Booting USB in Old BIOS

magicdanw · **pcGuru()** Calc Guru Joined: 14 Feb 2007 Posts: 1110

I'm trying to install Linux on a relatively old laptop. It has a working floppy drive, hard drive, and USB ports, but the CD drive seems broken. I can put the Linux installer on a flash drive, but I can't boot off of it, since the BIOS only supports booting from floppy, hard drive, and CD. Is there any way I can make a bootable floppy disk that will redirect booting to the flash drive, essentially chaining the boot process?

alexrudd · Posted: 10 Dec 2007 10:09:50 pm Post subject:

The only time I've heard of this was with a Small Linux. Here is the page on the USB bootfloppy. If you want a bigger distro, there are probably ways to do it too, but you'll have to look for them. Try using Google with "USB boot floppy."

magicdanw · **pcGuru()** Calc Guru Joined: 14 Feb 2007 Posts: 1110

I'm not sure what's included in DSL, but I need a distro that has a web browser with Flash support, and supports both a Linksys WiFi PCMCIA card and an RCA NTSC output on the graphics card. Basically, I have a lot of media on one computer, and I'd like to view it on my TV, but this laptop is the only computer I have with an RCA output. So, I'm streaming it over the network with TVersity.

elfprince13 · Posted: 11 Dec 2007 08:01:45 am Post subject:

theoretically you should be able to do it with any distro that can fit on your USB drive. look into distros that support installing the base system, and then downloading all the goodies from the internet so they don't have to be included on your USB drive. perhaps the alternate installer for Ubuntu, stripped of any anything but ubuntu-base, plug yourself into a network, boot into a recovery console and apt-get install [ubuntu-desktop/kubuntu-desktop/xubuntu-desktop/etc]

JoeImp · Posted: 11 Dec 2007 10:00:31 am Post subject:

Stick a new cd drive in there?

magicdanw · **pcGuru()** Calc Guru Joined: 14 Feb 2007 Posts: 1110

elfprince13: I have a 2gb flash drive that I've already copied Ubuntu onto, so space isn't an issue. I'll just have to try out that floppy boot method alexrudd linked to. Hopefully it'll work with non-DSL distros.

alexrudd · Posted: 11 Dec 2007 06:24:02 pm Post subject:

Since you're not using DSL, I found this tutorial which is a little more generic in case that one is only for DSL.

You might also want to look at booting from a network. (netboot)

JoostinOnline · Active Member Joined: 22 Aug 2007 Posts: 559

Have you considered QEMU? If you can't boot correctly, it is always an option.

magicdanw · **pcGuru()** Calc Guru Joined: 14 Feb 2007 Posts: 1110

I'm not sure I understand how a virtual machine will help. Please explain.

JoostinOnline · Active Member Joined: 22 Aug 2007 Posts: 559

It does not help right now. I only posted that in the event that you are unable to boot using the methods already given, or if you decide that it is not worth the trouble.

NETWizz · Posted: 11 Dec 2007 11:05:34 pm Post subject:

Maybe your machine supports a PXE network boot. You can use that to get something like pxelinux to boot a linux image, then establish a network connection, and install from a network share or from an image.

That would probably be the easiest.

-OR-

Upgrade your BIOS to support booting to USB if Applicable

-NETWizz

tr1p1ea · Elite Joined: 03 Aug 2003 Posts: 870

grub can boot from some USB drives iirc, you should check it out.

Have you considered taking the hard-drive out and putting it in another laptop/using a 2.5hdd->usb enclosure to install your os?

Newbie · Bandwidth Hog Joined: 23 Jan 2004 Posts: 2247

If your laptop doesn't support booting from the USB chances are (in more cases than not) the bios can't be upgraded to do so unless you get a new mobo which is just about pointless. Bios upgrades usually correct hardware problems that were already wrong and don't usually add features.

Netwizz, how would the network work if say for instance you're in your car on the road somewhere or in a hotel? I think he may want to use this is more than just one place (considering it is a laptop). I know he is very limited on options though.

As for the USB enclosure, if he had a laptop that would support USB booting then I think he might have tried that instead of bothering with this laptop although I may be wrong.

Grub can be put on USB drives to boot, but if the computer can't recognize the drive on boot, how will it know to use it just because Grub is on it? It may or may not work. I'm leaning toward no.

Here appears to be a nice article on how to put grub on USB:
http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/articles/grub_intro/

alexrudd · Posted: 12 Dec 2007 05:33:50 pm Post subject:

Newbie · Bandwidth Hog Joined: 23 Jan 2004 Posts: 2247

What I was trying to get at is how are you going to boot into an OS from a network, if you away from your network and not connected to it?

JoeImp · Posted: 12 Dec 2007 08:00:40 pm Post subject:

You netboot an install, install OS on hard drive from within what you netbooted. Boot from hard drive in the future.

Newbie · Bandwidth Hog Joined: 23 Jan 2004 Posts: 2247

Oh I see, his CD drive doesn't work and thats why he is trying to avoid installing with a CD by using a net install. Didn't really read his first post thoroughly rather skimmed over it. I see now, it all makes sense. Yeah the net install should work fine. I thought he was trying to use something like a small linux on the USB drive all the time.

NETWizz · Posted: 13 Dec 2007 09:43:28 pm Post subject:

You should read up on PXE. It is awsome. If he supports that, he will be good to go.

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