Boot from USB on a Dell Inspiron 1300

[MonsterDog]

Thank's to MU for these posts :
http://www.murga.org/%7Epuppy/viewtopic.php?t=7764
http://www.murga.org/%7Epuppy/viewtopic.php?t=3342

This is just an attempt at a HOW-TO of what I learned there and elsewhere.

If you are having problems booting Puppy 1.xx from a flash drive this might be helpful. First of all, I am not a Linux expert. I can only say that this worked on my computer. Secondly, this is only for Puppy 1.xx and I have only tried this on versions 1.08 and 1.09.

My hardware: Dell Inspiron 1300 (B130, ME051), 512M ram, Intel 910/915 integrated graphics, Broadcom 440 integrated ethernet, Broadcom 4318 mini-PCI wireless(Dell 1370),256M SanDisk mini Cruzer and I-stick 128M flash drives. Both flash drives needed the HP USB format utility, none of the other methods could make these drives bootable. MbrTool worked on the I-stick but Puppy still couldn't boot from it.

My symptoms: Puppy doesn't recognize either of my flash drives when I boot from the Live CD. If I run "modprobe ehci-hcd" Puppy will recognize both drives. Adding that line to rc.local still doesn't let me boot from the flash drives.

Your thumb drive needs to be made bootable before you do this. I can't really help you with that. There are lots of threads on that subject. The HP USB format utility is magic, but almost impossible to find (there are thousands of dead links). I haven't tried this yet, but Puppy 2's universal installer has several options to make a usb flash drive bootable. BTW, Puppy 2.01 solves most of the problems with my laptop: USB, sound, ndiswrapper, touchpad all work in 2.01. If you don't need the features of 1.xx consider the newest Puppy.

For people comfortable with Linux:

You need to add the line "modprobe ehci-hcd" to rc.modules (right before "modprobe usb-storage") in image.gz. So run the wizard, expand and mount image.gz, edit rc.modules, compress and reboot. You're done.

For everyone else:

1) Boot from the live CD. Choose option 4 run totally in ram, no acpi.

2) Open a terminal window and type "modprobe ehci-hcd".

3) Run the Install Puppy USB Drive wizard. If you need to add boot parameters (if you have a B130 you probably do), edit syslinux.cfg when the wizard gives you the chance. I add "pci=noacpi acpi=noirq" to the parameters. I also changed the value of PSLEEP to 6. Save the file. Finish the wizard.

4) Use MUT to mount your flash drive. In the ROX window, right click and choose "Xterm Here". Type these three commands:

gunzip image.gz
mkdir /mnt/images
mount image /mnt/images -o loop

Leave the terminal window open.

5) Use ROX to navigate to /mnt/images/etc/rc.d. Right click on the file rc.modules choose "Open as Text". Add "modprobe ehci-hcd" right before the line "modprobe usb-storage" (it was line 154 in mine). Save and close the file.

6) Go back to the terminal window and type these two commands:

umount /mnt/images
gzip -9 image

7) Unmount anything you mounted (sda1) and reboot. When asked, save the file to your thumb drive. The computer should boot from the thumb drive if your bios settings are allright.

Hope this helps,
Jags

[cthisbear]

Here is the HP USB format utility site

http://h18000.www1.hp.com/support/files ... 23839.html

posted by me in one of Barrys' forums ...kernel panic, under Elmits' name.I hope that Elmit had a successful resolution to his problem.

San Disk support is woeful, my first cheapie USB had a format disc included, but San Disk - nothing,good luck. Useless site.
My cheapie could be seen in the bios but not boot so I finally got out my
old 98 computer - try anything I said, and, formatted the 256 USB with that as a boot disc and everything worked.

I also had success with my LG USB with the HP utility-as a bootable hard drive. Now boots Puppy 2.01 in about 60 seconds including Java and other saved files.

I am hoping to get back my friends SanDisk soon to see if the HP utility works. And of course there are Bios issues.They all seem to be different.

But Puppy seems to me about fixing up problems - never say die.
It's not that everyone has a win every time, but hey! wait a week or so
and wow!. To me with Puppy there is a lot of WoW from the BOW WOW.
The help on Barrys' forum, MUs' or otherPuppy sites is fantastic.

I had a problem myself yesterday, which I posted and after trying 5 or 6 other Distros to see if I could use a fix from them ..whch did not happen..
I am just impressed once again by the speed and simplicity.
Regards to everyone ---Chris

[MonsterDog]

Chris,

Thanks for posting that link here. I knew it was on the forum somewhere, but I couldn't find it again. I might try wiping out the cruzer later today and try Puppy 2's installer as I think that might work, making the HP utility unnecessary.
I would rather not have to boot MS every time I need to make a thumb drive bootable. Puppy's a lot faster to boot than MS anyway.

Thanks,
Jags