Q:

Installer hangs when selecting full disk encryption

I'm doing a fresh install of Ubuntu 15.04. On the "Installation type" screen, I select "Erase disk and install Ubuntu" and then check "Encrypt the new Ubuntu installation for security", which causes "Use LVM with the new Ubuntu installation" to be automatically checked. I click "Continue" and am asked to choose an encryption key, which I do. I leave "Overwrite empty disk space" unchecked and click "Install Now".
And then the installer hangs with no error message. The rest of the system is still responsive, but all the buttons on the installer grey out and nothing happens. I've let it sit for hours with no movement.
I tried running the installer from the command line to see if there was any useful output, but no debug messages appeared.
Has anyone encountered this before? Is there a workaround?

A:

I submitted this question to the System76 support team and they very quickly came up with a solution that worked for me. This is the main reason I bought from a vendor that pre-installs Linux and I have to say it has paid off.
When the installer boots up, select "Try Ubuntu". After the desktop loads, open a terminal and run:
sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda status=progress

Then start the installation normally.
Note that I already had tried removing the old partitions that were on the drive before running the installer but that was not enough. I had to overwrite the drive with 0s first. Selecting the option to "Overwrite empty disk space" during the install might have also worked but I don't plan on testing that.

