Install XUbuntu from CD without using graphical installer?
Solution 1:
The desktop CD doesn't come set up to use the text-based installer. The text-based installer is provided by the debian-installer package, but installing or adding that package to a desktop CD will not make it possible to install that way without substantial additional modifications.
This is because the graphical installer (Ubiquity) works primarily by copying the contents of the live CD's own squashfs image to disk, while the text-based installer works by chrooting into a bootstrapped minimal system and installing each package. These are fundamentally different approaches to designing an OS installer. (The "graphical" way requires a big squashfs image that takes up most of the CD. The "text-based" way requires lots of individual .deb package files that take up most of the CD.)
Therefore, you should use the Xubuntu 12.04 Alternate CD instead. This provides the text-based installer you want. 12.04 is the last version of Ubuntu (and its derivatives, like Xubuntu) to have an Alternate CD, so you wouldn't be able to install a later version from an Alternate CD. But this will work for 12.04 and earlier.
The current point release for 12.04 is 12.04.2; you should use that to install, or you'll install a very large number of old packages that will immediately need updating.
ISO images for Xubuntu 12.04.2 are located in:
- http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/xubuntu/releases/12.04.2/release/
For your convenience, here are some links:
- 32-bit alternate CD (torrent) | 64-bit alternate CD (torrent)
If you prefer, these are listed on the Xubuntu download page too.