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I am trying to install Ubuntu 11.10 with Windows 7 from a CD. I am using an HP Pavilion dm4. I've never used Ubuntu (or any Linux) before.

Everything goes alright until I get to the "Installation Type" screen. Instead of giving me options, it just has a blank menu, and all the buttons are disabled. When I click "Continue", it gives me an error saying that it can't find the root or something like that.

The trial version works fine, but I can't actually install it. Everything on the trial version is really slow, presumably because everything is on the CD or the Windows partition.

I did some research, but the only post I could find was http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1870478 Where the only advice is to format the entire drive, which I'm not willing to do.

Any suggestions? I'm downloading 10.04 right now and I'm going to try with that instead.

EDIT: 10.04 didn't work either. I got to the partitioning screen and got the same problem.

I read some more forums, loaded up 11.10 trial from the disk, opened the Terminal and typed sudo apt-get remove dmraid and then y. Then I was actually able to see something on the "Installation type" page: "Erase disk and install Ubuntu" or "Something else". Which is weird, since Windows 7 should be installed. When I click Something Else, I get:

/dev/sda

/dev/sdb

/dev/sdb1 (ntfs) (208 MB) (69 MB used)

/dev/sdb2 (ntfs) (477542 MB) (unknown used)

/dev/sdb3 (ntfs) (18085 MB) (16094 MB used)

/dev/sdb4 (fat32) (4265 MB) (3084 MB used)

I have no idea what any of this means.

Also, my device for boot loader installation changed from /dev/sda to /dev/sda ATA SAMSUNG MZMPA032 (32.0 GB)

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Your installation cd may be corrupted.else retry it some times you may have to wait upto 10 minutes depending on your ram size – Tachyons Mar 11 '12 at 1:02
No root disk specified error? You have to format one partition to ext4 and choose '/' as root but normally installation wizard will show an option for install alongside windows ,just choose it and continue – Tachyons Mar 11 '12 at 1:09
It doesn't give me that option, that's what I was expecting it to give me. Instead, it just gave me a completely blank table. – Andrew Latham Mar 11 '12 at 1:49
I got the same problem when trying to install Ubuntu 10.04. It got stuck at the Prepare Partitions screen. I just see a blank table and three options, and when I try to go forward it says I don't have a root disk. – Andrew Latham Mar 11 '12 at 2:25
can you please post your current partition table – Tachyons Mar 11 '12 at 2:36
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closed as too localized by jrg♦ Dec 26 '12 at 0:55

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