General Category > Plop Boot Manager
PLoP with ext.3?
Javelin Dan:
Greetings all! I’ll apologize up front as this question or one like it has probably been addressed before, but I just found you folks and it’s my first visit here. I have an old Dell Inspiron 8000 laptop with a broken CD/DVD drive that has no native option to boot via USB. I have been able to load various versions of Puppy Linux on it using PLoP and a live USB that was created with a live CD of Puppy on another computer, but only by first formatting it with a Linux ext. 3 partition. For whatever it’s worth, I also install Grub “Legacy” to the MBR. As an inept newbie, this is easy for me as these options are all available in the applications menu of Puppy and easy to select through point-and-click. Any attempt I’ve made to boot a FAT 16 or 32 formatted iso has been unsuccessful – as in nothing happens when I click on the “USB” selection in PLoP. It doesn’t freeze or behave badly, it just does nothing. I have been trying to come up with a way to create a live USB of Lubuntu with an ext. 3 format and cannot find a USB creator that will work with anything other than a FAT partition (other than Puppy). Isn’t there a way to make this thing boot with a FAT partition? Any and all help will be appreciated. I should point out that I’m not at all adept with the command line and am attempting to accomplish all this graphically through point-and-click. Thanks.
P.S. – If using a Fat formatted partition, should I instead install Grub-4-DOS?
Elmar:
hi,
somehow your posting is confusing, please write it a bit clearer
best regards
elmar
jan4:
Hi Javelin Dan,
I don't think it has anything to do with the file system.
You CAN'T boot an ISO directly from an usb drive , you must write it to cd or dvd or at least Emulate an CD/DVD drive.
Grub installed by puppy can't do that as far as i know, grub4 dos can ( i do not know how wel it works with Lubuntu.
I would try to use puppy's grub to Frugal boot Lubuntu.
To do so startup Puppy and make a folder on the usb stick /Lubuntu (/boot is already there)
Double click on the lubuntu iso file and copy all files to the /Lubuntu directory
Than look in the isolinux.cfg how Lubuntu used to start and open in the /boot directory the menu.cfg and make a menu for Lubuntu.
Restart and try it.
Javelin Dan:
I was going to let this post die as I felt overwhelmed and out of my league as I have no technical ability to dissect and rearrange files, but then I thought maybe there’s a small nugget to be mined by me and other raw newbies so here goes…
What I’ve been able to do with puppy is this: I start with a 4GB flashdrive. With the version of Puppy of my choice booted up, I insert the USB and wait for it to show up on my desktop as “sdb1”. I open Gparted and erase any data that might be there and then make a new ext.3 partition and flag it to boot (for my application, previous attempts to use FAT 16 or FAT 32 partitions always ended in a failure to boot). I then start the universal installer and choose to install Puppy to sdb1. There are several choices to be clicked along the way, but I just click on the default choices. After the install is complete, I open Grub Legacy, click on all the default choices EXCEPT the final one which I choose to install to the Master Boot Record (bottom choice). When this is done, I have a bootable version of Puppy Linux that I can boot on this old laptop via PLoP after toggling to the “USB” selection.This version is an exact copy of the “Live CD” with all the same options to install the OS to wherever I choose. I’ve tried many slight variations of this process, and they have all met with the same failure to boot. Am I actually doing something wrong? Is there no way to simulate this process using another flavor of Linux without the previously mentioned “brain surgery”? I’d like to learn what my limited expertise will allow, but it looks like it would be easier for me just to replace the CD/DVD drive and run the live CD. Anyone care to weigh in? Thanks.
Javelin Dan:
jan4 - By the way, all the live USB's I've made so far using UNetbootin and Live USB creator that were formatted with Fat 16 or 32 WOULD boot and open a live session of Lubuntu on a newer computer that has the option to boot from USB. They just won't boot via PLoP on the old Dell which is really the point of this post.
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