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So, as I thought it was something about the (scuffed) flash drive I was using, working now from a different one.

Yeah, hash looks good though

No I have not checked the hash as I wasn't sure how to do it, but I suspect it wouldn't help. Anyway I'll try that.
I'm not sure what you mean by 'method', I wrote about it in the first paragraph.
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I've searched and can't seem to find a fix for this anywhere, so this post is kind of my last resort.
I've got the latest version (2018.1 amd64) and have successfully created a bootable usb drive,...