Odin installer goes black after 'try or install elementary'

[cameralibre]

Hardware: Dell XPS 9370
ISO: elementaryos-6.0-stable.20210823.iso

I had been affected by the 'Odin iso fails to boot on lots of Dell hardware' issue but with the updated iso, the installation medium was finally accessible in the BIOS 🥳

However, when I get to the try or install elementary OS screen, and either hit Enter, or wait for the booting in... countdown to finish, the screen goes blank. The keyboard is backlit, the fans are whirring away like they're doing something, but there's no operating system being booted, no matter how long I wait or which keys I mash at random.

The iso checksum is valid, and the issue is the same across different installation media and I've since tested and installed Solus, then Ubuntu 20.04.03 LTS without any issues so it doesn't appear to be with my hardware, or something I'm doing wrong..?

[davidmhewitt]

To help debug this, could you:

• Press e at the "Try or install elementary OS" screen
• You will be presented with an editor, the 2nd line should end with quiet splash
• Delete quiet splash from the end of this line
• Press F10
• The installer should then try booting with more debugging information printed to the screen

If it stops or freezes, attach a photo of the screen to this issue

[carniz]

I have this issue as well. I'm on slightly different hardware (Dell Precision 5510), but I get the exact same behavior (i.e. screen goes black after the "try or install elementary os" screen.) I've already tried removing the `quiet splash` options, but the screen still goes black after "try or install". I suspect it's due to the hybrid graphics of the 5510 (Intel + Nvidia), and I've tried adding `nomodeset` and `nouveau.modeset=0` (separately, in combination with removing `quiet splash`) without success :(

[cameralibre]

Thanks for your help!
I did as suggested and had the same experience as @carniz, still getting a black screen.

[catbaba1]

I had the same issue, which happens on some Linux kernels when using certain Intel onboard graphics chips. Try adding nomodeset after quiet splash and that should enable you to proceed.

[cameralibre]

Sadly it doesn't. Same deal, still a black screen with any combination of quiet splash nomodeset or nouveau.modeset=0 or none of the above

[EsmeAioli]

This is also happening to me on my MSI Prestige 14, which has an Intel iGPU and an Nvidia dGPU. I had issues installing Ubuntu, Pop and now Odin 6 for what is likely the same reason. I heard that Debian 10-based ISOs have this issue in general. Disabling nouveau or nomemset isn't working for any of these distros either

If I had to guess, there's likely something in the kernel that's made booting impossible, someone reported that an old version of Pop!_OS 20.04's ISO eliminated the blank screen issue pop-os/pop#1112

EDIT: Have a look at #324 to see if this is a duplicate issue for you. Switching to legacy boot instead of UEFI solved this for me

[tomazb]

Getting out of memory on boot during the first menu. This is UEFI based Precision 5510.

Using elementaryos-6.0-stable.20211005

[zhoro]

Still a black screen on XPS 9550 without quiet splash, with nomodeset or nouveau.modeset=0. Using elementaryos-6.0-stable.20211005.iso

After changing terminal_output gfxterm to termial_output console in grub.conf OS booted successfully.

[carniz]

@tomazb I had that as well until I did a BIOS/firmware upgrade. I am now on 1.16.1 and I no longer get the out of memory error, but I still get a black screen after 'try or install' with elementaryos-6.0-stable.20211005.iso.

@zhoro Where/how did you change that?

[zhoro]

@zhoro Where/how did you change that?

@tomazb on the USB flash drive with Elementary OS. Full path is /boot/grub/grub.cfg

[carniz]

I finally found a solution that solved the issue for me:

1. Create a bootable USB drive with Unetbootin (this will make the files on the drive editable)
2. Edit boot/grub/grub.cfg, changing set gfxmode=auto to set gfxmode=800x600

It seems as the common denominator is the resolution of a HiDPI (4K) monitor, and that the installer for some reason doesn't work on such monitors.

[npenin]

I was not able to update the bootable USB drive with Unetbootin. Is there any other solution like changing some grub parameters at USB boot time ?

[melsabagh]

Updating the ISO isn't necessary. You can set the resolution via Grub:

1. Boot from USB.

2. Press c at the "Try or install elementary OS" screen. This should drop to a Grub shell.

3. Type in the following commands (hit enter after each command; some commands may take a bit of time to finish):

   terminal_output console
   set gfxmode=800x600
   terminal_output gfxterm
   linux /casper/vmlinuz boot=casper maybe-ubiquity
   initrd /casper/initrd.lz
   boot
   

You should then see the installer booting and eventually be presented with the installation wizard.