Porteus USB-ZIP Live Installation

[Emanin]

Hi,

I have never used a live USB and my system, unfortunately since it is old, only supports USB-ZIP (and USB-FDD but let's forgo of that option for now) in its BIOS. Sorry, I'm in a precarious situation and can't afford another system even though I know the one currently using is very old, but still managable (P4 1.6GHz, 1 GB RAM from 2001). So, I have two questions:

First, I had come across an article/HOWTO about a tool which would make Porteus bootable via USB-ZIP, but I lost it. Does anyone know the name of the tool that would make the USB-ZIP bootable?

Second, if that is possible, that is I can get the USB-ZIP live to work, what USB brand/model works better with Porteus or USB live in general (16 GB preferably)? Apparently, some brands/models don't work properly, and I'm just trying to avoid the headache down the road.


Sincerely,

[brokenman]

The way i see it you have two options. Make a porteus liveCD and choose the PLoP bootmanager from the menu to then boot from your USB ... but this seems like alot of running around to boot a system.

You could just format your USB device as USB-ZIP/USB-FDD which is essentially just a partition with no table. I think there are wintools out there to format to these types.

http://www.partitionguru.com/step/boot-from-usb.php

I remember using a HP USBtool which from memory was very versatile too.

If you prefer the linux option:
http://www.geocities.jp/tedi_world/format_usbfdd_e.html

[Ahau]

My desktop computer has a BIOS that doesn't appear to support booting from a usb flash drive, either. I have the USB-ZIP and USB-FDD options, but those didn't seem to work reliably for me... What I finally figured out was that I had a separate menu item that configured the boot order for hard disks, and the BIOS showed my flash drive as a hard disk in that menu. I moved the flash drive to the top of the list, seletected 'boot from hard drive' as first priority, and it boots up my flashdrive properly

One annoyance is that it doesn't seem to remember this setting if I boot the computer up without the flashdrive plugged in...so I have to go in and change the BIOS setting every time I want to boot that computer off my flash drive.

Maybe you have a similar BIOS? This was an AMD-64 MSI motherboard, about 5 years old...

[Emanin]

The way i see it you have two options. Make a porteus liveCD and choose the PLoP bootmanager from the menu to then boot from your USB ... but this seems like alot of running around to boot a system.

If I understood this method correctly, I have to burn Porteus on the Live CD and USB, and every time plan to use the USB, load Plop boot manager off the CD, then select USB from the menu and hopefully it would do the job. I haven't tried this method yet.

You could just format your USB device as USB-ZIP/USB-FDD which is essentially just a partition with no table. I think there are wintools out there to format to these types.
http://www.partitionguru.com/step/boot-from-usb.php

I did create a USB-ZIP with Partition Guru, then copied /boot and /porteus onto the USB, ran the necessary installation file from /boot, rebooted... but it fell through and my system booted from the hard drive.

Let me just say that I'm suspecting the main culprit to be the motherboard. I have an Asus P4S333 motherboard with Award BIOS (revision 1005) that, set as the first boot device, which I can select to boot floppy, zip, USB FDD, USB ZIP, etc.. I updated my BIOS to 1008.005, the latest revision offered on their website, and now instead of "USB ZIP", it shows "USB ZIP/Flash". Nonetheless, with the USB created as described in previous paragraph (e.g. USB ZIP), the USB doesn't even get selected as a boot device and the order falls through the hard drive.

What I noticed is that when I plug in my USB card to the motherboard's USB (1.1) ports, I won't be able to read it at all. But as soon as I plug it into the PCI USB card ports (2.0), it shows up on Windows Explorer! Even when I format the memory stick with FAT32 and plug it in motherboard's USB ports, it won't be able to read it. Strangely, it can read another USB formatted in FAT32 when it's plugged into the motherboard's USB ports.

I'm going to try another memory stick see if it follows suit.

[brokenman]

I'm going to try another memory stick see if it follows suit

Yep that would be my next suggestion too.

[Emanin]

An unlikely flash driver actually booted from the motherboard's USB port. Wow! It did indeed work, but since it's a USB 1.1, it took almost 12 minutes to boot into the Porteus. Is this typical?

At least now I know I can manage to have it work, but frankly I see little functionality as it it is excruciatingly slow (not Porteus' fault in anyway). I wish there was a way to boot from the PCI-USB. Oh, well, back to installing Slackware 13.37 on an actual hard drive.

Posted after 1 minute 40 seconds:

My desktop computer has a BIOS that doesn't appear to support booting from a usb flash drive, either. I have the USB-ZIP and USB-FDD options, but those didn't seem to work reliably for me... What I finally figured out was that I had a separate menu item that configured the boot order for hard disks, and the BIOS showed my flash drive as a hard disk in that menu. I moved the flash drive to the top of the list, seletected 'boot from hard drive' as first priority, and it boots up my flashdrive properly

One annoyance is that it doesn't seem to remember this setting if I boot the computer up without the flashdrive plugged in...so I have to go in and change the BIOS setting every time I want to boot that computer off my flash drive.

Maybe you have a similar BIOS? This was an AMD-64 MSI motherboard, about 5 years old...

Unfortunately, my BIOS (AWARD) does not have support for such option, but as I mentioned in my previous posts, after upgrading the BIOS to the latest revision, now the USB-ZIP option actually boots.

[fanthom]

@Emanin
what about installing porteus (frugal method) on the HD and booting from it? would be much faster than CD/USB 1.1 i guess...

[brokenman]

12 minutes to boot? Not even windows takes that long!!

I would guess this is the fault of a read speed of the said USB device and not a limitation of USB1.1 which has a minimum data transfer rate of 1.5 Mbit/s

Also curious as to why you don't use from hard drive. What do you currently have installed? Porteus should work alongside any other operating system without disturbing anything. Although it would be nice to know why it won't boot from your PCI port.

[sud0]

12 minutes
Here porteus boots in 15 seconds(USB)!!!
I'm with brokenman, use it from hd, can resolve ur problems.