MD5 checksum not matching

Question

I just downloaded ubuntu-14.04.1-desktop-amd64.iso from the official website and ran a MD5 checksum d2b966f36e76486ff4c83fb085557f97 which doesn't match any of the MD5 checksums listed at http://releases.ubuntu.com/14.04.1/MD5SUMS.

I checked the download link, it's http://ubuntu.excellmedia.net/releases/14.04.1/ubuntu-14.04.1-desktop-amd64.iso. Apparently Ubuntu's official website (which is where I initially went) chose the server for me because it's closest to me.

Is this a reliable server? Should I download from http://releases.ubuntu.com instead? Am I doing something wrong? Should I just download the file again?

Answer 1

I'd use the torrent to download the iso. The torrent clinet should do it's own verification too, and the iso should match the MD5 when it's done, and torrent's often faster.

http://www.ubuntu.com/download/alternative-downloads

Answer 2

When the md5 do not match you either got a bad (can happen) or a tainted (would be serously wrong) download and need to re-download the ISO.

I would always download from http://releases.ubuntu.com/ myself but it might be worth an attempt to redownload from excellmedia and see if you get the same hash from their file (if 2 times the same md5 I would assume it is not a bad download). Maybe they got a corrupted ISO and if that is the case I assume they would want to know about it.