How to boot ANY iso from usb?

[rmprep]

chakra-2015.03-euler-x86_64.iso works too (tested under VBox booting from E2B USB drive using DavidB's Virtual Machine USB Boot utility).

[rcrsn51]

the ISObooter method seems incompatible with distros I've tried.

I looked through the ISObooter thread and could not find a bug report from you about this issue.

However, I just successfully booted:

bodhi-3.0.0-32.iso
pclinuxos-mate-2014.12.iso
ubuntu-14.04.2-desktop-i386.iso
phinxdesktop-2012-64bit-beta1.iso

provided that I followed the instruction posted above.

[jafadmin]

I don't know exactly why I started doing it this way, but I boot ISOs with Grub4DOS. I create the entry for ISO's manually. Here's what the menu.lst entry looks like if I have the iso in a directory called ISOs on the thumbdrive:

Code: Select all

# Boot this ISO file  
title clonezilla-live-2.2.1-25-amd64
partnew (hd0,3) 0x00 (hd0,0)/ISOs/clonezilla-live-2.2.1-25-amd64.iso
map --heads=0 --sectors-per-track=0 (hd0,0)/ISOs/clonezilla-live-2.2.1-25-amd64.iso (0xff)
map --hook
root (0xff)
chainloader (0xff)

Maybe it's because I boot so many differert types of things that Grub4DOS is kind of one-size-fits-all for me

BTW, if I copy the iso file into the root of the drive and test with filefrag to make sure it's just one extent, I have better luck with the copy for some reason. Then I just move it to the ISOs directory.

[johnywhy]

on booting an isobooter drive, loaded with about 6 iso's, i got

Error 15, cannot find file

That was because i picked "straight into desktop" on all of them, as rcrsn51 pointed out. Picking 'splash screen' enabled about 3 of them to display... a splash screen.

after about 15 minutes staring at a phinx or PCLinuxOS splash screen, i decided i wasn't going to get anything else. Am i too impatient?

thx!

[johnywhy]

If Easy2Boot didn't boot then you did something wrong

PCLinuxOS booted, sort of (as far as the splash screen, at least) after i defragged them.

Had to defrag in windows. Still have not found a Fat32 file defragger that runs in linux So at this point, it's a laborious process of loading the iso into ramdrive in Hiren's Mini Windows XP, then defragging the ramdrive, then transferring back to the USB drive. Hey, i don't mind, just trying to do this without leaving linux.

not sure why rcrsn51 could boot them all with isobooter. Maybe his iso's are contiguous and mine are fragmented?

GhostBSD, PClinuxos, bohdi, chakra, MidnightBSD memstick images and phinxdesktop are all in the 'tested' list

nice! how did i miss that before? Were they just added? More likely i'm just blind.

for BSD memstick images, you need to make an extra .imgPTN file...
New BSD iso's are not supported - only memstick images.

yes, i read that, but didn't know how to fix. Thx for telling me about imgPTN. So i use that to turn iso's into imgPTN, correct?

problem, it seems imdiskinst.exe (part of MakePartImage system) is a Windows executable.

I'm trying to do this all in linux

i would like to use E2B or Boot2ISO, since both can support multiple iso's on the same drive. But i'll take anything!

thx

[bigpup]

From what you are saying about defrag and the fact you are doing so many installs to the USB drive.
You may have file system errors and left over data issues.

I would completely start over with that drive.
Use Gparted.
Delete the partition or partitions.
Start fresh with a new partition and format.
Do a file system check of the new partition just to make sure it formatted correctly.

Now start installing operating systems.

For partitioning I would suggest you use the Gparted live CD or USB that you can get from here.
You can download a free version to make your own Gparted live CD or USB.
It is up to date and specifically made to run Gparted.
Info:
http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php
Download:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/gparted ... ve-stable/

There is always the chance you have a USB drive going bad.

[rmprep]

E2B includes a linux script to format and make an E2B USB drive as well as defragfs in the \_ISO\docs\linux_utils folder. Instructions are linked to on the E2B website http://www.rmprepusb.com/tutorials/114
If PCLinuxos is not fully booting from the ISO on E2B, then check you are using a USB 2.0 port.
When booting linux, you can often see diagnostic messages after the splash screen shows by pressing ESC or F2.
I added a few more linux OS's to the 'tested' list after I tested them, but pclinuxos and GhostBSD were already there.
I am afraid MakePartImage is a Windows .cmd script - you will probably need a full Windows OS to run it and convert .isos to .imgPTN files.
Note that you can also UEFI-boot from a FAT32 .imgPTN file (if the source contains UEFI boot files).
HTH
Steve

[johnywhy]

If having problems booting from a pendrive, look at this:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 429#539429

thx, Galbi, but looks like Plop is for giving usb-boot capability to older machines that cannot boot off a usb drive. Neat! but that's not the problem here.

Use Gparted. Delete the partition or partitions. Start fresh with a new partition and format.

Fo sho, been doin that repeatedly, throughout this endeavor.

I would suggest you use the Gparted live CD

That has advantages over gparted in my hard-disk puppy?

Do a file system check of the new partition just to make sure it formatted correctly.

fsck output:

root# fsck -V /mnt/sdb1 -n
fsck from util-linux 2.21.2
[/sbin/fsck.ext2 (1) -- /mnt/sdb1] fsck.ext2 -n /mnt/sdb1
e2fsck 1.42.9 (4-Feb-2014)
fsck.ext2: Attempt to read block from filesystem resulted in short read while trying to open /mnt/sdb1
Could this be a zero-length partition?

Says the same thing for sdb4.

Surprising, because it's a fat32-formatted drive.

sdb4 shows up as a liveCD. Created by isobooter?

gparted says (see screenshot)

terminal says:

root# ls /mnt/sdb1
DesktopBSD-1.7-i386.iso
pclinuxos-mate-2014.12.iso
GhostBSD4.0-RELEASE-i386.iso
pclinuxos-xfce-cr-2014.12.iso
MidnightBSD-release.iso
phinxdesktop-2012-64bit-beta1.iso
pclinuxos64-mate-2014.12.iso

root# ls /mnt/sdb4
boot
isolinux
livecd.sqfs

[johnywhy]

E2B includes a linux script to format and make an E2B USB drive as well as defragfs in the \_ISO\docs\linux_utils folder. Instructions are linked to on the E2B website http://www.rmprepusb.com/tutorials/114

sweet! I did not include the defrag option when i did it before.

If PCLinuxos is not fully booting from the ISO on E2B, then check you are using a USB 2.0 port.

you're saying i should use USB 2.0, right? i'm in the habit of using the 3.0 drive, so could be a factor.

When booting linux, you can often see diagnostic messages after the splash screen shows by pressing ESC

yep, discovered that. But i'm not seeing any activity behind the splash screen, just a blinking underscore.

I am afraid MakePartImage is a Windows .cmd script - you will probably need a full Windows OS to run it

Then i guess i can't use E2B, since the newer distros are the one's i want to boot. No windows in this house. i guess i gotta use Unetbootin or isobooter, or one of the manual methods posted by rcrsn51.

[johnywhy]

on reformatting with gparted, i'm repeatedly getting. the following alert. Note, the drive is not mounted.

Libparted bug found. error informing the kernel about modifications... device busy... linux won't know about changes until you reboot... don't mount or use before rebooting"

when finished reformatting, gparted shows BANG File system unknown.

then i rebooted without the drive inserted, then reformatted and got no errors. Apparently booting with the drive inserted, even tho i'm booting off the HD, and even tho the drive is not mounted, gparted still thought the OS was talking to the drive.

[bigpup]

If you are getting any error messages when using Gparted something is wrong.
It could be something wrong with the Gparted version or something you are just doing wrong.

I suggest the below version of Gparted, because it is the latest version and it boots and runs the computer to do nothing but run Gparted.

For partitioning I would suggest you use the Gparted live CD or USB that you can get from here.
You can download a free version to make your own Gparted live CD or USB.
It is up to date and specifically made to run Gparted.
Info:
http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php
Download:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/gparted ... ve-stable/

To do anything to the drive with Gparted, the drive and or partition has to be unmounted.

Gparted can check the drive partitions by right clicking on a partition and choose check.

There is always the chance you have a USB drive going bad.

[johnywhy]

Issue is partially solved. ISOBooter requires copying the squash ,sfs liveCD file from the iso, to my hard drive.

Then, the boot process finds and mounts it.

Not a total solution, of course, since it requires putting a file on the hard drive-- the goal is booting a live USB without touching the hard drive.

This is apparently an issue only with my computer-- other people are booting from flash drives without this step.

There may be a BIOS setting that fixes it. Plz see ISOBooter thread:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 684#838684

[johnywhy]

there's yet another possible method, using Grub2.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2/ISOBoot

now i'll have to study whether grub2 can run on puppy. Doesn't mean puppy has to boot via grub2, only that i can run grub2 inside puppy, and install it to a usb drive.

welcome any suggestions/tip.

thx

[rcrsn51]

The ISObooter thread has instructions for using GRUB2.