Got Knoppix 5.0.1 successfully booting from USB key

**MrGreen** · 01-27-2007, 08:47 AM

Hi,

I mean you have to change read/write mode on mounted device [you know right click icon on desktop]

used

Code:

mkdiskimage -4 /dev/sdz 0 255 63

so as you say its just under 8gb [fat16]

Code:

 sdd4        Boot        Primary   FAT16                             7994.98

Was not my intension to put knoppix on it was more for backup for my laptop ... but as your how to states you need a 1gb or more

Knoppix dvd emmm it would take forever to copy over to key

Have ordered a 1gb drive so may put 5.1.1 [cd] on that

One thing that I could not get on there was persistent home it ran up to 96% then stopped maybe I could do it from cd & put it on usbdrive

Think lang=<foo> has to go on end of line but I'll check that not sure if its gb or uk lol anyway not a problem

As you say usb booting is hit and miss some machines it works other well nothing I know my old system never worked at all, been running usb knoppix on my laptop no problem ... not tried my desktop yet

Something others may like to try [if not already been said!] is stick a hard drive in an external enclosure small old drives are cheap and easy to pick up, enclosures are not that expensive. Always handy to have for backup

If you need any testing, output or just a beer let me know

MrG

**Krellan2** · 01-27-2007, 11:11 PM

Originally Posted by MrGreen

Hi,

I mean you have to change read/write mode on mounted device [you know right click icon on desktop]

Ah. Is that just after you finish installing Knoppix to your USB key, and then boot up into Knoppix, but before you create your persistent home dir? If so, then that's what the bind mount commands are doing, in the guide, under the "Make the USB key writeable" section.

I didn't know there was also a way to do it from the desktop

so as you say its just under 8gb [fat16]

Code:

 sdd4        Boot        Primary   FAT16                             7994.98

Wow, I'd be careful with that.

FAT16 maxes out at 2GB, normally.

Windows NT has a variant of FAT16 that uses 64K clusters, so FAT16 created under Windows NT maxes out at 4GB. This variant is unreadable on DOS and Windows 9X (95, 98, ME), though, so it is not recommended.

I don't know anything at all that would work with FAT16 at 8GB. Maybe Linux could do it, but it wouldn't be compatible with Windows at all. If you don't mind losing Windows compatibility, you'd be better off with a native Linux filesystem such as EXT3FS.

I'd try FAT32 instead. Add the -F option to your mkdiskimage command.

One thing that I could not get on there was persistent home it ran up to 96% then stopped maybe I could do it from cd & put it on usbdrive

That may be an indication of something going wrong with FAT16 being used on a disk that is way too large for it.

Something others may like to try [if not already been said!] is stick a hard drive in an external enclosure small old drives are cheap and easy to pick up, enclosures are not that expensive. Always handy to have for backup

If you need any testing output or just a beer let me know

MrG

Thanks! I could use a beer

I have a USB hard drive enclosure myself, 320GB. I'm just using it for data files now, but am thinking about throwing Knoppix on it

**MrGreen** · 01-28-2007, 08:42 AM

Its more when you transfer files to usb_drive you cannot copy to device unless you change read/write mode [right click icon on desktop]

Yeah I think now that you have explained it FAT16 on my drive is not a good idea but I was too eager to try it out [my excuse!] I do not use windows here so for me ext3 would be more than good enough

No problem I will try the -F option [fat32] now that I know it works

Wondering if copying iso image to [normal linux system] then copying over to usb_drive would be much quicker [mount -o loop knoppix.iso /mnt/<point>] ?

Come to think of it I added dma but its not that much quicker so maybe the file system is slowing it done [cannot be sure!]

Would explain persistent home problem [largest I got was a couple of hundred mbs]

I will retry with fat32 [cd] if that feels or runs better than maybe I will try dvd version thats crazy lol

Thanks again for your help

MrG

**KiwiDan** · 01-30-2007, 05:58 PM

Hi there,
I luv the idea of having a portable operating system.
Followed the instruction and have my 1Gb USB drive booting up.
My PC requires I physically remove and reinsert the card each time between boots for some reason but no problem.

I do have one question......
I can not seem to make the sda4 writable, I tried the instructions from the tutorial (mount -o remount,rw /cdrom : mount --bind /cdrom media/sda4)
and also tried the right click and change permissions.
It appears the drive needs to be unmounted and remounted......of course the OS will not unmount while its running from the USB key.

Any suggestions?? Did I miss something???

I would like to install programs ect and have them there next time I boot........

Thanks

**MrGreen** · 01-30-2007, 06:33 PM

Assume you ran commands as root ... ?

**KiwiDan** · 01-30-2007, 06:43 PM

Yes seems to be the case, I ran the Create a persistant disk image util but still seems to be using ram..........
everything is running well but I need to save changes ect

**MrGreen** · 01-30-2007, 08:01 PM

Setting up persistant home did take quite a long time but it worked... I will check sda4 myself [just to be sure it works!]

**KiwiDan** · 01-30-2007, 09:02 PM

ok went through the steps againthe mount -o remount,rw /cdrom ect andsetting up the persistant home. only (20M hope thats enough)
Everything appeared the same, when I boot now I get some options and I change the setting from Cancel to Ok and I now seem to have a constant home directory.
Maybe it loaded past this and I was not watching before???

Maybe a stupid question but what is the best option to select just the default?? any way to make this automatic??
Will try and save some favorites, install some apps and see what happens on a reboot............