: Debian GNU/Linux 13 (trixie)
Machine:
Type: Desktop Mobo: MSI model: H97 PC Mate(MS-7850) v: 1.0
serial: <superuser required> UEFI: American Megatrends v: 5.5
date: 11/10/2014
CPU:
Info: quad core model: Intel Core i5-4590 bits: 64 type: MCP arch: Haswell
rev: 3 cache: L1: 256 KiB L2: 1024 KiB L3: 6 MiB
Speed (MHz): avg: 3708 min/max: 800/3700 cores: 1: 3708 2: 3708 3: 3708
4: 3708 bogomips: 26401
Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Graphics:
Device-1: NVIDIA GM206 [GeForce GTX 960] driver: nvidia v: 550.163.01
arch: Maxwell pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 16 bus-ID: 01:00.0
chip-ID: 10de:1401
Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.16 with: Xwayland v: 24.1.6
compositor: gnome-shell driver: X: loaded: nvidia
unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,nouveau,vesa alternate: nv gpu: nvidia
display-ID: :1 screens: 1
Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1080 s-dpi: 96
Monitor-1: HDMI-0 res: 1920x1080 hz: 60 dpi: 96 diag: 584mm (22.99")
API: EGL v: 1.5 platforms: device: 0 drv: nvidia device: 2 drv: swrast
gbm: drv: kms_swrast surfaceless: drv: nvidia x11: drv: nvidia
inactive: wayland,device-1
API: OpenGL v: 4.6.0 compat-v: 4.5 vendor: nvidia mesa v: 550.163.01
glx-v: 1.4 direct-render: yes renderer: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960/PCIe/SSE2
API: Vulkan v: 1.4.309 surfaces: xcb,xlib device: 0 type: discrete-gpu
driver: nvidia device-ID: 10de:1401 device: 1 type: cpu
driver: mesa llvmpipe device-ID: 10005:0000
Info: Tools: api: clinfo, eglinfo, glxinfo, vulkaninfo
de: kscreen-console,kscreen-doctor gpu: nvidia-settings,nvidia-smi
wl: wayland-info x11: xdriinfo, xdpyinfo, xprop, xrandr
Audio:
Device-1: Intel 9 Series Family HD Audio vendor: Micro-Star MSI
driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:1b.0 chip-ID: 8086:8ca0
Device-2: NVIDIA GM206 High Definition Audio driver: snd_hda_intel
v: kernel pcie: speed: 8 GT/s lanes: 16 bus-ID: 01:00.1 chip-ID: 10de:0fba
Device-3: Jieli USB Composite Device driver: snd-usb-audio,usb-storage
type: USB rev: 1.1 speed: 12 Mb/s lanes: 1 bus-ID: 3-9:4 chip-ID: 4c4a:4155
API: ALSA v: k6.12.48+deb13-amd64 status: kernel-api
Server-1: PipeWire v: 1.4.2 status: active with: 1: pipewire-pulse
status: active 2: wireplumber status: active 3: pipewire-alsa type: plugin
Network:
Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8211/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet
vendor: Micro-Star MSI driver: r8169 v: kernel pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s
lanes: 1 port: d000 bus-ID: 03:00.0 chip-ID: 10ec:8168
IF: enp3s0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter>
IF-ID-1: virbr0 state: down mac: <filter>
Drives:
Local Storage: total: 1.57 TiB used: 134.96 GiB (8.4%)
ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Crucial model: CT250BX100SSD1 size: 232.89 GiB
speed: 6.0 Gb/s serial: <filter>
ID-2: /dev/sdb vendor: MSI model: S270 480GB size: 447.13 GiB
speed: 6.0 Gb/s serial: <filter>
ID-3: /dev/sdc vendor: Western Digital model: WD10EZEX-00BN5A0
size: 931.51 GiB speed: 6.0 Gb/s serial: <filter>
Partition:
ID-1: / size: 219.39 GiB used: 134.73 GiB (61.4%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/dm-0
mapped: AlbertoCosta25--vg-root
ID-2: /boot size: 942.3 MiB used: 236.3 MiB (25.1%) fs: ext4
dev: /dev/sdb2
Swap:
ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 7.93 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2
dev: /dev/dm-1 mapped: AlbertoCosta25--vg-swap_1
Sensors:
System Temperatures: cpu: 34.0 C mobo: N/A gpu: nvidia temp: 29 C
Fan Speeds (rpm): N/A gpu: nvidia fan: 30%
Info:
Memory: total: 24 GiB available: 23.41 GiB used: 2.7 GiB (11.5%)
Processes: 261 Power: uptime: 10m wakeups: 0 Init: systemd v: 257
default: graphical
Packages: 3278 pm: dpkg pkgs: 3266 pm: snap pkgs: 12 Compilers:
gcc: 14.2.0 Shell: Bash v: 5.2.37 running-in: gnome-terminal inxi: 3.3.38
Is this in the installer itself, or is it the GNOME initial setup screens that you get the first time the newly installed system boots?
If it were just for the desktop environment, it should likely not crash with KDE but it does even more dramatically 
Well, you reported two different behaviours on GNOME and KDE:
-
Crash/freeze just before/after asking for the timezone on GNOME
-
Crash immediately when clicking on the icon from the KDE Live ISO
Itâs not clear that those would be the same issue, so I asked a clarifying question regarding (1). It wouldnât have been sound for me to logically infer from (2) the nature of issue (1).
Please rest assured that there are not second intentions in my language, let alone trying to offend; I am just stating facts. As I said, i did find a workaround, but I found it awkward and I think the installer should behave much better than it does in both cases (which is obviously an understatement).
OK. On social media, the emoji you used often has a connotation of âlaughing with contemptâ, so here it came across as saying âwtf did you ask that question?â
Particularly, you had mentioned in the original post:
This made me wonder if you were referring to:
That was an issue in the GNOME first-boot setup, not in the installer, so I was interested in whether the workaround deployed for that In Fedora 43 might not have worked.
is not "laughing with contempt.
anyway, this is becoming slightly off-topic. I know the thread but it does not solve the issue I am afraid.
It was certainly often used with that meaning back when I spent a lot of time on Twitter 
Thanks for clarifying you meant it otherwise.
OK, so the freeze on Workstation around the timezone selection is in the installer, not the issue mentioned in gnome-initial-setup?
Please be sure that I am here to make friends not arguing with people and I thank you for answering me. I am sure I will have fun using Fedora alongside Debian, I just I wish I did not have to spend hours to sort the installation, which is fine because I am learning as a computing student, but that would be very discouraging for a different type of user.
Totally understood.
Here on Ask Fedora youâre talking to fellow users like me who are trying to help, not (mostly) to the Fedora devs. So we should focus on trying to clarify, understand and resolve issues to make the experience better, rather than deliver negative feedback in a forum where its targets largely wonât hear it.
New hardware is constantly appearing. Linux devs tend to use new hardware, and more vendors are starting to support linux on new systems, but it is left to the user community to deal with issues with older hardware. The LHDB is good way to check how well an older system supports Linux, but it takes time for probes of recent releases to appear, and the site is sometimes overwhelmed so patience is needed. Linux has often resorted to hardware-specific code, but there are efforts to replace such code with newer cross-hardware standards. This can break support for older hardware that goes unnoticed until someone with the affected hardware installs an update. It is most helpful if users with older hardware participate in beta tests.
When reporting issues, you should try to provide enough detail to allow others to reproduce you issue. Insuring that both vendor firmware and Linux are fully updated makes it easier to replicate your configuration and also prevents wasting energy on solved problems.