• Registered: 2009-01-30
  • Posts: 39

Topic: Can I install it into an 8g usb flash drive?

Or is putting the live image on there better, since you can modify content and have the option to install?  Basically I want linux on a flash drive so whenever I want to do something with wget or whatever I can pop it in, boot to linux and have a go.  I'm tied to windows because all my classes force me to use windows, so I can't really virtualize since one of my classes has me remote into some XP install which then virtualizes other OSs..

  • Registered: 2008-11-24
  • Posts: 2,085

Re: Can I install it into an 8g usb flash drive?

Yes; 8gb should be plenty of room as long as you don't have a ton of personal documents in your /home.

I do it myself on an old laptop whose hard drive has failed. smile

  • luc
  • #! Die-hard
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  • From: Munich, Germany
  • Registered: 2010-03-21
  • Posts: 560

Re: Can I install it into an 8g usb flash drive?

I do not exactly see what you want to achieve but i know these options

dualboot
good if you work on only one computer and need a real windows (not only wine)

linux on flashdrive
good if you want to use your customized linux install on different computers (with modified settings like bashrc, conkyrc, openbox/autostart.sh etc.). this is rather the choice if you use the stick often.

live image
good for installing and occasional use on different computers.

hope this helps you decide
luc

  • pvsage
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  • From: Section Six
  • Registered: 2009-10-18
  • Posts: 5,999

Re: Can I install it into an 8g usb flash drive?

I've done the full install thing with #! 9.04 on a 4GiB flash drive.  It was a bit crowded, and it ran very slowly, but it worked.  Only way I could get it to work so it would boot on *any* PC with USB-boot capability was to remove the install PC's hard drive first; otherwise, it populated GRUB with anything that was on the internal HD.

Don't forget that a swap partition on a flash drive is a very bad idea and will slow things down terribly, so when you get to the partitions step...

I haven't tried this with Statler yet (thanks for the reminder!) but it should go swimmingly.

while ( ! ( succeed = try() ) );
  • Registered: 2010-02-03
  • Posts: 41

Re: Can I install it into an 8g usb flash drive?

Probably my first post in !# forums.


@nintennuendo

  Yes you can and it works like a charm. I've tested this on 9.04 32 & 64 bit on a 8G Transcend pen drive. Have a production version running now with 9.04 64 bit. Currently testing out (from a end user perspective) on a 16G Sandisk Cruze pen drive with Statler 64 bit OB version.

Here is a short checklist on how I did this.

9.04:

1. Start Live CD in VirtualBox.
2. Make sure the USB stick is recognized.
3. Start Install from OB Menu
4. Go through the usual Install wizard, only select USB HDD (sdb in my case).
5. Partition as needed (I selected 'use full disk' option with NO SWAP and EXT3 filesystem).
6. Finish install.
7. Reboot from USB.

Statler:

1. Start Live CD in VirtualBox.
2. Make sure the USB stick is recognized.
3. Select Text Install
4. Go through the Debian Install wizard.
5. Select USB for target of installation.
6. Finish install
7. Reboot from USB.


NOTES:

1. This method has only one issue when booting from different computers as far as i've tested.
     a. Graphics adapter driver: I did the first install on my Thinkpad T60p (large screen edition). When I tried booting the USB stick in my HP XW4600 workstation, Xorg kept crashing and hence was not able to boot in. Workaround was to install NVidia (HP workstation had that hardware) driver set from recovery console (only option). Reboot and now it works.
     b. Now the USB can be used to boot my Thinkpad since the graphics driver set is for a different hardware.
     c. This kind of defeats the purpose of using the install in different computers (unless they all carry the same graphics hardware OR are OK with generic stuff that linux has). But I'm OK with this since my other workstation too carries the NVIDIA hardware and that's about only set of computers i'll be using the USB on. Also, for my Thinkpad now, I have the Statler install running fine.
2. The Statler stuff is awesome even with A2 and upgrades from Debian. But then, I guess I'm just being superfluous smile everyone knows that already and YOU, Corenominal (aka Philip or whatever name you go by in the human world wink ), take a bow.

My Rig: Thinkpad T60p (soon to be refreshed to Thinkpad W510), 2G DDR2, 100G HDD, Running @#! Statler A2 (squeeze) dual booting with Win 7. I use @#! for all purposes (MS Office for office work running in wine and Evolution with Exchange plugin for email)
  • From: taipei
  • Registered: 2009-05-06
  • Posts: 17

Re: Can I install it into an 8g usb flash drive?

pvsage wrote:

Don't forget that a swap partition on a flash drive is a very bad idea and will slow things down terribly, so when you get to the partitions step...


i had no idea about this thx for the info!.
i've put 2 OS on this partitioned 8GB stick.
first time it was peppermint ICE. then i was using LMDE and thought statler
would also run pretty smooth.

so as of now i had partitioned the 8GB with;
2GB swap
6GB /
1GB /home
also using a 2GB mini-SD inside an adapter as well, Asus W6A.
guess i'm going to have to remove that swap partition..

go GParted!!

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  • pvsage
  • Internal Affairs
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  • From: Section Six
  • Registered: 2009-10-18
  • Posts: 5,999

Re: Can I install it into an 8g usb flash drive?

You might want to reconsider that swap partition - as I said, swap on a flash drive can really slow you down.  Unless you have less than half a GiB RAM, you really don't need swap with Statler.

while ( ! ( succeed = try() ) );
  • From: taipei
  • Registered: 2009-05-06
  • Posts: 17

Re: Can I install it into an 8g usb flash drive?

pvsage wrote:

You don't need swap with Statler.

thx again pvsage, reinstalling is my project for today..

CPU[-Single core Intel Pentium M (-UP-) clocked at 797.951 Mhz-]
Kernel[-2.6.32-5-686 i686-] Up[-8 min-]
Mem[-170.4/994.1MB-]
HDD[-8.0GB(35.7% used)-]
Procs[-123-]
Client[-Shell-]
inxi[-1.4.20-]

Last edited by rufong (2010-11-16 00:14:30)

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