# Can't run node-red

**URL:** <https://discourse.nodered.org/t/cant-run-node-red/2019>\
**Category:** General\
**Created:** [2 August 2018 23:59 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/cant-run-node-red/2019 "2018-08-02T23:59:08Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 30

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**Author:** ![dceejay](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/dceejay/32/38_2.png) [@dceejay](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/dceejay)\
**Post date:** [26 June 2020 08:08 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/cant-run-node-red/2019/30 "2020-06-26T08:08:18Z")

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Well by default the script looks to see if you have node already installed and if it "looks ok" (ie responds to node -v with a suitable number) then the script leaves it alone to save time - and we don't want to force a new install on folk who may have a stable working version. It can't tell (afaik) that the sd card has just been plugged into a new box as it doesn't have any history.

Of course there may indeed be ways round these - but whether they are viable or not would need investigation for what is a rather small edge case. Especially when the actual issue is due to the underlying OS and node.js itself and not Node-RED per se.

The other thing to bear in mind (going forwards) is that Arm6 is getting less and less support - the only nodejs builds currently are unofficial ones - [https://unofficial-builds.nodejs.org/](https://unofficial-builds.nodejs.org/) so while we do our best to make it look easy sometimes you'll have to work it out yourself.

If it's really a big problem then I'm sure we would be happy to accept a pull request if someone spares the time to investigate.

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_[View the full topic](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/cant-run-node-red/2019)._