is it when you start to boot the usb installation
or after the instalation ???
did you have another system running on same hdd
maybe old installation
or you have old files on your usb stick
pls try clean installation with formatted usb stick
and clean hdd with no old boot partition sometimes they are locked and can't read from gparted
only helps format and restart so partition is not loaded and can deleted
Also make sure you verify the image checksum to make sure it was downloaded correctly. If KDE works then GNOME should also work - while the DE is different the underlying operating system is exactly the same.