Why doesn't the Ubuntu ISO burned to a CD or copied to a USB work on my Mac?

Question

I just installed a new hard drive and for the life of me, I cannot get the .iso file on my USB stick or burned CD to begin the installation process.

I keep getting a picture of a folder with a question mark on it....

Answer 1

Assuming you're burning/writing it correctly according to these instructions...

• How to burn a DVD on OS X
• How to create a bootable USB stick on OS X

...the problem might be that you're using the wrong ISO image.

• What is different about the Mac ISO image?

So, if you're trying to install the 64-bit version of Ubuntu on a Mac, you should use the special ISO image for that purpose. It is called the 64-bit Mac (AMD64) desktop CD.

• For Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, you can get it here.
• For Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, you can get it here.
• For Ubuntu 11.10, you can get it here.
• For Ubuntu 11.04, you can get it here.

Answer 2

• Just copying the ISO file to the USB, or burning the file to the CD will not work.

  • ISOs contain a CD image, and it's that image which needs to be burned to a CD or transferred to a USB.

• Please insert a blank CD and open Disk Utility to burn the ISO (the ISO will refuse to mount if you just double-click it)

• Or use Unetbootin to "burn" the image to a USB stick.

Answer 3

Make sure you have the entire ISO file downloaded. It should be 981MB. Twice I downloaded the iso from the site, but it wasn't the full file although there were no errors with the D/L or indications that it didn't complete.