BOOT-ability & USB (outline)

What works, and doesn't, for you. Be specific, and please include Puppy version.
Message
Author
User avatar
walter90
Posts: 282
Joined: Wed 26 Aug 2009, 03:53
Location: Pennsylvania, USA

#16 Post by walter90 »

I installed my first puppy onto a USB flash drive. I installed clean, meaning I just plugged it in and installed. No setting boot flags or anything. It booted just fine until it over-heated one day and fried.
I installed to another USB flash drive, set the boot flag and all that but it would never boot by itself. If I put in the live cd it boots up and the cd remains unmounted so I can use the cd device.
I run 4 puppies now and all of them I boot from USB with the disk in the drive.
FYI, I copy all the extra .sfs files onto the USB when prompted.

I saw another guy had the same situation. A post above(woodeye18) may explain it. Any ideas?

nooby
Posts: 10369
Joined: Sun 29 Jun 2008, 19:05
Location: SwedenEurope

Re: "USB DISK 2.0" once booted, now it doesn't..tried

#17 Post by nooby »

woodeye18 wrote:I picked up a few 128mb usb thumbdrives at a trade show, all identical. I loaded puppy 2.0 alpha and it booted fine many times. I put in another one of these thumbdrives and booted it not realizing that this particular one still had the old "non bootable" data from the trade show (i.e catalogs, news releases, photos of new products, etc.) and it tried to boot off of it and sat there at the bios screen while the thumdrive blinked. I pulled it out and put the bootable one in its place and it no longer booted.

I reformated it and it still would not boot. It bypasses it and goes to windows. I removed all other devices from boot order and changed "boot from other device" to disable, it says no boot device. So I took my old thumbdrive (different maker-memorhigh) and loaded puppy on it, boots every time. I loaded puppy on my other 2 "USB DISK 2.0" thumdrives, and none of them boot.

Still, if I put one of these unformatted Thumbdrives in, the bios tries to boot and sits at the bios screen while the drive blinks. Only after being loaded with puppy does it get bypassed.

What is causing these once bootable USB drives to be quickly bypassed by my system?
this is an interesting thing I hope those who have clues on it could expand on.

I ahve a 60GB harddrive that behave even worse than this. It even fail to show up as bootable. Cloaked or Stealth mode whatever.
I use Google Search on Puppy Forum
not an ideal solution though

User avatar
Burn_IT
Posts: 3650
Joined: Sat 12 Aug 2006, 19:25
Location: Tamworth UK

#18 Post by Burn_IT »

Usb drives are notoriously tricky when it comes to booting.
The format(not Format command) of flash drives is NOT standardised so there are at least three formats that are used.
1) the easy one is if it emulates a hard drive and all hard drive functions are supported. These will have standard partition tables and will be fully bootable and will appear by default as drive C: or greater under MS Windows.
2) some emulate a superfloppy such as a ZIP or Omega drive and have a single partition and don't have a partition table and have a boot bit available. Can appear as A: or B: under Windows
3) others emulate a superfloppy and don't have a boot bit. Can appear as A: or B: under Windows
4) some smaller ones even emulate a standard floppy - with or without a boot bit. Appear as A: or B:

If that was it then it would be relatively easy, but not all BIOSs cope with theses different formats. And even worse some flash drives can be forced to change what they emulate.
I have drives of all four emulations and fortunately a BIOS/Machine that recognises them all and behaves accordingly.

And just to confuse the most clever BIOS, most machines don't check what format the drive supports and just writes what it likes.


PLoP (like grub but more powerful) will 'boot' a non bootable USB flash from a bootable device (disk,floppy,CD/DVD)

Whether a device is bootable(not whether it boots or not which is the MBR) is defined by a bit in a normally protected area, but there are utilities which can try to flip that bit deliberately (and no doubt some that do it without knowing)
"Just think of it as leaving early to avoid the rush" - T Pratchett

slowdog
Posts: 12
Joined: Sun 23 Jan 2011, 09:39

Full install from a usb?

#19 Post by slowdog »

Well, I know I'm getting close but I have CD issues with a machine, It wont' recognise any CD that I try to install.

Details: 333Mhz CPU
3 GB Hdd had win 98 - all gone now!
installed Wary 5 on USB using wakepup floppy.
320 mb of ram

I can see that there is a choice to install from CD which I don't have access to, and the other choice is from directories.

So the question is... Can I install this on to the hdd and get it to boot from the HDD? I really don't know what I'm doing with the directories!!!

I'm on the net with it now... and it all seems good, but I would rather get it onto HDD so I can get a one button or simple install so that it can be used in my school. It doesn't seem to save changes to the usb when I shut down either... or at least it's taking far too long.

Thanks in advance for any help or suggestions you can offer me.

slowdog

nooby
Posts: 10369
Joined: Sun 29 Jun 2008, 19:05
Location: SwedenEurope

#20 Post by nooby »

slowdog I feel unsure about if enough people who wants to help realize that you ask such a question in this old thread.

I rather trust you get more people involved if you start in the beginners place and ask about it there?

Rcrsn51 has a good description on how to get a USB with puppy on it.
Then you could use that one to get a frugal or full install on the HDD using that usb install.

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 412#413412

His description should work if one already have a running Puppy.

So you have to boot up the wary 5 on one usb and then using that one to make a frugal install or full install on the HDD?

is that not what you want. I would try a frugal install first.

You should be able to use the description that Shinobar have on how to use grub4dosconfig to do a frugal install on the HDD and then boot from that one later.

http://shino.pos.to/linux/puppy/grub4dosconfig.html

If wary 5 don't have grub4dosconfig then there should be a link on the forum thread for grub4dosconfig.
I use Google Search on Puppy Forum
not an ideal solution though

slowdog
Posts: 12
Joined: Sun 23 Jan 2011, 09:39

usb to HDD

#21 Post by slowdog »

Well, if the thread is too old, I'm glad you found it Ha!

Thankk you for the links, normally I go on chat and get some advice there, but I seem to be having difficulty getting on it at the moment.

I hope the links will help, I can not get windows to boot from these machines as I have no way of booting it - it goes through a network that no longer exists and I have no Windows OS disks, so I really want puppy to take over the machine totally. I'm hoping to get a full install into it.

User avatar
rjbrewer
Posts: 4405
Joined: Tue 22 Jan 2008, 21:41
Location: merriam, kansas

#22 Post by rjbrewer »

A link on how to do a full install:

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 782#201565

If running from the booted usb, click on the icon to mount the files
when running the universal installer.

Inspiron 700m, Pent.M 1.6Ghz, 1Gb ram.
Msi Wind U100, N270 1.6>2.0Ghz, 1.5Gb ram.
Eeepc 8g 701, 900Mhz, 1Gb ram.
Full installs

Pelo

USB hardware : Google Lego USB stick for christmas

#23 Post by Pelo »

Further info : i make OSMO a database for my USB sticks Puppy should renew Wikki files. USB sticks are much more used in 2014.
Puppy installed in USB is much faster than CD, and less dangerous than HD.
Puppy is a mobile distro, isn'it ?
Attachments
téléchargement.jpg
(4.58 KiB) Downloaded 875 times
Last edited by Pelo on Tue 17 Jun 2014, 07:28, edited 4 times in total.

User avatar
otropogo
Posts: 764
Joined: Sat 24 Oct 2009, 15:17
Location: Montreal
Contact:

Puppy USBflash boot on UEFI PCs

#24 Post by otropogo »

Has anyone had success in booting Puppy on a UEFI BIOS PC? I've tried my standard live-CD and usbflash installs of lupuplus 5.2.8-05, and had no success.

Knoppix 7.2 boots fine however, once the UEFI BIOS is properly configured.
otropogo@gmail.com facebook.com/otropogo

Pelo

Obsolete Wikka Compatible Device USB

#25 Post by Pelo »

Devices USB
Table should be usefull if filled

musher0
Posts: 14629
Joined: Mon 05 Jan 2009, 00:54
Location: Gatineau (Qc), Canada

Re: Obsolete Wikka Compatible Device USB

#26 Post by musher0 »

Pelo wrote:Devices USB
Table should be usefull if filled
It should indeed be useful -- except the thumb drives, USB sticks, pen drives
(however you want to call them) mentioned there are really out of date...
musher0
~~~~~~~~~~
"You want it darker? We kill the flame." (L. Cohen)

Pelo

Maintenance tools : updating

#27 Post by Pelo »

Maintenance tools : updating
No need to create new tools, these ones are enough. If anyone can help in fulfilling them. çà ne se fera pas à grand coups de philosophie.
Only headquaters can either update records or let users get free access to the spreadsheet.
There is of the carelessness and the documentation is abandoned, annihilating the efforts of those who created it.
Obsolete : easy, but why ?
Bristish Puppies need some peones (pionniers) again.

Pelo

Should be translated to french

#28 Post by Pelo »

Should be translated to french, to help our puplets makers with boot problems. Bookmarked

User avatar
Burn_IT
Posts: 3650
Joined: Sat 12 Aug 2006, 19:25
Location: Tamworth UK

#29 Post by Burn_IT »

In all the research I did into USB drives many years ago, none of the drives distinguished between OSs when booting or not or even working or not.

The only thing that was in the least significant was what type of drive the device emulated.
Hard Disk
Floppy
Or superfloppy
and whether the bit (as in data bit) that controls booting was accessible and modifiable.
"Just think of it as leaving early to avoid the rush" - T Pratchett

hamoudoudou

Has anyone had success in booting Puppy on a UEFI BIOS PC?

#30 Post by hamoudoudou »

otropogo questions
Has anyone had success in booting Puppy on a UEFI BIOS PC?
Our canadian friend never got answer. Everybody can boot Puppy from an UEFI BIOS PC. Mine is too old.. UEFI has been added in Puppy's boot system.

Post Reply