On Mon, 2006-10-09 at 16:38 -0600, Michael L Torrie wrote: > On Mon, 2006-10-09 at 16:30 -0600, Sean Kirkby wrote: > > Hello, > > > > I am looking for suggestions re: what distro to use to install on a 2.0 GiB > > USB thumb drive. > > > > In addition to support for booting from the thumb drive on machines with > > BIOS's that allow that, we also need to have a boot floppy that can boot > > into an environment in which "/" is on the thumb drive. > > > > I have found lots of references to DSL and Knoppix, but the weak > > instructions I've been able to find haven't worked so far... > > I was once going to work out a way to get my usb backup disk to be > bootable over usb. Never got it working. But here's what you'd have to > do on the linux side:
I remember now some of the snags I ran into. First was even though I told mkbookdisk (Fedora Core here) to include the usb storage driver, the linuxrc script inside the ramdisk was not loading the driver, even though it was in the package. I modified the linuxrc file, repacked the cpio ramdisk, but it still didn't work. The kernel panicked when it tried to do the root pivot. I believe the error was something about /dev/root not existing. It's been a while. I just use the vmplayer approach for now. > > - make sure /etc/fstab points to the proper devices (ie /dev/hda1 is > probably not correct) > - make sure the initial ramdisk has the usb drivers in it so that the > kernel can find the root file system > - use mkbootdisk to make a bootable floppy drive > > In the end I just made a special vmware player image that referred to > the entire USB device (under windows) in raw mode, and then just made > sure I had the scsi drivers in the initrd. Grub is written to the boot > sector of the usb disk and vmware makes it seem like it's a normal scsi > disk. > > > > > Any suggestions? > > > > Thanks. > > > > --sk. > > > > ======================== > > Sean Kirkby > > Concentrico, Inc. > > P: (801) 221-7606 x204 > > W: www.Concentrico.net > > -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= > > GroupWise and Linux > > to the Nth Power > > - Formativ Solutions > > - World-Class Service > > ======================== > > > > > > /* > > PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net > > Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug > > Don't fear the penguin. > > */ > > > > > /* > PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net > Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug > Don't fear the penguin. > */ > /* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
