New install, no Kodi. Just getting a login prompt

[Lemonsquare]

I've got an old Cubox-i2w and I'm trying to make it work with a fresh install. Writing to the micro SD card was super easy with the installer (thanks for that), but when I start up my Cubox it spends a long time trying to start Kodi and then kicks me to a login prompt. (4 GB micro SD, wireless network, connected to TV via HDMI)

There are several posts in the forum already with similar problems, so I have tried: checking /var/log/upstart/xbmc-preload.log - I can't read the file. "sudo nano xbmc-preload.log" gives me an input/output error, I don't know what's going on with this.

I tried deleting the /home/xbian/.kodi directory but this doesn't exist for me, I assume because I haven't been able to get Kodi to run yet. I do not have another similar device that I can import this directory from.

I tried checking for bad blocks on the micro SD card, but haven't found a good way to do that in btrfs. I can't rule out this possibility, it's an old card. So I got another newer card (32 GB) and tried it on that, same result. I have greater confidence in this second card, but it's technically possible that they could both have bad blocks.

I don't have any more things to try, but I'll do whatever. If anyone has any ideas about the log file, I don't know why I can't read it.