On dual-GPU laptops, installer does not finish properly (skips firstboot, missing Qubes tools and templates) and has flashing visual glitches on screen

[the-moog]

How to file a helpful issue

Qubes OS release

4.2

Brief summary

At the end of the install you expect to be asked about what qubes to create, that does not happen.
The bottom of the installer is 'flashing randomly'
When you login most of qubes and it's tools are missing, no LAN, no apps.

Steps to reproduce

Install Qubes on certain systems, I think this is related to dual GPU laptops (Bumblebee/Optimus)

Expected behavior

Normal install

Actual behavior

At the end of the install you expect to be asked about what qubes to create, that does not happen.
The bottom of the installer is 'flashing randomly'
When you login most of qubes and it's tools are missing, no LAN, no apps.

Root cause?? - Needs confirmation.

I've gone through and think I have found the cause.
There are scripts in /usr/libexec/initial-setup which I assume are the scripts called before the first proper graphical login.

The issue is that if you have certain NVidia Graphics chips, (for reasons I can't explain or find how to disable) X11 tries to load libbd_nvdimm.so.2 and the rpm that contains this this is missing from the install media.

That causes X11 startup to partially fail, but the script tries to carry on anyway, a bit later on Python fails as it tries to evaluate "None".
What is weird is that the later graphical login works, so there must be a config difference between the installer xstart and the login xstart.

The flashing was this happening at a high rate, but the installer does not check the result so rather than reporting an error it allows you to press 'done'

When you reboot and login you have a generic Fedora running on Zen with most of Qubes missing.

[marmarek]

That causes X11 startup to partially fail, but the script tries to carry on anyway, a bit later on Python fails as it tries to evaluate "None".

Can you please post the full message (or a photo of it)?

[the-moog]

I am not sure how I could capture this during a normal install, (one of the errors being long file not found as it's an incomplete filesystem on a ram disk) but I can run it manually after the install and capture that, if indeed my assumptions on how the install works are correct?

[DemiMarie]

I am not sure how I could capture this during a normal install, (one of the errors being long file not found as it's an incomplete filesystem on a ram disk) but I can run it manually after the install and capture that, if indeed my assumptions on how the install works are correct?

Can you see the error on screen? If so, then taking a picture and uploading the picture would be sufficient.

Also, is it possible to disable the Nvidia GPU in the BIOS? That might be a workaround.