Ubuntu – Can’t install 16.04.5 LTS on Dell Precision 5820

Try this to gather more information:

1. Download the USB flash drive or CD-R image for my rEFInd boot manager.
2. Create the relevant medium.
3. Boot with it. With any luck, you should see the rEFInd menu pop up, which should show an option to boot Ubuntu.
4. Boot Ubuntu.
5. In Ubuntu, open a Terminal window and type sudo efibootmgr -v.

The efibootmgr output will show your boot entries. Here's what it shows on the computer I'm using now:

$ sudo efibootmgr -v
BootCurrent: 0000
Timeout: 1 seconds
BootOrder: 0000
Boot0000* rEFInd (direct)   HD(2,c00,114000,6e49fcaf-d054-47c9-ba69-a668c5ee8192)File(\EFI\refind\refind_x64.efi)
Boot0004* UEFI: Built-in EFI Shell  Vendor(5023b95c-db26-429b-a648-bd47664c8012,)..BO

In your case, you should see at least one ubuntu entry that points to either \EFI\ubuntu\grubx64.efi or \EFI\ubuntu\shimx64.efi. There may well be other entries, like the UEFI: Built-in EFI Shell entry in this example. Furthermore, the ubuntu entry's number should appear on the BootOrder line as the first value. (My output doesn't show precisely what I've described because I'm using rEFInd, not GRUB, as my default boot program, and I don't even have GRUB registered on this system. The Ubuntu Shim/GRUB entry would be similar to my rEFInd entry, though.)

If you do not see such an entry, you can try creating a new entry with efibootmgr:

sudo efibootmgr -c -d /dev/sda -p 1 -l \\EFI\\ubuntu\\shimx64.efi -L "ubuntu"

Adjust the disk (-d /dev/sda), partition (-p 1), and the exact path to the file for what your system uses. There are also ways to do this using other tools; see this page for more information.

If you already see such an entry but it's not working, or if the entry you create disappears whenever you reboot, then chances are your firmware is broken. Workarounds are possible in such cases, such as installing the boot loader as EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi. In some cases, using bcfg from an EFI shell works even when efibootmgr in Linux doesn't work, so it may be worth trying that approach.

I had the same problem: Dell M6800, nvidia graphics, and 512 GB SSD, but 16GB RAM, and no extra hard disks.

I have tried booting ubuntu 14.04.03 and kubuntu 15.10. I have found that if I use CTRL-ALT-F1 to switch to the text console at the right moment, the system will survive for however long. As soon as I let it get to Gnome or KDE desktop, the system hangs.

Once I managed to switch back to text console, and the console was displaying error messages about CPU stalls.

What helped was this: When you boot from the CD (or USB key, same procedure), first press shift to interrupt the automatic boot.

You get asked to choose language, then you are at the screen where you can choose "try without installing", "install", etc.

Use arrow keys to move to "try without installing", press F6, you get a list of kernel options.

Press escape, this closes the list, but now you have the boot line listed.

Move to the end of the line, erase the "quiet splash --" part.

Add the words "nomodeset nouveau.noaccel=1".

Press enter, and the system should now boot and the GUI will work.

Note that you will need to go into settings->Software & updates -> Additional drivers and enable the broadcom driver to get the wireless working.

You will need to use the proprietary Nvidia driver to get accelerated graphics. Nouveau opensource driver causes CPU stall when it is accelerated. If you insist on using the opensource driver, you will have to permanently use noaccel=1, and I assume that will slow everything down.