Acer Aspire One D 270 - problems installing from USB

Happily running 12.3 (via a USB stick), a while back I tried to upgrade to 13.1 (via a USB stick) but it kept defaulting to the command line. So I reverted.

Just tried to upgrade to 13.2 to see if things have got any better but they have actually got slightly worse.

Read/write on USB definitely working once booted to 12.3 but during an install/upgrade attempt (USB stick or external USB CD ROM) although I can get the install screen up, the keyboard is frozen for menu selection. Worse, it is now no longer possible to attempt to install 13.1 (so it’s not clear it’s a 13.2 problem)

F2 establishes boot order but F12 seems to suggest it’s still the internal SSD.

I’m thinking whip out the CMOS battery but wondered if that would have any effect or if there were other information?

Thank you

Totally unclear if you are trying to do an EFI install or an old legacy MBR install. Also did you check the check sum of the down load and how did you put the installer on the USB and you are using the full installer and not one of the live ones???

Not EFI (AAO too old), the downloads are sound, used on other installs, tried both full and live, SUSE studio