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I've now spent hours trying and failing to figure out how to install Ubuntu Desktop 13.04 on my new desktop while setting up RAID as part of the installation.

I tried following the following two tutorials:

http://www.michielovertoom.com/linux/ubuntu-software-raid/ http://blog.foobaria.com/2010/05/installing-ubuntu-1004-desktop-with.html

Each time the installation ends with a pop-up error saying something about "'grub-install dummy' failed".

It's a PC with a pair of 120gb SSDs. It would be cool to have /boot on the mirror, but not essential. I've tried both that, and having a separate unmirrored /boot partition with the rest of the disk space dedicated to a mirrored root (/) partition (the two tutorials cover both approaches between them).

Help?

PS-It's annoying that this isn't yet a simple checkbox option during install, the way home dir encryption became a few years ago. Also, the awesome Alternate distro is no longer available for recent releases.

PPS-I've seen some people say to use 13.04 Server or 12.04 Alternate installer, then upgrade to 13.04 and install a desktop manually (if starting with Server). Is that a straightforward and safe way to end up with the equivalent of having installed Desktop 13.04 in the first place?

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3 Answers 3

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Install using a Server CD. It's a bit tricky, but it's possible.

Follow this Ubuntu community tutorial and you'll be just fine.

Afterwards, you can just add a Desktop.

Good Luck !!

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  • Will adding Desktop afterwards result in the same system as a plain Desktop installation?
    – Gerold Meisinger
    Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 19:41
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Even though this thread is a bit old...

I've found that the tutorial posted by Mike is missing a step.

After "Installing" step 6, you need to set up the mount point for the RAID device. Otherwise, you will get an error saying "no root file system is defined". This can be done by the following steps:

1. Select "#1" under the "RAID1 device #0" partition.

2. Choose "Use as:". Then select "swap area", then "Done setting up partition".

3. Next, select "#1" under the "RAID1 device #1" partition.

4. Choose "Use as:". Then select "Ext4 journaling file system".

5. Then select the "Mount point" and choose "/ - the root file system". Change any of the other options as appropriate, then select "Done setting up partition".

Finally, select "Finish partitioning and write changes to disk".

These steps are included in a more thorough tutorial found: Advanced Installation Tutorial

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Though this post is a little bit old, Here is another solution, which is, in my opinion, the best (I have tried install with a server edition, and it is simpler with this other tuto):

Have a look at this post, and a more accurate one at its answer: How to Install Ubuntu 14.04 with RAID 1 using desktop installer? BUT this post is to use the ONLY RAID array. If you want, as I did, to use the RAID array only as a /home for example, and the rest of files on another device (for example, a usb stick with grub, / and the swap, and the /home on the RAID array) you can do this tuto, but you can use the graphical installer. At the end of ubuntu installation, choose to continue testing, and do the chrooting, but there's no need for all the GRUB stuff (you simply put it on the USB stick during the installation).

Hope it helps!

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