Calamares installer not completely loaded

Armbroke · 2026-03-17 12:24

Hi all,
I need comments on this, to rule out basic errors. I have a fairly old HP pc, that was runnnng q4os for some time, but then stopped working.
So what I did, and still am trying, is reinstalling.
Since I have another machine also running q4os I tried q4os Imager.
The installation looks as expected; after the Live screen is there I klick "Install q4os", that starts the installation, but when it's finished
the installation button is still there, and testing shows it is still in "Live" mode.
So my question is, could this be due to something I did wrong ? I have tested with two ssd:s, and also two usb:s.

There is of course the possibility of a hardware problem, that's why I want to rule out user errors
Peter

q4osteam · 2026-03-17 13:19

Just install Q4OS, turn the PC off and remove installation USB disk. Power on again and post back what happens.

Armbroke · 2026-03-17 14:32

Have now installed q4os again, and restarted computer as indicated.
All that happens is a blinking cursor in the top left corner.
Also, as I mentioned, though Calamares seem installed, it's icon is still there.
Any ideas out if this would be appreciated.
Peter

q4osteam · 2026-03-17 17:19

Armbroke wrote:

... blinking cursor in the top left corner. ... Calamares seem installed, it's icon is still there.

We don't understand what you actually see. Blinking cursor or Calamares icon ?
Would you post a screenshot please ?

Armbroke · 2026-03-17 18:18

It is blinkning, I doubt it would show.
So, as per instructions I ran the installation, including starting Calamares installation, using the icon in the top left corner. This worked as it
should, I think. But after that, the Calamares icon is still there, and further settings can not be made.
Then I made a proper shutdown, removed the ISO usb, and powered up again.
All that happened then was a "-" symbol, do not know what it i called, blinking in the top left corner on the screen, nothing else.
Hope this makes sense
Peter

hchiper · 2026-03-17 19:21

In your original post, you spoke of a "fairly old HP pc". How much RAM? If you don't know, then give its exact reference (brand, model...) I suspect (not sure) it has too low resources, that's why I ask this information.
Or a hardware issue with your storage.

q4osteam · 2026-03-17 19:27

Yes, that looks like a hardware issue or incompatibility. Please post a brief HW specification of your PC. You could also try Q4OS "install-cd" instead of live media, see https://www.q4os.org/downloads1.html

Armbroke · 2026-03-17 22:16

I believe my computer has 6 gb of ram. As for resources that should not be a problem, I have been running q4os on this computer for weeks
without problems. But 2 to 3 weeks ago it suddenly stopped working. Not being able to fix it I tried reinstalling q4os. After failing to install Etcher,
and some testing with another ssd, I tried q4os Imager on my second pc and that's where I am now.

So the question I guess is could this installation behaviour be caused by some software setting ?
Or a hardware error in the basic PC ? Not likely, that would stop operation entirely ?

How is the Calamares installer organized, does it store everything first and then execute ?
I am totally lost about this, but at least I know for sure my pc can handle q4os.
Out of ideas for now.....
Peter

q4osteam · 2026-03-18 09:01

Armbroke wrote:

So the question I guess is could this installation behaviour be caused by some software setting ?

Likely no.

Armbroke wrote:

Or a hardware error in the basic PC ? Not likely, that would stop operation entirely ?

May be, but not tlikely. Rather a HW incompatibility.

Armbroke wrote:

How is the Calamares installer organized, does it store everything first and then execute ?

Yes.

Again, we recommend you to give Q4OS install-cd a try, see https://www.q4os.org/forum/viewtopic.ph … 178#p34178 , and post back.

hchiper · 2026-03-18 09:43

Armbroke wrote:

I believe my computer has 6 gb of ram. As for resources that should not be a problem, I have been running q4os on this computer for weeks without problems.

6 GB is unusual, generally there are 1, 2, 4, 8 ,16... GB (powers of 2).

But 2 to 3 weeks ago it suddenly stopped working.

If you didn't corrupt your system, this is typical of an hardware failure.

Not being able to fix it I tried reinstalling q4os. After failing to install Etcher,

How could you begin any installation, since your system is not working?

and some testing with another ssd,

If you replaced your internal SSD, perhaps it has been damaged at that moment or its connexions are somewhat loose.

So the question I guess is could this installation behaviour be caused by some software setting ?

No, if you make a fresh install, everything is erased first on the SSD where the OS is going to be installed. Nothing you have set or installed on that SSD can have any influence on the following installation of the OS.

Or a hardware error in the basic PC ?

Yes.

Not likely, that would stop operation entirely ?

It's exactly what happens, isn't it? Didn't you wrote in a previous post that you were stuck with a cursor on a black screen?

How is the Calamares installer organized, does it store everything first and then execute ?

Calamares exists only on the installation medium and runs only when you boot from an installation medium. Calamares itself is not installed on your system. So, after installation, when you have unplugged or removed the installation medium, and when you boot from your SSD, Calamares is no more there and you don't need it.

I am totally lost about this, but at least I know for sure my pc can handle q4os. Out of ideas for now.....

Since you said you tried to install on another SSD, you still have to check memory. See https://www.q4os.org/forum/viewtopic.ph … 092#p34092

Armbroke · 2026-03-20 23:25

Hchiper,
Sorry about delay, will try creating a bootable memtest as described. In fact I wrote an answer before, but had missed logging in first...
A test I did was removing one of four RAM boards (1 GB). That did not make q4os boot, but when I reconnected the original HDD,
which has Win10, it did boot. The removed ram board will of course be reinstalled before the memtest.
"How could I install q4os"; I have another computer, running q4os perfectly on ssd. That one was used to create an iso usb via Imager.
Again I will try to create, and use, memtest this weekend; should be quite interesting !
And, after removing 1 GB the system indicated 5 GB (on Win10) So 6 GB it is.
Thanks for your patience
Peter

Armbroke · 2026-03-21 19:41

Hchiper,
Hi again, trying to run memtest as suggested; unfortunately it doesn't work as per instructions.
All I get is "failed to open memtest86-usb.img" (though in swedish) file dooes not exist". It does exist, I see it in Dolphin.
What am I doing wrong, followed instruction exactly but no luck.
Peter

hchiper · 2026-03-21 22:59

When did you receive that error message? How did you try to create your bootable USB?

Armbroke · 2026-03-22 00:33

Hi,
I download memtest86-usb.zip,
sudo unzip memtest86-usb.zip,
the answer to that is "cannot find or open memtest86-usb.zip"
I also tried /downloads/memtest86-usb.zip; same result

Tested unzip with Ark, that worked, but then the transfer command, "sudo dd if=memtest86-usb.img of= dev/sdf" gave the sam result as above, it did not
find the file.
Any suggestions about this ?
Peter

hchiper · 2026-03-22 07:41

Probably you try to run the `sudo dd ...` command from a directory different from the one you used to unzip your .zip file.
Before running `sudo dd ...` you need to cd (= change to directory) to the directory that contains the .iso file. After that, to be sure, type `ls -l` (= list long) to check it is there.

And no need to `sudo` to unzip.

Last edited by hchiper (2026-03-22 07:45)

Armbroke · 2026-03-22 10:17

I suspected that, but tried to link to the file i stead of moving to it. However, my terminal will not accept this, even "cd" does not exist....!?
Both with or without sudo.
Will look further into syntax, but do not understand this.
Peter

hchiper · 2026-03-22 10:53

Are you able to open a terminal (called Konsole in Plasma)?
If you don't know what I'm talking about, open Dolphin and hit Shift+F4. It will open a terminal.
Then follow this procedure

# Note that here the # char introduces a comment (not the root prompt).

# Go to the /tmp directory.
cd /tmp

# Create a subdirectory with a name of your choice, e.g. "mydir".
mkdir mydir

# Go into that subdirectory, everything will happen there.
cd mydir

# Check wget is installed.
which wget

# If you don't see a response like /usr/bin/wget, install wget:
# sudo apt install wget  # Uncomment first.

# Download the zip file.
wget https://www.memtest86.com/downloads/memtest86-usb.zip

# Check unzip is installed.
which unzip

# If you don't see a response like /usr/bin/unzip, install unzip:
# sudo apt install unzip  # Uncomment first.

# Unzip the zip file.
unzip memtest86-usb.zip

# Create you bootable USB key.
# sudo dd ...  # Enter the full command.

Last edited by hchiper (2026-03-22 10:54)

Armbroke · 2026-03-22 15:25

Hi again,
Sorry to keep you busy on a sunday.....
After I exposed all my misprints it now seems to work, my usb is emptied except for what is presumably memtest.
The faulty computer has, temporarily, a HDD so it is extremely slow....
But it seems to open Win10, I thought memtest was totally independent?
Will leave it for a while and see.
Thank you for the very precise instructions.
Another thing, out of curiosity, where are you located ? I suspect a time difference, your post yesterday came through around
midnight here.
Anyway, my HDD is working away, will see what it shows.
All the best
Peter

hchiper · 2026-03-22 17:21

Armbroke wrote:

Sorry to keep you busy on a sunday.....

No problem.

The faulty computer has, temporarily, a HDD so it is extremely slow....
But it seems to open Win10, I thought memtest was totally independent?

I think that memtest doesn't make use of internal storage, since it boots from your usb key and is going to test (only) memory.
memtest is indeed independant of any OS installed. You need to boot from your USB key, not from your internal storage (Win nor anything else), as explained in the post I gave the link in a previous post (https://www.q4os.org/forum/viewtopic.ph … 092#p34092).
You need to hit a given key repeatedly to have access to the boot option (often F12) or to have access to the BIOS to set boot order (often F2 or Del).

Another thing, out of curiosity, where are you located ? I suspect a time difference, your post yesterday came through around
midnight here.

Look at the left of my posts
Yesterday I posed indeed about 1 hour before midnight (22:29 UTC+1).

Armbroke · 2026-03-23 10:09

Hello again, I have to ask another question,
I finally succeeded creating a memtest usb, but booting with it did not work.
Checking further it might be that memetest runs on UEFI, which I understand is an alternative to Bios.
To complicate things I can only start my computer with W10; can I then change to UEFI temporarily to run memtest, and switch back
after that ?
A newbie question I guess, and almost outside this topic.....
Still some hints would be helpful.
Peter

hchiper · 2026-03-23 11:38

Armbroke wrote:

I finally succeeded creating a memtest usb, but booting with it did not work.

How did you try to boot with your USB key?
Please give an accurate and detailed description of what you have done and what you have seen; we can't guess.

Armbroke · 2026-03-23 18:31

Ok, here's what happened:
First Memtest looked good, verified data transfer to usb. (I created it on my fully working q4os machine.)
I then connected the usb to my faulty machine, equipped with 80 GB HDD and running W10.
After powerup I saved changes (80 GB and Kingston 64 GB usb)
Went into Boot sequence and klicked boot from usb
After a while the Windows logo flashed by just briefly, then more waiting
A little later W10 booted normally, and everything I tried so far is working. Very slow, but this is a mechanical old drive.
All in all there has been no sign of Memtest.

Another thing I tried is W10 memory diagnosis, which did not show any errors.
Peter

hchiper · 2026-03-23 19:39

Since your system boots on the USB key you have prepared to install Q4OS and doesn't boot on the USB you have prepared with memtest86, I suppose the latter is not bootable. What's its content (files displayed by Dolphin or output of `$ ls`)?

Last edited by hchiper (2026-03-23 21:07)

Armbroke · 2026-03-23 22:26

Four folders: System Volume Information, help, EFI, licence.rtf

System Volume has:
WPSettings.dat
IndexerVolumeGuid

EFI contains:
Benchmark,
unifont.bin,
BOOTX64.efi,
BOOTIA32.efi,
BOOTAA64.efi
blacklist.cfg
and a logo png

There's also a users guide.

hchiper · 2026-03-23 23:02

OK. ~~Try to download the legacy BIOS version "Linux / Mac — USB Image" from here: https://memtest86.net/older-versions/~~

Edit
Look rather for memtest86+ at https://memtest.org/
Even the latest version works both with BIOS Legacy and EFI. Is is free and opensource, at the difference of memtest86 mentioned previously, which isn't opensource.

Last edited by hchiper (2026-03-24 09:17)

Q4OS Forum

#1 2026-03-17 12:24

Calamares installer not completely loaded

#2 2026-03-17 13:19

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#3 2026-03-17 14:32

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#4 2026-03-17 17:19

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#5 2026-03-17 18:18

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#6 2026-03-17 19:21

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#7 2026-03-17 19:27

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#8 2026-03-17 22:16

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#9 2026-03-18 09:01

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#10 2026-03-18 09:43

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#11 2026-03-20 23:25

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#12 2026-03-21 19:41

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#13 2026-03-21 22:59

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#14 2026-03-22 00:33

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#15 2026-03-22 07:41

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#16 2026-03-22 10:17

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#17 2026-03-22 10:53

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#18 2026-03-22 15:25

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#19 2026-03-22 17:21

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#20 2026-03-23 10:09

Re: Calamares installer not completely loaded

#21 2026-03-23 11:38

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#22 2026-03-23 18:31

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#23 2026-03-23 19:39

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#24 2026-03-23 22:26

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#25 2026-03-23 23:02

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