How to Make a Bootable Flash Drive using ISObooter

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nooby
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#61 Post by nooby »

I have slitaz and Zorin on a 1GB but I have Pearl on a 2GB
and embarrassingly I failed to remember to change the map
thing and it booted nevertheless. It does allow me to edit and
same a html file on the HD despite me booted from usb?

Is that normal for a Ubuntu style OS they usally want su or sudo?

Within an hour or so I will try two different Fedora
and Opensuse and a few others. Now back to the laundry
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rcrsn51
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#62 Post by rcrsn51 »

nooby wrote: I have Pearl on a 2GB and embarrassingly I failed to remember to change the map thing and it booted nevertheless.
Are you using the latest version of ISObooter?

It now automatically inserts the "--heads=0 --sectors-per-track=0" code with all ISOs.

Open the menu.lst file in a text editor to check this.

nooby
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#63 Post by nooby »

Yes now that I took home the even more latest
then it actually do add that text

OpenSuse, Fedora and PCLinuxOS booted but none of them
had adobe flash so will not keep them I am choosy that way.
Youtube a must for me.

ProteusOS, ZorinOS, CrunchbangOS, PureOS all these do have Flash for Youtube. netrunner maybe too but have not tested latest.
Some have Firefox and others have Chrome as browser.
What else can I test :) So may to chose from
Last edited by nooby on Tue 12 Feb 2013, 15:22, edited 5 times in total.
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rcrsn51
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#64 Post by rcrsn51 »

nooby wrote: I guess I should download the isobooter and try again?
Yes. The version posted right now has this feature.

gcmartin

Re: the RAM based sda4

#65 Post by gcmartin »

rcrsn51 wrote:
Is this ro mount suppose to hang around during the life of system operation? Is it required or merely an aid in booting?
Yes and Yes. But Postfs1 pointed out that this "feature" could have another use. It would be handy to have the ISO already unpacked if you wanted to do a remaster.
Yeah, I could see that use, but, I been monitoring the system for any other use upon desktop arrival, and I cannot see any. I do understand the boot benefit. After boot, I wonder if the RAM that is tied up could be better used.

I'll delete and see, if there are any obvious detrimental hazards.

Here to help

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rcrsn51
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Re: the RAM based sda4

#66 Post by rcrsn51 »

gcmartin wrote:After boot, I wonder if the RAM that is tied up could be better used.
Sdb4 is just an entry in the partition table. Puppy detects it because it is part of the USB drive. But there is no significant RAM used by its existence.
I'll delete and see, if there are any obvious detrimental hazards.
Are you planning to do this through Gparted?

gcmartin

Re: the RAM based sda4

#67 Post by gcmartin »

rcrsn51 wrote:Are you planning to do this through Gparted?
Check for PM.

nooby
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#68 Post by nooby »

rcrsn51 I wrote a comment on trueriver thread here?

How to multi-boot Puppy and other Linuxes on same USB
http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=84314

I have now read it and it is way too complicated for me to use
but I got curious on the check of a site it does on internet.

Does your Isobooter also look up things on internet and
would bark loud or not work if my LAN are not there?
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trueriver
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Re: bootin on old pc without usb support?

#69 Post by trueriver »

pacer106 wrote:does this method of booting from a usb flash stick work on a pc that does not support booting from a usb device?

i really am interested in figuring out how to boot from my usb key on a few old boxes that dont have cd drive or floppy drive.

thanks in advance :)
Hi

apologies if my suggestion has alread been posted: I have had a quick scan through the thread but may have missed something.

If you have a bootable USB key, you can often boot that on a computer that boots Linux even if you do not have bios support.

The trick is to put the relevant stanzas into the boot config on that machine, so that the machine's internal bootloader chainloads the MBR of the USB stick. That way the BIOS boots what it knows, and the installed bootloader does the next step.

If your internal hard drive boots using grub2 I can't help you with the exact commands (I only know legacy grub and grub4dos) but I do know it is possible. Sometimes the BIOS is unpredictable about what to call the usb stick and you have to include several stanzas, one for each possibility.

Sorry, I can't help you with the details but I hope this idea gets you started

Of course it won't help at all if the internal HDD has died...
Last edited by trueriver on Mon 11 Feb 2013, 21:18, edited 1 time in total.

trueriver
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#70 Post by trueriver »

nooby wrote:So what other Linux OS should I try?
Do try WattOS. It is an Ubuntu derived version that is smaller than Ubuntu and good for older machines. It has some innovations that Puppy does not.

(for example it uses a compressed swap device residing entirely in memory - so when you swap out 4Mb it compresses into say 2Mb and there is a net gain of 2Mb -- this is faster in practice than using a swap partition on a USB stick as the compression is faster than a flash write -- and it does not wear out your drive).

It uses the Ubuntu repositories directly (ie through Synaptic/apt/dpkg) which for some people adds the advantage of familiarity.

It is faster than Puppy some of the time, but on balance probably slower than Puppy more often.

Overall it is definitely not as compact as Puppy, though, and I have not yet discovered how to do peristence from the iso.

Just a thought. I won't be offended if you hate it
River~~

nooby
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#71 Post by nooby »

I will give it a try.

If you have the time would be cool to read your experience
if you test out what rcrsn51 set up with his IsoBoot which to me
is much easier than both Easy2Boot and your manual method
but that could be my Nooby way to see it so could you compare?

I gave link to it somewhere. or check my profile and my other posts
and you find it very easily.

I am using watts now that one works good so thanks for encouraging
me to try it out. Much appreciated.
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nooby
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#72 Post by nooby »

A hasty report. Most or all of the Ubuntu derivatives
works best using this method. Even some Debians
seems to allow what Ubuntu allow. To edit HTML files
and to save them and to download a Puppy file
from Murga onto the HD. Usually such would require sudo
or similar trick.

but some OS fail to mount the HD. Not permitted it says.

Manjaro seems to be such a OS but it could be me
that fail to do it right.

Manjaro seems to allow root so maybe one should
open up Terminal and write root and then password
manjaro and then it allow to reach the HD but I am
too lazy to find out. So if some of you get curious
do test it.
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rcrsn51
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#73 Post by rcrsn51 »

The following instructions explain how to set up a Puppy ISObooter flash drive from another Linux like Ubuntu or Mint.

1. Run Gparted. Format the flash drive as fat32. Set the boot flag.
2. Copy the Puppy ISO file onto the flash drive. Rename it as linux.iso.
3. Download ISObooter-Linux.tar.gz (attached below) to your home directory and extract it.
4. Open the new ISObooter-Linux folder.
5. Copy three files onto the flash drive - grldr, isobooter and menu.lst. It should now contain four files.
6. Inside the ISObooter-Linux folder, open a terminal.
7. Run the command: sudo fdisk -l
8. Identify the device name of your flash drive, like /dev/sdb. Be sure about this! Don't pick your hard drive!
9. Run: sudo ./bootlace.com --time-out=0 /dev/sdb
10.Run: sudo sync
11.Close the terminal, unmount the flash drive and shut down.
12.Boot off the flash drive.

-------------------------
Attachments
ISObooter-Linux.tar.gz
(128.83 KiB) Downloaded 646 times
Last edited by rcrsn51 on Sat 05 Oct 2019, 15:36, edited 14 times in total.

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Mike7
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#74 Post by Mike7 »

Hi again, Rok

I am joining this thread, too.

Sorry, but I am a little confused. You wrote:
The new ISObooter method is much simpler than the original GRUB2 method. 

But please use it on a USB drive. The hard drive method requires a separate partition, and I don't think that you have one. 

1. Plug in your USB drive. 

2. Run Gparted from the System menu. Select your USB drive. 

3. Right-click on the current partition and reformat it to FAT32. 

4. Right-click again and set the Boot flag. 

Then follow the steps for ISObooter.
Question:

If I am running Puppeee on one pendrive, and want to install a different distro onto another pendrive, then I will have to have three pendrives plugged into my computer, is that right? (You said to put ISObooter onto a separate USB drive.)

Cheers!

Mike

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rcrsn51
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#75 Post by rcrsn51 »

No. Two pen drives. The one you are currently booting from and the one you are setting up with ISObooter.

ISObooter is ONE file. It goes on the pen drive you are setting up.

gcmartin

An Alternative Guide to assist ISObooter setup

#76 Post by gcmartin »

This Guide may be helpful to some in understanding the ISObooter service.

All of the work for ISObooter and the instructions you see there results from the work of @Rcrsn51. But, the guide is aimed to assist understanding.

Post any comments there.

Here to help
Last edited by gcmartin on Mon 25 Feb 2013, 02:19, edited 1 time in total.

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Mike7
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#77 Post by Mike7 »

Okay, I get it now: ISObooter goes onto the pendrive where the new distro goes.

I am a little thick sometimes. I appreciate your patience.

Cheers!

Mike

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Mike7
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#78 Post by Mike7 »

Thanks for the Guide, GCMartin. Very helpful for slow learners like me {grin}.

Mike

nooby
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#79 Post by nooby »

Rcrsn51 did you notice that Scooby had added
a new most easy version to the easy2boot thread?

Alternative 0 link http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=83583

your version works very good. I really love it but
it does fail on a few isos. Could be how them set it up
so nothing wrong with your isobooter.

I should have taken a note but I am bad at such .Too impulsive
and I hate to fail at things so I delete and forget what it was.

I hink one of them where Antix so if you have time to test it
that would be cool. Or maybe you could tell me to test it again?
if it is important to find out exactly what goes wrong.

One iso that failed was looking for a font and could not find it.
Rather odd error message that one. :)

One thing that would be cool to know is how to add casper-rw
files that makes a live OS able to save changes.
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rcrsn51
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#80 Post by rcrsn51 »

nooby wrote:One thing that would be cool to know is how to add casper-rw files that makes a live OS able to save changes.
If you want persistent storage with Ubuntu, go back to the instructions on Page 1. Use Grub4Dos instead of GRUB2 as the bootloader.

Remember that the casper method does not use a save file. You need an entire partition for storage.

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