Hi all out there. I would like to install Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd without installing grub on my main hard drive. my computer is a medion 96640 with a 500hdd internal and I using a 320G usb hdd. is tere any way I can install 9.10 onto the usb drive and then booting from when i tell the bios to boot from the usb hdd. I hope i explained good enough what i wish to do.
-
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
Hi there,well there are loads of options to do this but the simplest one is unetbootin ( http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/ ) available for both windows and linux
.
What it does is make a bootable USB with a give ISO image.
Theres also the kubuntu usb image installer,it gives the added advantage of saving your work.
Cheers!! -
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
Yes, you need two USB drives. One where you install the installer (following shadeslayer 's suggestion), and boot from there, just to launch it. Then, once the live USB is loaded, you'll choose to install, make sure the second USB drive is inserted and install to it. Grub will be written to the MBR of the second USB key unless you do an advanced install.
Once this is done, all you need is to know the key combination that allows you, at boot time, to choose the boot drive. This depends on the laptop/BIOS.
That's all. If you have troubles we'll try to help. Try to choose a fast USB for the actual installation, most usb drives are excruciatingly slow, particularly at writing. They can make you feel kubuntu is slow, but it's just the drive. There are some tricks like using tmpfs for some folders, but this only helps a bit.
Comment
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
I'm always very careful with usb and installed drive installs. The usb&internal drives scenario is very similar to an IDE&SATA drive one.
The main problems to be aware of during the install is how kubuntu sets up drive lettering, and how grub is selected to be installed to which drive.
To avoid any potential problems with the MBR of different drives, I install on single drive systems only. That means I remove all of the storage media except for the install target and the boot device - which I normally use a CD for, though a liveUSB drive should work too.
There are two required steps to make a drive bootable: it must be set as the boot device in bios and also be labeled as a bootable partition using some sort of partition manager. The installer in kubuntu does offer the manual partitioning option, and an included partition manager, which allows for setting the bootable flag, but there are other [better?] partition managers to make a partition bootable. Gparted is a good partition manager as well.
With only the one drive as the install target there is no potential for harm to other drives or MBRs during the install.
Running the updates after installation however, could be another problem.
Here is the breakdown of the device lettering issue for me:
Internal drives are given priority lettering, starting with SATA drives, then PATA [or IDE], and then external drives with USB. These are assigned when the kernel boots, and not when grub boots from the USB drive, or from bios.
For example, right now I have a laptop which boots from an external USB drive, assigned as sdb, and the internal drive is assigned as sda.
A more detailed example would be my desktop, which has 2 SATA drives, and an IDE drive, but boots from a USB drive. SATA1 is assigned sda, SATA2 is sdb, the IDE drive becomes sdc, and finally the usb drive is assigned sdd. The USB drive is still the root system, but is not sda. Any device configurations stored as drive letters [such as grub] that want to write to sda would try to write to the SATA1 drive.
If grub is ever updated, it may try to write the update to sda's MBR - based on the settings grub chose while installing in the single drive configuration. For me, this is not good, so I manually update to grub when needed. This is the only major drawback to my system that I have found so far. A much smaller inconvenience is that I have to select the boot device in bios, and not with the grub menu - although it turns out the laptop is a bit intelligent, in that if it doesn't detect the USB drive, it will boot from the internal drive, and if the USB is returned, it boots from the USB drive again.
So, in short, my method is:
1) remove the internal drive(s).
2) connect the external USB drive.
3) install from bootable media - liveCD or liveUSB, etc, - making sure the boot partition of the install target has the bootable flag set. Grub should be written to the usb drive MBR.
4) reconnect the internal drive(s), and set bios to boot from the usb drive.
Drawbacks to this method:
1) don't update grub [or update carefully] with multiple drives installed
2) change the bios settings as needed to change the booting OS
3) the internal drive(s) will not be recognized during install, and won't automatically mount during boot. The /etc/fstab file will have to be manually edited to make them automount, or the drive(s) will have to be manually mounted after a boot.
Comment
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
Many thanks everbody for all information, it seems a bit dodgy to me so I think I wait untill somebody explains each step of the way. I am sure I can find somebody local who may be will able to help.Comment
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
You should start by learning how to get a list of boot devices at boot time, for your laptop. One step at a time, once you are don pls feel free to ask.Comment
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
Hi Imilano. Thanks for the info. I have just been to the Boot screen of the Bios and I get the following information.
1. IDE HDD: FUJITSU MJA2500BH GS-(S1)
2. USB KEY:
3. USB HDD:
4. IDE CD: HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-T40N-(
5. USB CD ROM:
6. USB FDC:
7. PCI BEV: Realtek Boot Agent
From earlier info am I right in assuming that because the make and type of HDD is not listed by the side of either USB KEY or USB HDD I cannot boot from the USB HDD. If I understand correctly, is there anyway I can get the BIOS to recognise the external drive attached the USB port. Many thanks for all help.
Comment
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
Hi Stuart,
Yes, I think the BIOS would not allow you to boot from the hard-drive. The only solution could be a BIOS upgrade, but upgrading the BIOS is a bit risky and there is no guarantee that this will fix it.
I was referring, though, to another thing. There is usually a magic key, some times just the Esc key, that shows you a list of devices at boot time, and it allows you to choose the device to boot from, just once. This is very handy, because you can set the bios to boot from the internal HDD, and whenever you want the external (or an usb key or whatever), you hold "Esc" (or whatever key your laptop uses) to get to that menu.
If you find this menu I am talking about, there is a small chance your external HDD will be recognized. This should be in the computer manual (I googled a bit for your laptop and couldn't ifnd it)
Please disregard part of my post above, you have a DVD reader, so you would just need to boot up from the live cd and install to the external HDD, but we need this first step sorted.
Hope this helps!
Leo
Comment
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
That looks like the "Boot Device Sequence" screen in BIOS. There may be another separate screen, perhaps even on a different page in BIOS, where it has a couple of settings for USB. Look further -- one of them might be "Enable USB Boot?" and you have to set it to "Y".Originally posted by stuart
Then in this "Boot Device Sequence" screen, if you want it to boot first from a USB device (stick or hard drive) you will have move that option to the top of the list.Comment
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
Ah, yes, that too, I forgot that some times there is an advanced setting to allow USB bootingComment
-
Re: installing Kubuntu 9.10 on a usb hdd
Hi there, I have looked all over for another screen re Booting from usb but there does not appear to be one. The label USB Key does reconise the usb key. so it looks as if I cannot do what I want to. Shall have to use vmware.Comment
Comment