Did you reboot? There should have been an option to select Windows or
Ubuntu during the boot up.

did you use wubi or vmware or anything similar?

I think you misunderstood. Ubuntu doesn't run under Windows.
It replaces Windows usually. You can also repartition the disk
and have a system that can be booted into either Windows or Ubuntu.
And then there are other ways to use it also, naturally. Most people
who want to try it out download a live CD image and burn it to a CD
which requires an image burning application which is available off the
web also. Once you have the image on a burnable CD you need to make sure
you PC or Laptop can boot from the CD drive as the first choice. Put the
CD in the drive and restart the PC, it will boot from the CD and let you
try Ubuntu. If you then want to load it on you PC it will repartition
your drive and replace Windows ans the operating system. The other
option is to set it up as a dual boot system which I have not done yet.

Restart and you should see Ubuntu boot options.

When the computer starts you should see a boot menu which gives you the
choice between Windows and Ubuntu. It might not be onscreen for more than a
few seconds and therefore easy to miss. You can't see any "strange"
partitions from within Windows, because it doesn't recognize ext3 or any
other Linux partitions.

> I just tried to install the latest Ubuntu.

What source? That is - downloaded or mailed or from friend, etc.

> I can't see where it took

> I installed it within Windows.

You can not install Ubuntu within Windows. Ubuntu is NOT a Windows
program. It doesn't run under or in Windows.

> There is no Ubuntu program in Windows.

Ubuntu is a totally separate OS (Operating System). It is NOT a program.

> There is no Ubuntu on the task bar.

Ubuntu is NOT a task. It is an Operating System.

> There is nothing running other than Windows.

You can NOT run more than one Operating System at the same time. You
can run several OSs on one computer but NOT at the same time.

> I inspected the disks with Partition Magic

I don't know how you tried installing it, but you can NOT install it via
Windows. Therefore it is NOT installed and you will not find any
partitions.

> There is no .ext or other strange partition.

That is because you did not install it.

> How do I find or use Ubuntu?

You need to download the program (if you did not get a disk from some
other source) and burn it to disc.

Then place the disc in your drive and RESTART your computer. WINDOWS
should not boot up at all. Instead, Ubuntu should boot up. Then you
can use Ubuntu B*UT it is NOT yet installed. To install you need to use
the installation program on the Ubuntu desktop. Most everything is easy
after that but be VERY CAREFUL about the partitioning. You DON'T want
to wipe out your Windows installation.

You CAN install Ubuntu from with in Windows in at least three ways:

1) WUBI http://wubi-installer.org/

In this case it installs inside Widows onto the C drive with no partitioning
necessary but runs independent of Windows when you reboot.

2) Inside a VM using VirtualBox or VMWare

3) Portable Ubuntu which uses CoLinux and actually runs in Windows as an
application would without a VM. http://portableubuntu.demonccc.com.ar/

I suspect that he meant WUBI and did not complete the installation, not
realizing that while WUBI install inside Windows that it is not used in
Windows. To do that you need a VM or CoLinux.

Note this is a repeated posting. Something messed up an the original one may be
lost in cyberspace so pardon me if it shows up twice.
>
> You can not install Ubuntu within Windows. Ubuntu is NOT a Windows
> program. It doesn't run under or in Windows.
>

You CAN install Ubuntu from with in Windows in at least three ways:

1) WUBI http://wubi-installer.org/

In this case it installs inside Widows onto the C drive with no partitioning
necessary but runs independent of Windows when you reboot.

2) Inside a VM using VirtualBox or VMWare

3) Portable Ubuntu which uses CoLinux and actually runs in Windows as an
application would without a VM. http://portableubuntu.demonccc.com.ar/

I suspect that he meant WUBI and did not complete the installation, not
realizing that while WUBI install inside Windows that it is not used in Windows.
To do that you need a VM or CoLinux.

I down loaded the UBUNTU 9.4 from the web.
Then i made a cd of it.
Then I tried installing from the CD.
My take is the the download is corrupt.
Therefore does not install.
I tried the CD in a different computer and it is not recognized there.
I will wait till the CD comes in the mail and try again then.

The Ubuntu download is a CD image. If you copy the file to a CD, you don't get
anything useful. You have to use software which can "burn the image to a disc."
Nero is a Windows program which can do this; it's under "copy and backup" on the
version I have.

The result is a CD with a bunch of files on it, not one file.

I used Nero to burn the ISO image to the CD.
A review of the ISO shows there are 100s of files within the folder.

I am a newbie but let me give you my thoughts and perhaps it will help or give
you some idea. The CD image I downloaded was an .iso (image). What I did was
download a Windows program (ISORecorder). The ISORecorder was used to burn the
.iso file to a CD so you could use the CD. Try to google "ISORecorder".

Hope I am on the right track and that helps you.

when you created a CD from your MS Windows CD image creating program did
you create the CD as a .iso image or a data CD?

The image on the CD of Ubuntu 9.04 should be an .iso image.

Of course you can install inside windows. It a progrsan called Wubi .
Its on the ubuntu 8.4 CD and 9 CD. It installs just like a folder and
can be uninstalled like a windowes program .It uses the Grub loader.

I finally found what it used as user and password.
Now my problem is that when I use it and it goes in sleep mode and comes
back up the screen is unreadable.
It is like all the letters were scrubbed and blurred.
What the heck is going on?

You can use wubi, which is a Windows programme on the CD, to install Ubuntu
from within Windows. You then choose the operating system from the boot
menu.

I finally rebooted a third time and UBUNTU loads.
Next problem.
It is asking for a user and password.
I did not enter anything during the install.
But all it keeps saying "Wrong user or password"
I hate this stuff.
I never entered anything in Windows either.
But W boots fine.
Do I have to do a new install and enter something?
Or can I find what they want for the user and password?

DUDE Ubuntu isn't windows the reason it asks your for a user name and password
is for security purposes at the set up you should have done that wipe your drive
and set it up right and stop complaining Ubuntu is a great system to use and
safe use everything it gives you windows wont.
I use it and i set it up right and never had a problem using a user name and
pass wont kill you.

If you did not provide a user name and password in Ubuntu when you installed
it then you need to re-install Ubuntu. The password is given before the
installation process begins, so it sounds like something messed up. This is
not the usual experience, so give it another try and it will likely work
properly.

Maybe its a bug then. I had to reinstall three times last time because
it never asked for a password/username the first two, but installed
anyway. And this was NOT via Windows.

I finally found what it used as user and password.
Now my problem is that when I use it and it goes in sleep mode and comes
back up the screen is unreadable.
It is like all the letters were scrubbed and blurred.
What the heck is going on?

Your experience thus far is far from normal. It definitely should not go
into sleep mode right away and the screen should be readable. Try turning
off the power saving features. Go to System, Preferences, Screensaver and
click on the Power Management button. However, it may not be sleep mode that
you are seeing but a graphics driver problem. It may be trying a graphics
mode, but it isn't working and then defaulting back to something low res
that should work but isn't.

Did you install from the Live CD? Did Ubuntu work fine in Live mode? Did you
try everything to make sure that it worked by running off the CD?

If your problems continue we will need to know more about your computer to
be able to help further. Make and model would be nice. Amount of RAM, drive
specifics and graphics card make would help. Someone is bound to have the
same computer as you and will be able to help troubleshoot your problem.
Please be patient.

A while back I was playing with resolution sizes in GRUB, You know -
those VGA=305 type things. Anyway, when booting up, if it didn't
understand the resolution it would halt and ask. However, when I went to
shutdown it would go back and grab the line from menu.lst and the screen
would all be screwed up. Do you have any type of custom resolution or
font anywhere (outside a standard application) that might be being
looked at when the computer comes out of sleep?

During the install, you had to put a password in twice. The name would
be the Windows account name, all lower case.

Well, kind of. I'm guessing Sam's trying to install Wubi. Per Wikipedia,

"Wubi adds an entry to the Windows boot menu which allows the user to
run Linux. Ubuntu is installed within a file in the Windows file system
(c:\ubuntu\disks\root.disk), as opposed to being installed within its
own partition. This file is seen by Linux as a real hard disk. [1] Wubi
also creates a swap file in the Windows file system (c:\ubuntu\disks
\swap.disk), in addition to the memory of the host machine. This file is
seen by Ubuntu as additional RAM."

The Partition Magic result (no ext partition) would be consistent with
that.

So, I'd ask the user to look on boot up and see if there's an option
when booting to boot Ubuntu. If not, he might check for the directory c:
\ubuntu\... If that's not there, then I'd say the install failed. But
it's not entirely correct to say that Ubuntu isn't a task within
Windows. It sort of isn't, but Wubi blurs the distinction between OS and
program.

If Sam's trying to install it to a separate partition, then Emil's
right: You need to reboot and tell the machine to boot first from the CD
(this may take opening the BIOS menu and changing the order of boot
devices, or may be a hotkey option while the system is booting. There
are too many different machines to give all the possible options). If
the CD was burned properly from the *.iso file that was downloaded (that
is, burned so the CD shows a directory with a number of files, not a
single .iso file), it will boot up to a menu with options to boot the
Live CD or to test the system.

After trying the Live CD and making sure everything works (e.g., all
hardware is recognized), if you want to install, there's an icon on the
Live CD desktop to do that.